Doctor Who is bucking tradition in another big way this year. In addition to casting Jodie Whittaker as the first-ever female Doctor, the show will also skip Christmas for the first time since it returned in 2005 (yeah, we got this one wrong). Instead, the series will return after its eleventh season finale for a New Year’s Day special.
The change has been rumored for a while now, but was seemingly confirmed on Wednesday via Doctor Who Magazine. According to the previous showrunner Steven Moffat, the reason for excluding a Christmas special might be pretty simple: “I sort of think we might have mined, and possibly over mined, every single thing we could about Christmas in Doctor Who and the last time we more or less ignored it” Moffat said in the past. Current showrunner Chris Chibnall has yet to comment on the shake-up.
This won’t be the first time the beloved sci-fi series has played on New Year’s. The second part of David Tennant‘s sendoff episode, “The End of Time,” aired on New Year’s Day in 2010 to 12.27 million viewers.
BBC hasn’t officially confirmed the news, but the pieces seem to align on this one. What we do know for certain is that Jodie Whittaker will conclude her first completed season as the Thirteenth Doctor on December 9 in a Chibnall-directed episode titled “The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos.”
What do you think about the lack of a Doctor Who Christmas special this year? Does the news make you sad, or do you think a New Year’s special could be a fun new direction for the show? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
Images: BBC
