At long last, the BBC have confirmed what’s next for Doctor Who.
The good news is we’re getting a new Christmas special…
…the bad news is that it’s coming out Christmas 2026, not 2025.
So what do we know so far? Well, very little. Disney is out, so the budget will be smaller (though if rumours are to be believed, the money they contributed to the past two seasons mostly went towards rendering VFX in 4K, so the drop in production quality might not actually be that noticeable).
We also know RTD is returning as writer/showrunner for the special, but that’s it. We’re still none the wiser as to who’ll be playing the Doctor and companion, who’ll be guest starring, who’ll be directing, who’ll be composing the music, the runtime, and whether we’ll get a new instalment of Doctor Who: Unleashed.
The 19-month gap between The Reality War and the upcoming special is the longest in all of NuWho, which kinda sucks. However, on the flip side, it gives RTD plenty of time to cook up something extraordinary – and plenty of time for fans to theorise about what’s in store.
Indeed, there are already rumours floating around about what (and who) the special will involve. And given the state Doctor Who is currently in, there are certain things this episode needs to do in order to set itself up for the future, and tie up what has happened over the last few years.
Due to Ncuti Gatwa’s early departure, there are still a handful of RTD2 plot threads that remain unresolved.
If RTD sticks around these could be saved for future seasons, but if the 2026 special is his last episode, those answers might have to be brought forward.
A big one is the Master, who made an appearance (sort of) in The Giggle, imprisoned inside the Toymaker’s gold tooth.
When the Toymaker was defeated a mysterious manicured hand picked up his tooth from the UNIT helipad, echoing the hand that picked up the Master’s ring in Last of the Time Lords, suggesting that he might be resurrected again some time soon.
But since then we’ve had nothing. And two of the prevailing fan theories (that the hand belonged to Maestro or Mrs Flood) have been debunked – which probably means that yet again RTD is going to just pull a solution out of the aether without any forward planning.
Of all the mysteries in RTD2 it’s not one that necessarily demands an answer. It could easily be left for the next showrunner to deal with. But it’d certainly be nice to see the Master again in the special, given that they’ll have been away for four years. And it wouldn’t be the first time RTD’s done a Christmassy Master finale!
