Fucking Major Doctor Who spoilers!

[The Romulan Republic]

Oh, I know their are other writers, of course. But most of them have written few episodes or are just not that well known, or so it seems to me.

Bob Baker sounds interesting, though.

As to Whitehouse, well, the episodes he's written are of decidedly mixed quality, but at least he has a fair amount of experience under his belt.

[jwl]

Bob Baker is one of those unlikely ones though, because he's just started on the K9 movie which presumably is unrelated to the BBC so there are probably legal issues in asking him.

[Eternal_Freedom]

As long as it isn't Helen Raynor, who wrote the gods-awful Daleks in Manhattan two-parter.

[The Romulan Republic]

Has she written anything else for Doctor Who? Why would she even be a serious contender?

And frankly, their are worse episodes. Hell, their are worse Moffat episodes.

Edit: I do think that if they go the female Doctor route (and frankly, I'd say their is at least a fifty-fifty chance of this happening when Capaldi leaves), they might prefer to have a female head writer to handle it. Not that I think a man would be incapable of writing a female Doctor well, or that a woman would necessarily be able to, but it might minimize the risk of someone screwing it up though sexism, intentional or otherwise.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Well she was in that list that someone posted showing how many writers wrote more episodes than Moffatt did before he took over.

[The Romulan Republic]

Well, the thing is, Moffat may not have written a lot of episodes, but he wrote acclaimed episodes. The Doctor Dances. Blink.

And actually, going off of IMDB, Raynor has written only four episodes of Doctor Who (Daleks in Manhattan, Evolution of the Daleks, the Sontaran Stratagem, and Poison Sky). Plus two for Torchwood (To the Last Man and Ghost Machine). The bulk of her Doctor Who work appears to be as a script editor (on 18 episodes).

Moffat, in contrast, is listed as writing six Doctor Who episodes before he was running things, plus whatever minor contributions he made to End of Time part II.

[DaveJB]

IIRC, Raynor would have been a serious contender to take over from RTD had Moffat turned the position down, but nowadays she's probably too far out of the loop to be seriously considered. Of the others, Chris Chibnall's running his own show, Broadchurch these days, Gareth Roberts doesn't have any experience as a head writer/producer, and Bob Baker is getting on 80 years old. So, barring a change of heart by Gatiss, looks like Toby Whithouse is the most likely candidate.

[jwl]

Well, the thing is, Moffat may not have written a lot of episodes, but he wrote acclaimed episodes. The Doctor Dances. Blink.

And actually, going off of IMDB, Raynor has written only four episodes of Doctor Who (Daleks in Manhattan, Evolution of the Daleks, the Sontaran Stratagem, and Poison Sky). Plus two for Torchwood (To the Last Man and Ghost Machine). The bulk of her Doctor Who work appears to be as a script editor (on 18 episodes).

Moffat, in contrast, is listed as writing six Doctor Who episodes before he was running things, plus whatever minor contributions he made to End of Time part II.

Looks like I can't count to six *facepalm*

I think I took off time crash twice by accident or something.

IIRC, Raynor would have been a serious contender to take over from RTD had Moffat turned the position down, but nowadays she's probably too far out of the loop to be seriously considered. Of the others, Chris Chibnall's running his own show, Broadchurch these days, Gareth Roberts doesn't have any experience as a head writer/producer, and Bob Baker is getting on 80 years old. So, barring a change of heart by Gatiss, looks like Toby Whithouse is the most likely candidate.

Gareth Roberts helped Phil Ford run SJA, so he isn't entirely lacking in showrunner experience, but apart from that, pretty much. In addition, apparently it took quite a bit of convincing from Moffat to even get Catherine Tregenna to write an episode (she seems to prefer Torchwood), so her being a showrunner is pretty unlikely as well.

[The Romulan Republic]

This has some bearing on the question of Moffat's departure:

http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2015-11- ... doctor-who

You’ve written this year’s Christmas special. What can you tell us about it?
Obviously, we’ve just lost Clara so I didn’t want to go straight into a new companion, and it’s not right to set that up at the end of a series where you’re all exhausted. So, I’ll be honest, I brought River Song back in because I thought there’s a possibility I’d never write it [Doctor Who] again so that’ll be my goodbye. But also I really fancied it. I hadn’t written River for a couple of years and I’d always loved writing for her and I’d missed her. I thought, given that I’m knackered at the end of a series, what would be a treat for me would be getting Alex Kingston back onto Doctor Who.
And luckily she was available.
It was. She’s very busy and successful. But we spoke to her quite a long time in advance and I sat in the office one day and said, “Can I have River? Bring River back?” Our current series of Doctor Who gets quite dark towards the end so I thought it was time at Christmas to take it back up.
So there’s a deliberate change of tone?
It’s towards the comedy thriller end of the Doctor Who market. It’s light, and quite emotional at the end. The big deal is Doctor No 12 encountering River and vice versa. It’s strange because they’re now, in our human terms, the perfect couple. They’re both sexy older people. It’s always been slightly strange before with Matt [Smith]. Now, yeah, they could actually be married. It works. She’s great with Peter [Capaldi]. She genuinely hasn’t aged a day since she did The Silence in the Library [her debut story], which we made in 2007. She looks amazing. She totally gets how to do that part. And she’s very, very funny.
It’s a great romp for Christmas day but – and you’ll be pleased – there’s not a lot of Christmas in it. It starts with a big bit of Christmas at the beginning and then we ignore it and go off on a chase, really, with Mr & Mrs Who. One thing worth saying about it is, if you’re a long-term fan of the show, you might be interested because there’s been a lot of talk about the Doctor and River’s glory years but we’ve never seen them. Here at last we see them as Mr & Mrs Who at the height of their powers. It’s great fun.
Where is it in River’s timeline?
It doesn’t really matter but for those who care, it’s immediately after The Angels Take Manhattan [2012] so she’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.
Read more...

As Moffat put it, "So, I'll be honest, I brought River Song back in because I thought there's a possibility I'd never write it [Doctor Who] again so that'll be my goodbye."

So while its not a confirmation of his departure, and indeed makes it sound like he's decided to stay for now, he evidently was at least seriously considering leaving this year.

[Enigma]

More info regarding Hell Bent.


SPOILERS!
Rassilon returns.

Do these new Doctor Who finale pictures prove a classic villain is returning?

The baddies are back to celebrate the Doctor's homecoming

By Radio Times staff
Sunday 29 November 2015 at 9:48AM

We only have one episode of this series of Doctor Who left, but it's going to be a big one. Not only has the Doctor returned home to Gallifrey (the very, very long way round), it seems some old friends...

... and enemies have come along to celebrate.

Wow, what happened to you guys? It looks like the Doctor isn't the only one to be trapped for a long period of time.

Anyway, we're pretty used to the Daleks, Cybermen, Weeping Angels and Sisterhood of Karn showing up by this point, but the most recent batch of promo images also hint at the return of a villain we haven't seen in a long time.

This cheery fellow.

Recognise him? No? How about his accessories?

1. An ultra-fancy headpiece, that's somehow even gaudier than all of the other Time Lords'.
2. A fancy staff.
3. A fancy sigil.
4. A fancy metal gauntlet on one hand. Here's a better look.

Want more clues? Well, that staff is called the 'Staff of Rassilon', the glove is called 'Rassilon's Gauntlet' and the logo is called the 'Seal of Rassilon'.

That's right! It's either some guy who's nicked all of Rassilon's stuff, or it's Rassilon himself! The ancient Time Lord/war lord was resurrected to lead Gallifrey during the Time War. We last saw him in 2009's The End of Time, David Tennant's final two parter, when he was played by Timothy Dalton.

Back then Rassilon schemed to bring Gallifrey back into the wider universe, in the process destroying all of time. He was last seen battling with John Simm's version of the Master.

Both characters have clearly regenerated since then. (It must have been a bruising fight!) Missy, the Master's new female form, was the first Time Lord to re-emerge following the events of the 50th anniversary, revealing that Gallifrey wasn't lost after all.

So, Rassilon's back and no doubt he's up to no good. But who's this grim looking Time Lord, and why are his clothes so tatty?

We'll have to wait until Saturday to find out!

A regenerated Rassilon returns along with Weeping Angels, Cybermen, Daleks and the Sisters of Karn. Thoughts?

[Iroscato]

A regenerated Rassilon returns along with Weeping Angels, Cybermen, Daleks and the Sisters of Karn. Thoughts?

Hopefully, not total fucking chaos I'm excited to see Rassilon coming back particularly given the actor playing him.
But...it seems like a routine thing now to have a 'greatest hits' of the Doctor's enemies in finale episodes. The end of series 5 had pretty much EVERY enemy. 11's final episode had Weeping Angels, Daleks, Cybermen, and Silence. Last year, it was Missy teaming up with Cybermen.

It just serves to dilute the impact each individual enemy has, I think.

[jwl]

From the picutres I don't think the cybermen, daleks, and weeping angels are going to do much. They all seem to be covered by pipes and cobwebs so I think we could well never see them moving significantly. In the case of the cybus cybermen, they are too battered now to do any significant movement whilst looking realistic. Look at the Cyberman hitting its chest in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOJhUknemag