Doctor Who fans are in for a treat this Sunday, 23rd July 2017, a
preview of the Christmas episode will be shown at the San Diego
Comic-Con.
Episode director Rachel Talalay has shed some more light on what fans can expect from the event, suggesting that the 'sneak-peak' will be comprised of a teaser trailer or fottage from the as yet unnamed special. And in more good news, Talalay suggested that the footage would be
released online after the panel – not always a guarantee at San Diego
Comic-con, as proven when the trailer from 2013 50th anniversary special The Day of the Doctor was withheld from non-attendees.
Finally. The BBC revealed the new companion to Peter Capaldi's Twelfth Doctor as Pearl Mackie. Her character is named Bill. WHO is Bill? We have a while to wait and see. Next year in fact. Unless this clip is from the Christmas episode this year?
What do we know about the new companion?
1. She's never encountere the Daleks before ....as you can see from the clip above.
2. The character is called Bill.
3. Pearl Mackie is an amazing young talent from Brixton, South
London and has most recently performed in the National Theatre's West
End production of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time.
4. Coincidentally, Pearl has appeared in another BBC programme featuring doctors – the medical drama series Doctors!
5. Pearl also performs as a singer, a passion for music shared with Peter Capaldi. Maybe we’ll see a Doctor and companion duet!
6. Not that she’ll need to use these with the TARDIS’ Translation
Circuit, but Pearl speaks French and Spanish – great skills for any
traveller.
7. We all know the Doctor likes a dance, so Pearl’s moves may come in
handy… She’s skilled in Ballet, Jazz, Period Dance and Tap!
8. Pearl honed
her craft at Bristol's Old Vic Theatre School, the same school Samantha
Bond trained at, aka Mrs Wormwood in Doctor Who spin-off The Sarah Jane
Adventures.
The new Doctor Who companion has been cast – and according to Peter
Capaldi, Jenna Coleman's replacement could be announced very soon...
"There will be a new companion, along any minute," said Capaldi,
"which I'm very excited about, 'cause obviously I know who that is and
we've been doing a bit of work together already and it's very exciting.
Because it's a very different sort of take on it."
Capaldi added that, unlike Coleman's Clara Oswald, the new arrival will know "very little about the Doctor".
"Clara had prior knowledge of the Doctor," Capaldi told Brazilian website Omelete.
"It was conceived as a human connected to your timeline, and so had
access to the cosmic nature of the Doctor. She understood a little about
how he was. And as she was already with [Eleventh Doctor] Matt [Smith],
she knew the Daleks and the TARDIS. Now we have someone who knows very
little about the Doctor."
When Steven Moffat announced his departure as Doctor Who showrunner earlier this year, there was only one question on everyone’s minds – would current Doctor Peter Capaldi stay on with new boss Chris Chibnall, or hand over the Tardis keys like former Time Lord David Tennant did when Russell T Davies left the series?
Now, RadioTimes.com can reveal that the BBC has asked Capaldi to stay on as the Doctor after Moffat’s departure – but the actor himself isn’t sure whether he’ll take up their offer.
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“I’ve been asked to stay on,” Capaldi told RadioTimes.com, “but it’s such a long time before I have to make that decision.
“Steven’s been absolutely wonderful, so I love working with him. Chris is fantastic, and I think he’s a hugely talented guy.
“I don’t know where the show’s gonna go then. I don’t know. I have to make up my mind, and I haven’t yet.”
He concluded: “As Steven will tell you, it’s very difficult to say goodbye.”
In summary, you shouldn’t be surprised to see a very familiar Time Lord at the Tardis controls for a few years yet to come.
Since RadioTimes.comrevealed that Steven Moffat will be stepping down as Doctor Who showrunner, fans have been clamouring to know what the Doctor himself makes of this regime change.
Speaking exclusively to RadioTimes.com at the Radio Times Covers
Party, Peter Capaldi said it would be "very exciting" to see what
Moffat's replacement, Broadchurch writer Chris Chibnall, does with the show.
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"I think Chris is a wonderful writer, so that’s the exciting thing
about Doctor Who — I don’t really know what he’s going to do with it.
It’s going to be different and he’ll take it in a direction that is his…
and that’ll be very exciting. That’s the lovely thing about Doctor Who, it keeps changing.
Steven's been fabulous but it will be very exciting to see what Chris
does."
And whichever new direction the series does go in, Capaldi says that playing the Time Lord will always keep him on his toes.
"It's always a challenge. I don't take it lightly, it's always hard
trying to figure out how to do it. But that's a delightful challenge."
BBC bosses expect Peter Capaldi to leave Doctor Who after the next series – when writer Steven Moffat also steps down.
The 57-year-old’s tenure as the 12th Doctor is likely to end in 2017. When
new chief Chris Chibnall, who created Broadchurch, begins a new era in
series 11, it is thought he will also get to choose his own Time Lord. A source on the BBC show said: “Bosses are already discussing a fresh start when Steven leaves."
“They’ve
been happy with what Peter has brought to the role but some think it
might make sense to give Chris his own choice of actor to play the
Doctor. They hope he will be able to find someone who can have the same impact
as Matt Smith did when Steven Moffat kicked off his run as executive
producer.”
Carole Ann Ford has revealed that Peter Capaldi is keen for her too reprise her role as original Doctor Who companion Susan Foreman.
The actress played the Doctor’s granddaughter from the show’s first
episode in November 1963 until 1964’s ‘The Dalek Invasion of Earth’. She
later returned in 1983’s ‘The Five Doctors’ and 1993 charity special ‘Dimensions in Time’.
Speaking to Doctor Who Magazine in the new issue, Ford recalled: “…they invited us to the studios in Cardiff [during the filming of ‘Last Christmas’]. It was great. It was lovely to meet Peter [Capaldi]. A lovely man.
“…I had seen some of the performances he’d done as Doctor Who and I
didn’t like the way they wrote him at the beginning. I thought, ‘What’s
going on here? Give him a chance!’ They portrayed him as someone who was
so prickly.
“…he started saying, ‘Oh, you should come back!’ I said, ‘Yeah, I’d
love to come back!’ He was running around the TARDIS saying, ‘She’s got to come back! She’s got to come back!’”
Asked if she’d be interested in returning, she confirmed: “Yeah, of course! Are you kidding?”
Peter Capaldi has said he would happily make more episodes of Doctor Who each year, if he was allowed.
Speaking in the new issue of DWM #494 : “I’m shocked at the speed at which it’s going. I’ve done 26 episodes already, and I don’t know how that happened".
“I’m amazed that people ask me all the time, when I am going? It
makes you feel very unwelcome! ‘Please, when are you leaving?’
Or…someone said this morning, ‘You’re only doing six episodes next year
because you’re too tired?’ I don’t know where they’ve made this stuff up
from. Six episodes?! That’s not what I’m contracted to do. And I would do 20 episodes if they let me. I could do Doctor Who all the year round, quite happily.”
Peter Capaldi recently visited a young Doctor Who fan in his hospital room dressed as The Doctor and remained in charcter the whole time.
14 year old Danny, who is a bit of a Whovian, missed the Doctor Who Festival in November; was taken by surprise when the Doctor turned up for one of his consultations.
Four new images for this year's, as of yet to be titled Christmas special starring Peter Capldi and Alex Kingston returning as River Song.
Here's the synopsis for the episode: “It’s Christmas Day in the future and the TARDIS is parked on a
snowy village street, covered in icicles, awaiting its next adventure.
Time traveler River Song meets her husband’s new incarnation, in the
form of Peter Capaldi, for the first time this Christmas."
Alex Kingston returns to Cardiff
to reclaim her role as Professor River Song for the highly anticipated
2015 Doctor Who Christmas special, part of BBC One’s essential seasonal
viewing.
It’s Christmas Day in the future and the TARDIS is parked on a snowy
village street, covered in icicles, awaiting its next adventure. Time
traveller River Song meets her husband’s new incarnation, in the form of
Peter Capaldi, for the first time this Christmas.
Day one of filming the eleventh Doctor Who Christmas special starts
this week and is written by Lead Writer and Executive Producer, Steven
Moffat, produced by Nikki Wilson and directed by Douglas Mackinnon
(Doctor Who, Sherlock).
River Song made her first Doctor Who appearance in 2008 in ‘Silence
in the Library’ and ‘Forest of the Dead’ and has appeared in 15 episodes
to date.
Award winning Alex Kingston comments on her reappearance, “To be
honest, I did not know whether River would ever return to the show, but
here she is, back with the Doctor for the Christmas special. Steven
Moffat is on glittering form, giving us an episode filled with humour
and surprise guest castings. I met Peter for the first time at Monday’s
read through, we had a laugh, and I am now excited and ready to start
filming with him and the Doctor Who team. Christmas in September? Why
not!”
Steven Moffat, Lead Writer and Executive Producer, adds, “Another
Christmas, another special for Doctor Who - and what could be more
special than the return of Alex Kingston as Professor River Song? The
last time the Doctor saw her she was a ghost. The first time he met her,
she died. So how can he be seeing her again? As ever, with the most
complicated relationship in the universe, it’s a matter of time...”
Steven explains when the meeting of River Song and the Twelfth Doctor takes place:
"It's immediatetly after The Angels Take Manhatten (2012). River’s just seen Matt Smith’s Doctor lose Amy and Rory, and obviously
before The Name of the Doctor [2013] because she’s dead in that.”
Speaking of ending things, Steven Moffat also revealed that this might have been his last ever Doctor Who episode: “We’ve just lost Clara, so I didn’t want to go straight into a new
companion. I’ll be honest, I brought River Song back in
because I thought there was a possibility I’d never write for Doctor Who again so that’d be my goodbye.”
Joining Peter Capaldi and Alex Kingston in this year's Christmas adventure arecomedians Matt Lucas and Greg Davies.
A short synopsis reads as:
It’s Christmas Day on a remote human colony and the Doctor is hiding
from Christmas Carols and Comedy Antlers. But when a crashed spaceship
calls upon the Doctor for help, he finds himself recruited into River
Song’s squad and hurled into a fast and frantic chase across the galaxy.
King Hydroflax (Greg Davies) is furious, and his giant Robot bodyguard
is out-of-control and coming for them all! Will Nardole (Matt Lucas)
survive? And when will River Song work out who the Doctor is?
“All will be revealed on a starliner full of galactic super-villains
and a destination the Doctor has been avoiding for a very long time.
The BBC Cymru Wales produced drama will return to BBC One on
Saturday, 19 September with a 12 episode series, followed by the
Christmas special on Friday 25 December.
Peter Capaldi interviewed by Nick Grimshaw on Radio 1's Breakfast Show. Wednesday, 4th November 2015
"I found it really sad to say goodbye to her. I don't want to go into what happens, because it's really clever what happes in it, but it's very sad. It's really sad."
“I
found it really sad to say goodbye to her … I don’t want to go into
what happens, because it’s very clever what happens in it, but it’s very
sad. It’s really sad.” - See more at:
http://www.combom.co.uk/#sthash.ii2BoxT0.dpuf
