Outgoing Doctor Who showrunner Russell T Davies has opened up about the cliffhanger ending that still has fans reeling more than a year later.
Russell returned to the Who-niverse in the early 2020s, overseeing the show’s anniversary specials – in which David Tennant took over for a second stint at the helm of the Tardis – before welcoming Ncuti Gatwa as the latest incarnation of the Time Lord.
Back in June, the Tip Toe creator announced he was parting ways with Doctor Who, meaning his last episode was the divisive finale in which Ncuti’s Doctor regenerated into a mysterious figure played by Billie Piper.
Naturally, this has led to a lot of debate about whether Billie will be the franchise’s next Doctor, and exactly what this regeneration meant – none of which anyone involved seems to have any answer to.
In an extract from his new memoir The Queerest Of Folk: A Life In Television, published in The Guardian over the weekend, Russell explained exactly how this scene ended up coming to be, admitting it was a “surprise” to “all of us”.
“We knew Ncuti Gatwa was leaving, so I’d written the climax in which the Doctor, having saved the life of a baby in The Church on Ruby Road, Ncuti’s first episode, now departs by saving the life of a baby because the universe is at stake,” Russell recalled.
At this time, Russell suspected that Disney’s deal with Doctor Who was not going to be renewed, and had already set about “creating new work” including Channel 4’s Tip Toe and a theatrical reimagining of It’s A Sin.
He continued: “As the third series was in flux, the finale was intended to climax with an open-ended regeneration. So we shot that with Ncuti: he smiled and said his last line, and the screen melted into a golden glow … Except when we edited that together, it looked like the death of the show. We said, ‘Think of children watching that. It’s like a death. We can’t do that to them’.”
Because of months of what he described as behind-the-scenes “inaction” with regard to Doctor Who’s future, Russell said he felt “stuck in limbo” with “an ending that looked like too much of an ending”.
“So I summoned a Zoom with all our execs, and I said: ‘We can’t transmit this’,” he claimed. “We [needed] someone to step in. We [needed] someone to be there. Someone for [The Doctor] to physically regenerate into in front of our eyes. We decided the Doctor should regenerate into… Billie Piper!”
Russell claimed Billie was “delighted to do it” and “gave us the fastest yes we could have had”, with the finale having the desired effect of getting everyone talking.
“There was only one problem,” he pointed out, referring to the show’s uncertain future at that time, which included a one-off Christmas special that was eventually scrapped when the BBC revealed that Doctor Who was being put out to competitive tender earlier this year.
As for how to resolve the issue of the now-infamous cliffhanger, Russell wrote: “This new [competitive tender] plan sets the show free. The future can be planned by a brand-new team. Clean and bold and bright.
“Yes, that leaves us with a Billie puzzle, but c’mon, that’s easy. Doctor Who problems are simple to solve (remember, in 1996, it was proclaimed that the Doctor is half-human – that was fixed by everyone discreetly never mentioning it again). A new production team can either seize hold of that appearance happily, or – and this is more likely – they can explain the event away with exactly seven words. Painless. That’s not a problem, that’s a piece of piss.”
Russell told his Instagram followers earlier this year that his departure marked a “goodbye from me to Doctor Who but hello to a big new future for the show, as the BBC announces it’s putting the show out to tender”.
He clarified: “For the record: there was no script [for the Christmas special], I never wrote it, and no actor was ever approached to play the next Doctor.
“You may disagree; fine, sit in that chair and wait to be proved right. You’ll wait a lonnng time. Now I’m as excited as anyone to see what comes next! Will they keep the theme tune? Will they lose the blue box? Will they bring back the Drahvin?! It’s all up for grabs, which is so Doctor Who, exciting and unpredictable and new! Here comes the future, vworp vworp.”
