Doctor Who showrunner admits ‘we don't know what's happening' as future remains uncertain
Doctor Who showrunner Russell T Davies has admitted that he's still uncertain about the future of the beloved sci-fi show following the conclusion of the latest season.
Ncuti Gatwa departed as the titular Doctor after season 15 came to an end last month. In a shock reveal, he was seemingly replaced by the returning Billie Piper, however, it is yet to be officially announced what character she will play.
The BBC has yet to confirm if Doctor Who has been renewed, with questions remaining over the show's co-production deal with Disney+, which streams the series in the US.
In a production diary for the latest issue of Doctor Who Magazine, Davies announced a pause to the page as he awaits news.
The 62-year-old wrote: 'We don't know what's happening yet, and while everyone works that out, I'll take a pause on this page… Hopefully, we'll have news soon,'
Deadline quotes a source from the show as saying: 'This letter is a production notes diary for when the show is in production, or on air, and as Russell has stated within the piece, it is a pause.'
The news comes as new ratings show that overall viewership was down for the latest season, which averaged around 3.2 million viewers across the eight episodes, which is half a million fewer than the previous season, as per Deadline.
Davies previously addressed the future of the show in an interview with Radio Times in April.
'There's no decision until after season two,' said Davies, a month before the latest series was due to come o an end.
'It's funny, because even people who work on the show think that means we're having secret meetings about it. People I work with every year say, 'What's really happening?' and I'm going, 'Nothing! No meetings, nothing.'
"That's when the decision is – and the decision won't even be made by the people we work with at Disney+, it'll be made by someone in a big office somewhere. So literally nothing is happening, no decision."
Gatwa was the Doctor for just two seasons, but in a behind-the-scenes clip released on YouTube, the actor revealed that a short tenure was always the plan.
According to the star, this was 'because it's a role that demands a lot of you, physically and emotionally and mentally'.
Speaking on the companion show Doctor Who: Unleashed, the Sex Education star added: 'You know it's gonna happen when you get cast. You're like, 'I'm gonna have to hand this baton over one time, it's all gonna come to an end soon.' So I feel like I've been in constant preparation for that.'
Gatwa, 32, called his exit from the show 'bittersweet', stating: 'I can imagine it's been for all Doctors. Just looking at the console before regenerating was like, 'My god, this console – it's been here for 60 years. And I was here for some of those years. And how magic.''
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Forbes
37 minutes ago
- Forbes
Beatie Wolfe Talks About Working With Brian Eno On Their Two Collaborative Albums
(L-R) Brian Eno and Beatie Wolfe Beatie Wolfe, the Anglo-American conceptual artist and musician, says she never really considered that the recordings she made with the legendary Brian Eno in his studio — born out of the spirit of creativity — would lead to their official commercial release. 'It's been this incredible, creative kind of volcano,' Wolfe says of working with the British music pioneer. 'And it's been so joyful and so much fun that I was really doing it for that reason. I was doing it because it felt so good to make the work. That was very much a shared feeling. It was Brian who really said, 'Hey, we should be releasing this stuff. This is so great.' At that point, I thought, 'Yeah, okay. Why not?' But it's been interesting because part of me has always felt it's our music. Sharing it with people is wonderful because you see [them] really connecting with it.' Earlier this month, the two experimental artists released a pair of minimalist and exquisitely beautiful-sounding collaborative albums: Luminal, which features vocals and lyrics, and Lateral, an instrumental ambient work. Wolfe says the music organically developed without much forethought or conscious effort. 'There were pieces that were becoming more identifiably songs,' she says. 'And then there were pieces that we called 'nongs' — non-songs. Then there were pieces that were sort of long nongs. And then there were these other ones in between that were kind of textural or sort of drone, more on the verge of soundtracks, odd kind of sound design stuff. It was a whole spectrum, and we weren't really favoring any one avenue. We were just allowing everything to be created as it was interesting to us.' The creative relationship between Eno and Wolfe began when they first met virtually in late 2021 to discuss each other's environmental work. Their shared connection about the environment and the power of art and music led Eno and Wolfe to deliver a talk at South by Southwest in 2022 — with Eno delivering his remarks virtually and Wolfe appearing onstage at the event. (L-R) Beatie Wolfe and Brian Eno. But it was in 2023 that the two finally met in person as they were having exhibitions of their works displayed at separate galleries in London. 'We went to one another's shows,' Wolfe says, 'and obviously so enjoying one another's conceptual artwork, realizing, 'Oh, wait, we have all of this in common as well.' It was following those two shows that I was at his studio. 'So we were having a really lovely Sunday with no plans to make anything. Then he said, 'Hey, let me show you something I've discovered that I've been enjoying using.' We went into the studio, and he got out his Playbox native instruments. Then we ended up making two pieces just very spontaneously. There were no real instruments. There was maybe the Omnichord, but there weren't really any guitars. There was just a single out-of-tune ukulele. So I was playing that along with this Playbox kind of bed. And I would say the music definitely only got better from there, but it was a very good start.' 'It was almost like I could feel, even from that first meeting, that first taste or the first dipping your toe into this expansive ocean of what we could make together because it was so easy and it was so fun and un-self-conscious…It felt like I was with my best friend from childhood and we were making up plays or pretending to be ninjas.' The instrumental album Lateral consists of eight tracks each titled 'Big Empty Country.' It was born from one of the duo's landscape pieces that conjured up a land that they wanted to be in. 'We'd both surprisingly listen to the original piece, which was only eight minutes long, on the same day, with me in L.A. and Brian in the U.K.,' Wolfe recalls. 'We ended up looping it eight times because we just wanted to stay in that world. Then Brian sent me an email saying, 'Hey, I'm just completely transfixed by 'Big Empty Country.' I've been listening to it on this train going through the English countryside. I think it should be around an hour long.' And I said, 'Brian, this is so weird because I did exactly the same thing walking in Griffith Park in L.A. for a walk and I just kept looping this original eight-minute version.' So things like that would happen very naturally, then the kind of final version of the record started forming.' Featuring vocals and lyrics, Luminal worked along similar lines as Lateral in evoking a desire to be in a particular place. Wolfe says: 'With Luminal, it was just choosing [material] that had that nice variety of these strange moods, these dreamy moods, with some of them being sweeter than others. Similarly, there was a mixture of feelings. Both of us love these complicated feelings. Things that are sweet and sour, edgy and beautiful, and painful and passionate.' Cases in point of how Lumimal conveys different moods are the whimsical and poppy 'Sunny' and the dissonant and haunting 'Never It Was Now.' ''Never Was It Now' — that was a great example of something that began with this sound atmosphere where Brian had found an amazing sound for the guitar. Everything that 'Never Was It Now' is was an improvisation, really, in terms of the music. And then it was, 'Okay, where are we?' We're in this almost like a post-apocalyptic world or L.A. after the fires. There are the helicopters and everything is dark and ominous and you're at the edge of humanity or something.' 'I lost my father a year ago,' she adds, 'and there are references within both of those songs to him, even though they're so different, because 'Suddenly' was written sort of right before he died. But then there are some lines that reference what was going on. And so even though ['Suddenly'] is this sweet, beautiful kind of very whimsical pop song, I still think it contains something of even a subtle little edge within it. Obviously, 'Never Was It Now,' you go fully into that dark space." Not just in the music, but the chemistry between Wolfe and Eno is quite evident in their blended vocals, especially on the dream pop track 'Play On' from Luminal. 'Particularly in music, if you're often in a band situation, everyone wants themselves to be the biggest part,' says Wolfe. 'With Brian and me, it's the opposite. It was often me saying [to Brian], 'Please sing this with me because I love your voice,' and 'Let's have more of your voice in here.' And he's like, 'Oh, my God. I don't want to ruin it by adding me to it because this is so beautiful.' It's so nice because it's the opposite of so many situations where you're sort of elbowing one another out of the way.' Wolfe admits that she didn't grow up as an Eno fan; as a teenager, she loved the music of David Bowie, the Rolling Stones and Leonard Cohen. 'I think I'd always just liked people's work as opposed to getting into who they were," she explains. "I somehow really specifically didn't listen to any of his music. I don't know why. I was listening to a lot of American music, actually, and I was at times living in the States.' She adds: 'What would happen is when I would do these other projects that were the core of my work — with rebooting experiments and technology for Bell Labs or doing these space broadcasts or climate visualizations, all these kind of weird and wonderful thing — I would often get people saying, 'Oh, you and Brian must know each other' or 'You two must have worked together. There's such an interesting alignment between what you guys are doing.'' (L-R) Beatie Wolfe and Brian Eno Luminal and Lateral don't appear to be one-offs from the duo but rather teasers of what's to come; Wolfe says she and Eno have recorded nearly 400 pieces of music together. It's clear from the way Wolfe talks about working with Eno that she found a kindred musical spirit. 'I feel very, very blessed because it's just a joy, and it's so easy,' Wolfe says. 'It's like the gift that keeps giving. You think, 'Wow, we've spent how many hundreds of hours together making things. Wouldn't we get bored?' If something isn't interesting to us, we just can't keep doing it. I'm amazed by how compelling it is to make what we're making. The number of times we've played something back, and it's almost as if we made it in a dream because we're thinking, 'When did we make that and how did we make that? And is that just the two of us? How did that happen?''
Gizmodo
an hour ago
- Gizmodo
Christopher Eccleston's ‘Doctor Who' Regeneration Remains One of the Show's Best
Twenty years ago this week, the first season of the revived era of Doctor Who came to an end with 'The Parting of the Ways,' as did the tenure of Christopher Eccleston's Ninth Doctor. Ready to sacrifice it all to stop the Daleks, the Ninth Doctor's final moments remain a vital moment in Doctor Who history. It was the first time in decades since Doctor Who had asked its audience to trust in the magic of the series' defining trick to survival and re-invention: the magic of regeneration itself. Eccleston's exit may have been born from behind-the-scenes strife, but in giving the revived series a necessity to introduce this fundamental aspect of Doctor Who to its new audience so soon, it would go on to shape every regeneration after it for the next 20 years. Sure, they've gotten more explosive, but that bright, violent flash of conical streams of orange light has been with the series in some ways ever since the Ninth Doctor bid one last goodbye. What remains so interesting, and so poignant, about the Ninth Doctor's regeneration beyond the thematic template it set for the series is how quiet it is. Violence has become an indelible part of the modern Doctor Who regeneration: console rooms are smashed and battered; the Doctors themselves are wracked with sudden, debilitating agony; the release of energy is less about the rejuvenative aspect and more about this sundering, overwhelming force. Regenerations are big. They're dramatic. They're occasionally indulgently overwrought, a chance for the show's main star to have one last hurrah, one last emotional speech, or one final surprise. The Ninth Doctor's is anything but big. It has to balance a delicate line, both explaining to Rose and the audience alike exactly what is happening, but also metatextually acting as this final point on the story of who the Ninth Doctor is. For a man so haunted by the specter of the Last Great Time War, that his final moments are quiet, contemplative, and peaceful is a wonderful coda. An incarnation of the Doctor that was born in rage and shame for what he'd had to do in battle is given peace, a moment to reflect and acknowledge that his turn at this life was good, and of value, both to the Doctor and the people he let into his life with this face. There's something fascinating about revisiting the moment for this 20th anniversary—at a time where Eccleston's scene partner in Billie Piper has now stood where he once was, the face of the Doctor (or something that remains unseen), as Doctor Who heads into an uncertain future. Back then, the series felt full of possibilities, even laced with concern. Would regeneration work in 2005 has it had back in 1966? Would people accept a new face to their hero? Would the show be able to continue, and thrive? Those questions linger in the here and now with the Doctor's latest transformation, albeit with a different tone. The question about regeneration itself is moot at this point; we've seen plenty since, plenty grander, plenty weirder, than Eccleston's exit. But that nervous energy of what's next beyond that burst of dazzling light is still there now. Perhaps it's humbling that we can look back to those similar feelings from two decades ago, with the hindsight that yes, there was something beyond that light: 20 more years of something. Perhaps one day there will be more.
Forbes
an hour ago
- Forbes
Mariah Carey's Milestone New Top 10 Bestseller
Mariah Carey scores another top 10 in the U.K. as 'Type Dangerous' debuts on two sales charts, ... More helping the singer reach two milestones in the process. LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA - FEBRUARY 04: (FOR EDITORIAL USE ONLY) Mariah Carey speaks onstage during the 66th GRAMMY Awards at Arena on February 04, 2024 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by JC Olivera/WireImage) For more than half a decade, all of Mariah Carey's musical releases have been disconnected from a typical album campaign. She has focused more on maximizing her earnings during the holiday season, when her smash "All I Want for Christmas Is You" becomes the biggest song in the world. In recent years, she has also paired with a number of superstars for one-off collaborations, remixes, and similar projects. The celebrated singer-songwriter has finally officially kicked off a new era, as she begins promoting her as-yet-untitled sixteenth album with a new single, "Type Dangerous." The track becomes a quick bestseller in the United Kingdom this week, helping the chanteuse reach a milestone number of wins on every tally it touches. "Type Dangerous" debuts on two rankings in the U.K. this frame. The song opens at No. 8 on the Official Singles Downloads chart and No. 9 on the Official Singles Sales list, as fans rush to buy the latest from Carey upon its arrival. Throughout her career, Carey has scored only a few top 10 wins on both of these tallies — but that's largely because they were introduced long after many of her biggest smashes had their heyday. That type of performance is not uncommon for even the most prominent musical acts from decades past. "Type Dangerous" is her seventh top 10 on the list of the most downloaded tunes in the U.K. and just her fourth on the all-encompassing Official Singles Sales chart. While she hasn't promoted a new album in more than half a decade, it has only been a few years since Carey last collected a top 10 on both of these lists. In 2022, she joined rapper Latto on "Big Energy." Carey was credited on a remix that interpolated her own song "Fantasy," blending the two hits, which both sampled Tom Tom Club's "Genius of Love," and turned the new take into a top three success on both U.K.-based purchase-only rankings. As "Type Dangerous" arrives, Carey earns her milestone tenth win on the Official Singles Sales chart. The new arrival is also her twenty-fifth success on the Official Singles Downloads chart. Amazingly, even though it's June, "All I Want for Christmas Is You" manages to return to one tally in the U.K. as "Type Dangerous" debuts. That seasonal favorite reappears on the Official Physical Singles chart at No. 79, perhaps helped onto that list by the excitement around the singer's latest cut. It will almost surely make its way back later this year when December arrives.
