Doctor Who is floating through space right now. The British time-travel series may have started in 1963, but now its future is uncertain. In 2023, it seemed like the series was on the right path by bringing back Russell T Davies, the showrunner who resurrected the series back in 2005, and striking a new deal to premiere a rebranded “Season 1” on Disney+.
But despite Ncuti Gatwa’s fresh take on The Doctor, attitudes have shifted around this new era. In the Season 2 finale, Ncuti Gatwa regenerated into yet another legacy cameo: Billie Piper, who played Rose Tyler throughout the 9th and 10th Doctor’s runs. But a new quote from Gatwa seems to suggest this big reveal may not be as important as we first thought.
In a conversation with BBC Radio 4’s Today, Gatwa was unsurprisingly vague about the future of the series — at this point, nobody seems to know anything about what’s going on with the show. But it’s how vague he was that is raising concern. “I’ve finished playing Doctor Who, we all saw the gold sparkle — or did we, I don’t know?” he said. “I just don’t know who the next Doctor Who is, but it’s certainly not me.”
There’s a lot to pick apart in this frustratingly general statement. First, there’s the usage of the term “Doctor Who” to refer to the character, not just the show: the title character is always referred to as The Doctor. But the most glaring part of the quote is not what’s mentioned but what’s not mentioned. Gatwa doesn’t bring up Piper’s cameo at the end of the series, which at the very least suggests she won’t be the next Doctor.
But there could be another interpretation of this quote. If Gatwa doesn’t know the plan for the show going forward, it’s possible there wasn’t a plan for this big cameo at all. It does seem like Doctor Who is keeping its options open — when Piper is credited at the end of the finale, her character is not identified as “The Doctor.”
If Gatwa is not fully in the loop as to what the future of Doctor Who is, the show may be in a holding pattern until we know just how it will continue. Disney+ has yet to renew the show for the streamer, so it’s possible we’ll get our second shakeup in two years.
