What do you call a high sontaran?

…………..A baked potato

One of the bits of writing advice you hear the most is “Don’t write about not knowing what to write about.” It’s good advice when you consider just how self-indulgent pieces like that can be. Unless you’re Charlie Kaufman, it’s best to leave it alone. But what about when the lack of inspiration is a genuine reaction to something? For the last two series of Doctor Who, I have written articles before each of them aired. In said articles, I speculated about the rumours, casting choices, and changes in the production crew. But leading up to series thirteen, I find myself hard-pressed to care about much of anything. My anticipation for new Doctor Who is at an all-time low, and I’m not the first person to say this.

If you go back and look, you’ll see that I have been more than fair to Chris Chibnall’s vision of Doctor Who. Possibly even more than it deserves. I always try and take an optimistic stance toward Doctor Who because, at the end of the day, I do want to enjoy it. History has shown us that Doctor Who has its ups and downs. Even within bad eras, you will find the occasional gem. These gems make sorting through the rough worth it. However, a number of my friends have said to me that they have no plans of watching until the Chibnall era has passed. These are people who survived “The Twin Dilemma,” and intimate relations with pavement stones. It would appear then that “The Timeless Children,” has done lasting damage.

With my series eleven preview, I speculated about what a Chris Chibnall and female Doctor dynamic would look like. In my series twelve preview, I talked about the strengths and weaknesses of series eleven and how they could be improved upon. But going into series thirteen, I haven’t much to say other than “I’m glad it’s short,” which is something I would have never expected to say about Doctor Who. Thank Ood that it’s only six episodes long. However, considering the damage that can be done to the history of Doctor Who with one episode, six seems almost too many. But this has been a tradition for the last two series, and therefore I will continue with tradition and give you my impressions leading to series thirteen.

Chris Chibnall

It’s genuinely hard to care about Chibnall at this point. He claims he always planned on leaving after three series, but his lack of a plan for series eleven makes his claim dubious at best. The fact that they have already wrapped filming on his 2022 specials reeks of having been sacked. The BBC just wanted him gone. My only hope for him at this point is that the BBC have done damage control. You get the impression that the BBC is aware of the damage he has done to the show’s history. You don’t break out Russell T Davies when the show is doing well. Clearly, there is a desire for a return to form. At the same time, bringing back RTD also shows the same lack of understanding for the property that got Chibnall hired in the first place. The BBC doesn’t seem to know what works about Doctor Who, but Chibnall looked good enough on paper. They don’t know why RTD was successful, only that he was successful. 

Aside from betraying the mystery implied in the show’s title, Chibnall broke one of the biggest cardinal sins of being a showrunner- being boring. I imagine even his parents call him “Chibnall.” I’ll give the man credit that you can tell he actually tried to make series twelve more exciting and even succeeded in places. But this is also the man who managed to make dinosaurs in space and giant spiders boring. I would venture to say that what makes Chris Chibnall’s writing so boring is how utterly depressing it can be. His version of Doctor Who is clearly Broadchurch with a Doctor Who skin. For a man who seems to think he is expressing open-minded and liberal opinions, he’s actually fairly mean spirited with his writing. He’s going to portray gay characters long enough to kill them. The Doctor speaks out against guns in favour of bombs. She even sells a brown man out to the Nazis. In Chibnall’s Doctor Who, man is the greatest monster of all, and it’s tired as hell.

In my time as a Doctor Who fan, I can think of at least five occasions where I have reacted to the show with emphatic cheering. I cheered when the Eighth Doctor showed up in “The Night of the Doctor.” I cheered when the Twelfth Doctor’s eyebrows made an appearance in the 50th anniversary. I cheered at the announcement of a female Doctor. And I cheered when it was announced that Chibnall was leaving and again when I learned his replacement would be Russell T Davies. Doctor Who has fallen so low that its highs are no longer found in narrative triumphs, but in firing bad writers. The only real joy we have left is knowing that there is an end in sight.

Chris Chibnall promises to “blow up the universe,” in episode one. I find this claim weird because he already effectively did that in “The Timeless Children.” Every promise he makes feels like more of a threat. He’s done so much lasting harm to Doctor Who that at this point, less is more. Each episode under his watch is yet another possible disaster in the making. I would take no Doctor Who over more of his Doctor Who. Seeing set photos of RTD and the Fourteenth Doctor would be more exciting to me than anything Chibnall has planned. Most everyone I know is more excited for the return of Russell T Davies than the return of Chris Chibnall. Series thirteen feels more like something to get past rather than experience. My only real hope from his remaining episodes is that he leaves quietly.

One Season One Story

The pandemic has given Chris Chibnall the ultimate excuse to churn out even less Doctor Who than usual. Already they had been reducing the number of episodes and the frequency at which they were produced. Now we’ve got what is essentially one story spread among six episodes, and I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. It’s closer to classic Doctor Who with its serialised format, but with fewer stories overall. The closest thing we have to compare it with from modern Doctor Who is series nine where the episodes were mostly two-parters. Consequently, I find myself returning to series nine the least. I don’t always have time to dedicate to two episodes. Combine that with subpar writing and I’ll probably never return to series thirteen again.

From what I can tell from the trailers is that some episodes may focus on one baddie at a time. There’s the chance that one episode will be dedicated to the Sontarans and the next to the Weeping Angels. Maybe the only way Chibnall can understand the concept of a season arc is to refer to it as a single story. Whatever gets you there in the end, Chris. The real issue I have with “Flux,” being one continuous story isn’t really that it’s fewer stories, but rather that it means more Chris Chibnall. It’s been revealed that every episode has been written by Chibnall himself - a man whose name on the title screen is as welcome as a positive result on a COVID test. Only episode four offers a possible respite from Chibnall’s cruel brand of Doctor Who in the form of co-writer Maxine Alderton. Even so, the episode is still co-written by Chris Chibnall, so my expectations are still rather low.

Dan the Companion Man

The introduction of John Bishop’s “Dan,” has never excited me. I was excited to see Yaz and the Doctor alone for a change. Finally, we were going to get to see some much-needed character development for Yaz, but no. Part of me wonders whether the inclusion of Dan stems from BBC execs worry that the complete lack of a male presence in the TARDIS would further alienate the misogynist portion of their audience. It’s some small brain energy and I’m not there for it. This isn’t to say John Bishop is going to be good or bad. I know nothing about the guy. He’s a blank slate at this moment. I just find the move cowardly.

One aspect to Dan’s character that I’ve heard rumoured is that he’s supposedly the son of a previous companion. My initial guess would be probably Jo Grant. Under another showrunner, this concept might actually excite me. But under Chibnall, it’s yet again another promise that feels like a threat. Instead of being just another companion, Dan threatens to be an element that could retroactively tarnish a pre-existing companion. Not an auspicious start for Dan, sadly. I’m sorry, John Bishop, it’s not your fault. You inherited this mess, possibly in more ways than one. It’s not your fault that you’ve been yoked with one of the worst showrunners in Doctor Who’s history. As the Thirteenth Doctor effectively said to Graham’s cancer concerns- “Sucks, brah.”

Returning Classic Baddies

When Chris Chibnall threatened before series eleven that there would be no classic baddies returning, it felt like a misstep. Certainly, series eleven suffered from a deficit of memorable villains. But now, much like Dan, the inclusion of classic baddies feels more like a threat than a promise. While I think the redesign of the Sontarans looks cool in its throwback to the classic series, I also think “Oh goody, now he can ruin the Sontarans too.” We also get the return of the Weeping Angels, who have never gotten better through more development. Even Moffat struggled to make them more effective than their first appearance in “Blink.”

However, I find myself slightly hopeful in one respect. The redesign of the Sontarans looks as though Chibnall is interested in re-establishing them as dangerous again. One of my complaints with Moffat’s Doctor Who was how he constantly undermined the threat of villains. Perhaps Chibnall could restore a little menace to both them and the Weeping Angels. This is, of course, hoping against hope, but like I said, I want to enjoy Doctor Who. I will try and remain as fair and optimistic as possible. However, if the rumours of the return of Davros are true, I worry then that Chibnall lacks the gravitas required to capture what is good about the character. If he can’t get the Doctor’s morality right, I doubt he can nail Davros. We’ll see I guess.

Publicity

One of the most undeniable facts of the Chibnall era of Doctor Who has been its lack of promotion. The number of books and merchandise have plummeted. Webisodes are at zero. Not even Doctor Who Magazine was doing the comics properly. It was nice to see the lead up to series thirteen’s trailer marked with little clues within emails. Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve seen glimpses of the Doctor glitching into advert bumpers on BBC. All of these have been nice little bread crumbs for a show that has gotten surprisingly little coverage over the last couple of years. The BBC doesn’t seem to know what to do with Doctor Who lately, so anything has been better than nothing. Their faith in the Thirteenth Doctor is so low that they don’t even allow her to have her own comic book without also inserting the Tenth Doctor at every chance they can get.

On top of the lack of promotion, the promotion we have gotten has all been rather lacklustre. Shots of Jodie Whittaker doing the hands out Doctor Who pose in front of a colourful background has been the norm for all three seasons. The promotional image for Flux is somehow even more boring. I will say, however, that the new trailer for series thirteen has gotten me mildly excited. The shot of the battlefield, in particular, has caught my interest. I’m wondering if Chibnall isn’t returning to the War Games from the Second Doctor era. And yes, that does worry me in the same way Davros and Dan worry me, but it also piques my interest, which is something. I’ll take any point of interest over any feelings of dread. I, like you, would like to enjoy Doctor Who despite who is writing. Sometimes the actors and the production crew can elevate substandard material. Sometimes things are just weird enough to be fun. With series thirteen my plan is to hope for the best and brace for the worst.

On this day in 2008, the Tenth Doctor met the brains behind ATMOS, Luke Rattigan and General Staal of the Sontarans!