Doctor Who showrunner Russell T Davies has said he still doesn’t know whether the series will be renewed for a new season in the immediate future, as the flagship BBC show’s status grows increasingly unclear.
Amid a mixed response to Doctor Who’s current era, and a growing sense that Disney’s recent co-production deal will not be renewed, fans have been left waiting to find out if and when the veteran sci-fi series will return.
The series’ most recent finale ended with the departure of its star Ncuti Gatwa, in a sequence added during later reshoots, and an unexplained regeneration cliffhanger featuring Billie Piper, with her official status as the next Doctor left up for debate. Now, Davies has said even he is uncertain what will happen next.
Writing in the latest issue of Doctor Who Magazine, in a regular column where the showrunner reveals details of the series’ ongoing production, Davies admitted there was little currently to cover.
“We don’t know what’s happening yet,” Davies admitted, “and while everyone works that out, I’ll take a pause on this page… Hopefully, we’ll have news soon.”
In a statement to Variety, a production source confirmed the show was currently on a “pause.”
Analysis of Doctor Who’s viewing figures by Variety shows a decline of 500,000 viewers from Gatwa’s first season to the next, with the era down a further 1.7 million viewers from episodes starring previous Doctor Jodie Whittaker.
Davies has previously claimed the plan had always been for Disney to decide whether to continue co-financing new episodes of Doctor Who after the conclusion of its latest season. However, the showrunner has also said the plan was for a new season of Doctor Who to be made on an annual basis — and it’s clear from the current production hiatus that this is no longer the case.
Next up for Doctor Who fans is a spin-off miniseries, The War Between The Land and The Sea, which has already been filmed and is expected to debut in 2026. Last week, the BBC announced early plans for another spin-off — an animated series for UK children’s channel CBeebies — but with a production partner yet to be found, this sounds even further off. There’s also no word on which Doctor this will focus on — or whether the character will even appear.
With no sign of production resuming on the main Doctor Who series in the near future, fans expect new episodes of the series will now not appear until 2027.
Photo by Dave Benett/Getty Images for The Newt in Somerset & Burberry.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
