Produced to mark the 40th anniversary of the Doctor Who franchise, Shada was a remounting of the television story of the same name, which was originally planned to end Season 17 in 1980, but abandoned before completion due to industrial action at the BBC. When the original episode was completed in 2017 and released on Blu-Ray, the webcast, which was included in the boxset as a special feature, was re-titled The Return to Shada and referred to as a sequel.
While the original version featured Tom Baker's Fourth Doctor, the webcast was rewritten to feature Paul McGann's Eighth Doctor, with Lalla Ward and John Leeson returning to voice Romana II and K9 Mark II respectively, with their own characters modified to coincide with the continuity established in the Big Finish Productions audio drama range.