SPOILERS ALERT!!!

Hello everyone! 🙂

Welcome to ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog and I’m Tim Bradley!

So, some time has passed since Series 15 of ‘Doctor Who’ ended on the 31st of May 2025. Now is a good time to share my overall thoughts and feelings about Ncuti Gatwa’s second and (apparently) final season as the Fifteenth Doctor and whether I liked it or not.

The first question that comes to mind is: Is Series 15 better than Series 14? In some respects, yes, it is, because the stories are little more coherent and the endings are stronger compared to Series 14’s episodes. But I wouldn’t quite rate this season highly. 😦

The main issue for me with Series 15 is some of the missed opportunities found in terms of the storytelling and character development. Thankfully, there are more writers to enjoy in this season compared to Series 14, but I don’t think it’s that consistent nor engaging. 😦

Series 15 had a similar issue to Series 14 with the first seven episodes being shown on BBC iPlayer first before being shown on BBC One. Thankfully, they were shown at 8am instead of 12am. And the last episode was shown on BBC One first before BBC iPlayer. 🙂

Mind you, like Series 14, I never saw any of the episodes of Series 15 on their TV transmission times, as it was mostly BBC iPlayer for the first seven episodes and I saw the finale ‘Wish World’/’The Reality War’ on the big screen at Cineworld in Milton Keynes.

I will say this, through my quick video reactions, I did get emotionally invested when watching the eight episodes of Series 15. Then again, that’s a result of me wanting things to be different in Series 15 compared to how its episodes turned out in the storytelling. 😐

I’m disappointed that Millie Gibson who plays Ruby Sunday wasn’t in every episode of Series 15, as this was mainly Ncuti Gatwa and Verada Sethu’s season as the Fifteenth Doctor and Belinda. Not that’s bad, since I appreciate a new storyline told in Series 15. 🙂

But I wouldn’t have written Ruby Sunday out of the TARDIS at the end of Series 14, as I would have kept her as a travelling companion. Plus, I wouldn’t have put Ruby through the heartbreak she endured in Series 15, especially in ‘Lucky Day’, which I’ll get into a bit.

Let’s talk about the episodes each in turn. First, there’s ‘The Robot Revolution’, which is a season opener that I think introduces Verada Sethu well as the new companion in Belinda Chandra. Plus, I found it a better season opener compared to ‘Space Babies’ in Series 14.

However, I’m disappointed with the way things concluded, as I recall it being rather confusing in terms of how the villain was thwarted. Plus, the villain happened to be Belinda’s ex-boyfriend that tended to be domineering and he became an ‘AI Generator’. 😐

The ‘evil boyfriend’ thing is a trend that gets repeated in ‘Lucky Day’ with Ruby, but again, I’ll get to that in a bit. ‘Lux’ is an episode that has an interesting premise of a cartoon character being the villain and it turns out it’s one of the god-like entities such as the Toymaker, Maestro and Sutekh.

However, a missed opportunity is made to have a segment of the episode animated, especially when the Fifteenth Doctor and Belinda became cartoons. Plus the fourth-wall breaking scene is pretty bizarre and the way that Lux as a villain is defeated is rather weak.

‘The Well’, is arguably, the best episode in Series 15 of ‘Doctor Who’. It works well as a sequel to ‘Midnight’, which I don’t really consider one of my favourites in Series 4 of ‘Doctor Who’ with David Tennant. Plus, it’s a pretty grim and dark story when watching it.

The episode introduces Rose Ayling-Ellis who is deaf in real-life and is playing a deaf character in Aliss Fenly. I found this depiction of a deaf character played by a deaf actor a lot more satisfying than what’s in ‘Under the Lake’/’Before the Flood’ with Peter Capaldi.

‘Lucky Day’ is an episode I’m in two minds about. On the one hand, I’m very pleased it has Millie Gibson being given a central role as Ruby Sunday and I found it better than ’73 Yards’. However, I’m very disappointed it wasn’t the happy romance story I was hoping for.

I wouldn’t have made Conrad the evil boyfriend and instead would have made one of the other Think Tank members be the one that caused trouble. ‘Lucky Day’ is an episode that frankly should have combined both a romance story and a conspiracy theory story in one.

I hope to elaborate more on this when it comes to doing my in-depth reviews on Series 15 of ‘Doctor Who’, but honestly, the whole direction of ‘Lucky Day’ didn’t make me happy as I hoped it would. I was also reminded by how ‘Thor: Love and Thunder’ handled things. 😐

Basically, that turned out not to be about Thor and Jane as lovers, but with the villain’s daughter called ‘Love’ and Thor called ‘Thunder’. With ‘Lucky Day’, I felt it wasn’t a ‘lucky day’ for Ruby and instead became a ‘lucky day’ for Conrad when he was freed from prison.

Moving on to ‘The Story & The Engine’, it’s an episode that’s intriguing in terms of it being set in Lagos in 2019 and having a villain in the Barber that had customers pay for their haircuts by telling stories in order to fuel this engine that’s generated by a ‘giant spider’.

But I can’t say I fully comprehend what the episode’s about and I’ll need to rewatch it in order to understand it properly when it comes to doing my in-depth review on ‘The Story & The Engine’. It was nice to see Jo Martin return as the Fugitive Doctor, even if it was brief.

‘The Interstellar Song Contest’ is an episode that works well as a TV debut for author Juno Dawson. I enjoyed the episode’s plot and the characters, and it was nice to see Carole Ann Ford back as Susan, even if her cameo in ‘Wish World’ for next time isn’t well-explained.

I’ve come across arguments for and against the Fifteenth Doctor’s torturing of Kid in the episode. The arguments against say that it was out-of-character for the Doctor. I can see that viewpoint, but frankly, it was an intriguing side to the Fifteenth Doctor on display.

‘Wish World’/’The Reality War’ is arguably a better season finale than ‘The Legend of Ruby Sunday’/’Empire of Death’. Plus, there are plenty of exciting elements, including the return of the Rani, as played by Archie Panjabi and Anita Dobson as Mrs. Flood in the story.

However, the two-part finale suffers in terms of the reveal of Omega and his easy defeat. I also feel Ruby Sunday’s story is left unfinished and was disappointed there wasn’t a proper resolution between her and Conrad, even when she wished him ‘to be happy’.

It was nice to see Jodie Whittaker back as the Thirteenth Doctor in that scene she had with Ncuti Gatwa as the Fifteenth Doctor and it’s my favourite scene in ‘The Reality War’. The resolution of Poppy’s parentage in the two-part finale was very disappointing for me.

Also, the shock regeneration of Ncuti Gatwa into Billie Piper, marking the end of the Fifteenth Doctor era, is something I’m not really happy with. This is especially when I didn’t want it to happen, since I hoped Ncuti would continue being the Doctor for a third season.

A lot of this I’ve covered in my quick reactions video for ‘The Reality War’, but suffice to say, I’m uncertain about how the future of ‘Doctor Who’ is going to turn out as a TV series. This is regardless of whether Disney gives funds to ‘Doctor Who’ for the next season or not. 😐

So, yeah. Series 15 of ‘Doctor Who’ is a bit of a mess. An interesting and insightful mess, but still a mess. A lot have argued that Ncuti Gatwa’s era of ‘Doctor Who’ has been underwhelming and I’m inclined to agree, as this wasn’t how I expected the neo-RTD era to turn out.

I’m sure I’ll cover more on this when it comes to getting into doing in-depth reviews on Series 14 and 15 of ‘Doctor Who’. At this point, I still have my updated reviews on Season 25 of ‘Doctor Who’ with Sylvester McCoy to sort out. But do I regret checking out Ncuti Gatwa’s TV era?

No! Far from it. There are good things to take away from Ncuti Gatwa’s era as well as bad. I’m very pleased I’ve met Ncuti Gatwa and Millie Gibson in real-life at conventions and I’m pleased I saw ‘Wish World’/’The Reality War’ recently at the cinema in Milton Keynes.

To disregard this era entirely would be very harsh. There are certainly problems with it and I would have let Ncuti Gatwa face the Daleks and Cybermen in his era. But on the whole, I’m glad I’ve seen it and it’ll be very fascinating to see what happens next for the TV series.

Thanks for reading!

Bye for now!

Tim 🙂