Chris Chibnall on wanting Doctor Who spin-offs
Since the deal between the BBC and Disney was announced there has been increasing speculation about spin-off shows arriving in the Doctor Who universe. In fact, showrunner Russell T Davies appears to have suggested in a recent interview that there will be an expansion to the Whoniverse coming soon.
At this stage, we don’t know what spin-offs are being planned or when they might appear. Fans, of course, have had many excellent ideas already, and it feels like only a matter of time before we see more spin-offs join the collection that already exists including Torchwood, The Sarah jane Adventures and Class.
But is turns out that the idea of more spin-offs is something that was being thought about before the return of Russell T Davies last year – it’s just there hadn’t been the budget in place to make such things a reality until the Disney deal, it seems.
“That’s a thing in terms of keeping up with modern television, a thing of how does the show keep evolving and keep continuing it?” former showrunner, Chris Chibnall told the Radio Free Skaro podcast.
He added: “That’s a really interesting discussion, and it will, because now the Disney thing is the perfect solution to opening up space, opening up budgets, opening up — being able to have places for spin-offs, which you know, we wanted to do, but there wasn’t the space or budgets for.”
So it appears that the desire for spin-offs is not a new one, and that we’re all but certain to see some announcements at some point in the future now the budgets have been expanded.
We’ll be seeing more of Doctor Who in 2023 on TV when the series returns for three one-hour episodes starring David Tennant to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the show. The stories, penned by Russell T Davies, will also feature a returning Catherine Tate as Donna Noble, Yasmin Finney as Rose and Neil Patrick Harris as an unnamed enemy to the Doctor.
There will also be audio celebrations for the 60th including Big Finish’s Once and Future epic with all the Doctors uniting alongside special guests including Georgia Tennant as the Doctor’s Daughter, Jenny.
Doctor Who season 14 will begin around the festive season of 2023 with the first full season for Ncuti Gatwa’s Fourteenth Doctor playing out across 2024 with his new companion Ruby Sunday, played by Millie Gibson by his side.
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