Photo credit: doctorwho.tv
In shocking news today, the BBC announced that Russell T Davies, the showrunner of Doctor Who from 2004-2009, is returning to be the showrunner again, after the departure of current showrunner Chris Chibnall in 2022. The news was met with strong enthusiasm by Whovians. However, to be honest, I'm not as excited as nearly everybody else is. There are a lot of pros to RTD returning, but there are some cons as well.
Pros:
I think RTD is the best showrunner of the current Doctor Who series. "The Stolen End"/"Journey's End" are my absolute favorite episodes and I've watched them more than any other episodes. Steven Moffat was really good at writing episodes and is the best Doctor Who writer of the modern era, but overall his time as showrunner was not as good as Davies'. Chris Chibnall's era is a lot closer to RTD's, which is why I really like it.
After Jodie and Chibnall announced they were leaving the show in 2022, I had a bad feeling that there would be no 60th anniversary special in 2023, because it would have been on the new showrunner to start out their tenure with it. But with RTD already having five years of experience with the show, it wouldn't be too much for him to do an anniversary special right off the bat.
Interestingly, RTD has possibly given hints towards the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Doctors. In his novelization for the series premiere "Rose", RTD expanded on the scene where Clive explained the Doctor to Rose. Clive showed her more than just photos of the Ninth Doctor. After not paying attention to the Tenth Doctor, she sees the Eleventh, Twelfth, and Thirteenth Doctors, and then incarnations described as "...a tall, bald black woman..." and "...a young girl or boy in a high-tech wheelchair with what looked like a robot dog at their side...". While the novelization probably isn't "canon" and RTD shouldn't have to be held to what he wrote, it is fascinating that he provided possible descriptions of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Doctors and now he will be in charge of bringing at least one of them to the big screen.
Cons:
While binging all of the Doctor Who Christmas Specials in December 2020, I realized that I liked RTD's specials less than I liked Moffat's specials. So while it's a pro that he's familiar enough with the show that he could handle the 60th anniversary special for one of his first, if not his first, episode back, I don't think he's that great at creating Doctor Who specials.
The biggest con, though, is that RTD coming back feels like surrendering to the angry vocal minority. Like how after the angry vocal minority hated what Rian Johnson did with "Star Wars: The Last Jedi", Disney and Lucasfilm brought back "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" co-writer and director J.J. Abrams to co-write and direct Episode IX, the BBC bringing back RTD to showrun Doctor Who feels like appeasing the angry vocal minority who hate Chris Chibnall and Jodie Whittaker.
I wrote earlier that I think Chibnall is closer to RTD's time as showrunner, but he still brought his unique contributions to the show. He was the first showrunner in the show's history to cast an actress as the Doctor. Jodie Whittaker is tied as my favorite Doctor with David Tennant and I love what she brings to the character of The Doctor. I really feel that The Doctor should still be a woman for at least a couple more incarnations. But even though RTD hinted that the Fourteenth Doctor could be a black woman, rumors from a couple months ago suggested that he might be considering casting an actor from his previous TV series to be the next Doctor. Also, Chibnall completely shook up the show's established history with the Timeless Child twist. While I currently don't think it actually works, I'd like the show to stick with it, at least for a time. It shouldn't immediately be retconned by Chibnall's successor. The next few seasons of Doctor Who shouldn't feel like "course-correcting" after a few controversial changes, like how "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker" felt like it was trying to undo the brilliant storytelling of "The Last Jedi".
Like with every time I express a negative dissenting opinion, I hope I am pleasantly proven wrong. I really hope the next few seasons of Doctor Who are the best yet.
