After months of speculation, angst and general anxiety, we finally know who’ll be taking Peter Capaldi’s place on Doctor Who. And the future is female, after all.
After months of speculation, angst, and general anxiety, we finally know who’ll be taking Peter Capaldi’s place on Doctor Who. And it turns out that the future is female, after all.
The BBC announced today that Broadchurch actress Jodie Whittaker will play the Thirteenth Doctor. She will be the first woman to play the iconic Time Lord. And we’re all freaking out a bit, tbh. (Okay, okay, fine: We’re all freaking out A LOT.) As much as we all really wanted Doctor Who to make a progressive casting decision this time around, almost no one believed they’d actually do it.
Pretty sure that Doctor Who fans have never been happier to be wrong.
Watch the history-making announcement for yourselves below:
Meet the Thirteenth Doctor #DoctorWho #Doctor13 pic.twitter.com/qNJZmyaYcJ
— Doctor Who on BBC America (@DoctorWho_BBCA) July 16, 2017
In hindsight, Whittaker’s casting makes a lot of sense. She turned in a critically acclaimed performance on popular mystery series Broadchurch. She’s worked with incoming Season 11 showrunner Chris Chibnall extensively. And career-wise, she’s sitting right at the sweet spot the BBC loves: Known, but not that known. Of course, none of us guessed it, but it sort of seems obvious now.
It’s unlikely that we’ll really see much from Thirteen prior to Doctor Who Season 11 airing. That’s probably sometime in 2018. We’ll likely get a few moments with the new Doctor – and maybe a line or two – at the end of this year’s Christmas special. That’s generally tradition, following a regeneration. But it also usually doesn’t amount to much. (Capaldi’s Twelve got one line about his new kidneys, for example.) So we will have to wait a while to see what the Doctor’s latest incarnation will be like.
In the meantime, we do have one more episode left with outgoing Doctor Capaldi. And given the surprise guest star revealed in the Season 10 finale, it certainly looks as though Twelve will be going out in an unforgettable way. Which is comforting, in a way, because the character – and the man who plays him – certainly deserves it.
“Everything ends, and that’s always sad,” Twelve said back in 2016 Christmas installment “The Return of Doctor Mystery” “But everything begins again, too, and that’s always happy.”
Related Story: Orphan Black season 5 recap: “Manacled Slim Wrists”
Be happy. We have a new Doctor. And she’s going to change the history of the show.