Anna Daniels
By its nature, Doctor Who is a show filled with gaps and holes — the series was off the air for 16 years between the time it was canceled in 1989 and revived for a modern audience in 2005 by Russell T. Davies. Even when it’s on the air, our favorite time-traveling alien is having countless off-screen adventures that we’ll never be privy to.
The mystery of Doctor Who has allowed fans to fill those gaps with their own imaginations, or with the hundreds of audio book stories released by Big Finish. But imagination can only take us so far, especially when that’s the only thing we’re stuck with in quarantine. So former showrunner Russell T. Davies and current showrunner Chris Chibnall are stepping in to fill in those gaps with never-before-seen prequels to their respective runs on Doctor Who.
“Rose,” the inaugural episode of the modern Doctor Who revival that launched a whole new era for the sci-fi series, celebrated its 15th anniversary yesterday. In honor of the episode’s 15th anniversary, for which Davies lead a live-watch of “Rose” on Twitter, Davies wrote and published “Doctor Who and the Time War,” a short story covering the Time War and the Eighth Doctor’s (Paul McGann) regeneration into the Ninth Doctor (Christopher Eccleston), on the BBC website.
“This was never meant to exist,” Davies explained in an introduction of the short story. “Way back, maybe early 2013, Tom Spilsbury, the editor of Doctor Who Magazine, asked me if I wanted to contribute to DWM’s great 50th special. Maybe addressing that huge gap in Doctor Who lore, how did the Eighth Doctor regenerate into the Ninth?”
Davies was hesitant, as that would take the mystery out of the whole thing. But he ended up writing a short story, which would be rendered non-canonical by Steven Moffat‘s 50th anniversary special “The Day of the Doctor,” which introduced John Hurt as the War Doctor. So the story never ended up being published — until now. You can read it here, and giggle over the very appropriate first word that comes out of the Ninth Doctor’s mouth.
Davies’ story comes after Moffat wrote special introduction for Strax the Sontaran ahead of a live-tweet of “The Day of the Doctor” earlier this week, and after current showrunner Chibnall published his own prequel to the first episode of his run, “The Woman Who Fell to Earth,” on the BBC website. Chibnall’s story is equally brief, and mostly documents the chaotic thought process that Jodie Whittaker’s Doctor went through as she fell to Earth from her exploding TARDIS. You can read the story here.
While these aren’t new episodes, or even short mini-sodes of Doctor Who (by the way, I miss those, BBC), it will be enough to hold us over until the series returns this holiday season.
The post ‘Doctor Who’ Writers Russell T. Davies and Chris Chibnall Pen Prequels to Their Respective Runs appeared first on /Film.
Written by: Slash
