Russell T. Davies Returns to Doctor Who as New Showrunner

[jaime]

No doubt now that I have committed this thought to print I will be proven wrong, but I get the impression that nobody writing for DW outside of Big Finish has any interest in revisiting Susan or how the Doctor came to be a grandparent.

(Next week: RTD announces season-long plot based around Susan and her parents)

I actually think bringing Carole Anne Ford back, and possibly regenerating her on screen, would be the simplest and best way to make the ‘Anniversary Specials’ actually be anniversary specials, and not just a mulligan on an ending for Donna RTD regrets, and a way for the show to get a reset back to ‘the popular doctor’.

 

[thribs]

The last time we saw Susan, the Doctor just abandoned her right after her son was killed by a Dalek. She may not be happy to see him.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

My guess is that, despite all the Tennant is the 14th Doctor stuff, Jodie regenerated into Ncuti and Tennant is the Toymaker playing games. As originally planned for the first change.

That's been my theory since the regeneration. It would explain why the clothes changed, too—the Toymaster is up to some tricks.

 

[jaime]

That's been my theory since the regeneration. It would explain why the clothes changed, too—the Toymaster is up to some tricks.

But that would mean Troughton was a CT regen too…
Well… that’s one way to retcon in Chef!Doctor to a better place.

 

[Mr Awe]

That's been my theory since the regeneration. It would explain why the clothes changed, too—the Toymaster is up to some tricks.

I feel like that would be huge cheat for the audience. We're all expecting Ten and Donna reunited, possibly (likely) undoing her memory loss. (Indeed, I suspect that'll be the rational for Ten reappearing--to fix that.) Having it be the Toymaker short changes those emotional payoffs. I don't see that happening . . . but we'll find out!

 

[kirk55555]

Its going to be hilarious when Tennant just is the 14th Doctor, and all the weird conspiracy theorists have a fit

The guy is just back for three specials, anyone that obsessed with hating him (or at least the idea of him coming back) can easily skip three episodes, I certainly skipped enough of Chibnall's run to know you really don't miss it when you know you'd just hate watching it.

I honestly wish that Tennant was coming back for a longer run, but I'm happy with three specials and then hopefully we'll get something good from the 15th Doctor. Its been almost half a decade since Capaldi regenerated, I'm ready to actually be excited for, and possibly even enjoy, new Doctor Who stuff again.

 

[Starkers]

The trailer is pretty amazing, and Ten and Donna back together again? Love Donna's "Kick its arse" moment.

 

[Emperor-Tiberius]

Honestly, I would've been fine with a little over 3 specials. Why not 5, to mirror the 2008/09 run?

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Its going to be hilarious when Tennant just is the 14th Doctor, and all the weird conspiracy theorists have a fit

The numbers are just marketing speak and not anything meaningful or intrinsic in-universe. A reveal that Tennant was Ncuti Gatwa all along doesn't negate the power of the marketing of "David Tennant is also the 14th Doctor!"

 

[jaime]

The numbers are just marketing speak and not anything meaningful or intrinsic in-universe. A reveal that Tennant was Ncuti Gatwa all along doesn't negate the power of the marketing of "David Tennant is also the 14th Doctor!"

To be fair, there’s been a not insignificant number of times where that number has come into play or been mentioned on screen. Certainly starting in season 20 at the very least. (The number of regenerations remaining, ‘goodness, so there are five of me!’ Etc. In the new series it’s endemic — ‘The Fall of the Eleventh’ and so forth. Even in the novels there’s things like ‘eighth man bound’ that play on where we are in the regeneration cycle.)

edit because I poked finish too early:
I have to admit, I don’t much like the idea of the same face being twice in the ‘doctors line up’ images, but I can see why they have done it. Would have been nice if it were Davison tbh — he always mooted coming back when he was older, and he could still do it I reckon.

 

[Starkers]

Honestly, I would've been fine with a little over 3 specials. Why not 5, to mirror the 2008/09 run?

Why not a whole series? Any number of factors. Tennant's and Tate's availability, budgets, and lest we forget Ncuti is the Doctor going forward, the longer Tennant sticks around the more likely people are to miss him when he goes. This is just about perking up interest in Dr Who again and celebrating the 60th before we move forward with our new Doctor.

 

[kirk55555]

The numbers are just marketing speak and not anything meaningful or intrinsic in-universe. A reveal that Tennant was Ncuti Gatwa all along doesn't negate the power of the marketing of "David Tennant is also the 14th Doctor!"

But it shits on the whole thing, story wise. It means so much more for it to basically be the "reincarnation" (for lack of a better word) of the 10th Doctor coming back into Donna Noble's life, while him not being a real incarnation is only a negative thing. Thats besides the fact that he's obviously Tennant's Doctor personality wise, and I doubt Ncuti will have that personality.

We know that The Doctor can revisit faces, thats been around since Day of the Doctor, and we know that subconscious things can make him regenerate into specific faces (12's face supposedly being taken from the guy in Fires of Pompeii for psychological reasons). People are too tied up in the clothing, when The Doctor's regeneration can be literally anything they want, including having his clothes change, too. Honestly, I think the explanation for the clothing thing is going to be a very boring out of universe "They didn't want David Tennant dressed like Jodie Whitaker".

 

[Rich Watson]

And remember it started life as a one-off special that was going to be completely divorced from whoever the new showrunner and Doctor were going to be.

I'd love to hear someday how that was intended to work; were we just going to be asked to suspend our disbelief and pretend it was 2008 again?

 

[jaime]

And remember it started life as a one-off special that was going to be completely divorced from whoever the new showrunner and Doctor were going to be.

I'd love to hear someday how that was intended to work; were we just going to be asked to suspend our disbelief and pretend it was 2008 again?

I have the feeling that was precisely it — at most it would have led into the odd special (like most beeb shows end up) with old doctors coming back to be squeezed into continuity Big Finish style. This would be the Ten/Donna, fix that old scar in some opinions, then a year or two down the road maybe they get Moffat back to finally do Eleven, River and Jim the Fish.
That’s the gut feeling I have. The traditional end for a Tv show… Christmas specials till the steams all gone. (Much like we saw with Doc Martin having its ‘end’ and then their Christmas special)

 

[Haggis and tatties]

But it shits on the whole thing, story wise. It means so much more for it to basically be the "reincarnation" (for lack of a better word) of the 10th Doctor coming back into Donna Noble's life, while him not being a real incarnation is only a negative thing. Thats besides the fact that he's obviously Tennant's Doctor personality wise, and I doubt Ncuti will have that personality.

We know that The Doctor can revisit faces, thats been around since Day of the Doctor, and we know that subconscious things can make him regenerate into specific faces (12's face supposedly being taken from the guy in Fires of Pompeii for psychological reasons). People are too tied up in the clothing, when The Doctor's regeneration can be literally anything they want, including having his clothes change, too. Honestly, I think the explanation for the clothing thing is going to be a very boring out of universe "They didn't want David Tennant dressed like Jodie Whitaker".

Yeah the whole clothing thing is going to turn out bring a nothing burger, with a off the cuff remarke explaining it away.( no pun intended) :-)

 

[Mr Awe]

The numbers are just marketing speak and not anything meaningful or intrinsic in-universe. A reveal that Tennant was Ncuti Gatwa all along doesn't negate the power of the marketing of "David Tennant is also the 14th Doctor!"

Agreed. RTD is all about character moments. And he clearly wants to reunite Tennant's Doctor with Donna Noble. The mechanics of the specific number doesn't really matter in that calculation.

We know Time Lord thoughts can affect regeneration and it'll probably be a sense of guilt over how he left Donna Noble that brings Tennant's Doctor back to fix it. In universe, yeah, it probably counts as a regeneration just like how Tennant already technically has two regenerations under his belt. Make it three!

But in terms of the story that RTD wants to tell, it's probably a non-factor. It's that Tennant is back and he'll probably fix Donna's memory issue.

And remember it started life as a one-off special that was going to be completely divorced from whoever the new showrunner and Doctor were going to be.

I'd love to hear someday how that was intended to work; were we just going to be asked to suspend our disbelief and pretend it was 2008 again?

I'm forgetting, but do we know for sure that RTD was only going to do one special and then was asked to be the showrunner? What I recall is that there was just the announcement that he's the new showrunner and then a dribbling of info about Tennant and the specials before the next new Doctor.

Chibnall was only informed about RTD being the new showrunner the night before the public announcement. They left the show assuming that there was going to be no one left to hand it off to before that point. So, I guess if RTD didn't comeback as showrunner but did do the special, we'd have the one off special and then a hiatus.

Kind of makes it easier to view it as a separate thing from the program when it effectively ends and then you get a single special before a prolonged hiatus.

 

[The Nth Doctor]

Finally got a chance to watch the trailer properly on my computer (been busy)...and I will say, Davies eccentricities aside, I do love how the story appears to be an epic battle between The Doctor and The Celestial Toymaker. That's a notion I've always loved and it's a shame never did that (even though it once tried to go there in that aborted Colin Baker season). Big Finish handled the character brilliantly during the Ace/Hex run so I'm excited to see the show itself tackle him.

And remember it started life as a one-off special that was going to be completely divorced from whoever the new showrunner and Doctor were going to be.

I'd love to hear someday how that was intended to work; were we just going to be asked to suspend our disbelief and pretend it was 2008 again?

But did it actually start that way or was that just fan speculation? Always seemed to me that was an assumption on fandom's part and that it was hardly ever anything conclusive.

Not that it really matters. All that matters is what we get in the end.

 

[Rich Watson]

As per Russell in DWM the discussion about coming back to do something started at Christmas 2020, at which point in time the showrunner job was not up for consideration.

 

[Rich Watson]

And now for your entertainment watch Stephen Moffat fail to simply say, "No I'm not coming back in any capacity."

https://twitter.com/BBCNewsnight/status/1706436978596536672

 

[The Nth Doctor]

As per Russell in DWM the discussion about coming back to do something started at Christmas 2020, at which point in time the showrunner job was not up for consideration.

Right, but that still comes along with a lot of speculation. We know that he was coming back for doing something and not necessarily as the showrunner, but that's not the same as he was coming back to a special that was "completely divorced" from whatever may come later.

And now for your entertainment watch Stephen Moffat fail to simply say, "No I'm not coming back in any capacity."

https://twitter.com/BBCNewsnight/status/1706436978596536672

When in doubt, Moffat lies!

That said, I do also detect the weariness in his voice and I don't blame him. It's clear he stayed longer on the show that he wanted (much like JNT) and stuck around as long as he did for the sake of keeping the show on (again, JNT). I seriously doubt he has recovered from that exhaustion yet so I definitely don't expect him to return at this time.