Hello everyone! 🙂
Welcome to ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog and I’m Tim Bradley!
So, yeah. The 2026 ‘Doctor Who’ Christmas Special we’d been looking forward to has been cancelled. 😦 I can’t say I’m that surprised considering we didn’t have any news nor updates about it in the first half of 2026. The telltale signs were clear it wasn’t happening.
At the same time though, I can’t help feel slightly annoyed and disappointed. The 2026 ‘Doctor Who’ Christmas Special was something to look forward to at the end of the year. Now that it’s been taken away from us, the lifeline for ‘Doctor Who’s future is uncertain. 😦
I know the BBC have stated they’re continuing to commit to ‘Doctor Who’s future, but it seems like we’re going to have to wait a long time for the TV show to come back. I know it’s not going to come back in 2027 as first thought. Will the series return in 2028 or 2029?
To be honest with you, I’m not really that fussed. When ‘Doctor Who’ comes back to TV screens properly, I’ll be very happy indeed. In the meantime, I have other ‘Doctor Who’ items to check out, including DVD/Blu-ray box sets, Big Finish audios, books and comics.
At least we have confirmation that Russell T. Davies and Bad Wolf Productions have left ‘Doctor Who’, meaning that the neo-Russell T. Davies officially ended with ‘The Reality War’. It wasn’t a very dignifying episode to end the era on, but at least it was an ending. 😐
No doubt, I’ll be sharing more thoughts about how the neo-RTD era of ‘Doctor Who’ ended in my upcoming in-depth reviews on Series 15 of the new ‘Doctor Who’ TV series with Ncuti Gatwa, which I’m looking forward to. I’m currently working on the Series 15 reviews.
It’s a shame we’re not going to get the answer to why Ncuti Gatwa regenerated into Billie Piper in the narrative sense and, as I predicted in my quick reactions video, we’re likely to speculate this for a very, very long time. Hopefully, the TV show can start afresh from this.
I don’t know that will happen, but I’ll look forward to it when it does. Hopefully, I’ll get to do a rewatch of all the ‘Doctor Who’ TV stories featuring Sarah Sutton as Nyssa to make up for the absence of the 2026 Christmas Special in December. We’ll see what happen then.
In the meantime, I hope to keep you entertained with the various ‘Doctor Who’ reviews and stories I’m looking forward to sharing on my blog in the upcoming months. Hope you enjoyed my latest blog post and my latest video about the latest news on ‘Doctor Who’s future.
Please feel free to share your thoughts about the latest ‘Doctor Who’ news below.
Thanks for watching and reading!
Bye for now!
Tim 🙂
Bradley's Basement 
As surprising or unsurprising as cancellation issues for Doctor Who may be, they continue to be a most inevitable discussion. Even if we can still have the luxuries of Big Finish, novels and fan films like DW2012 and Doctor Who Velocity, and even if some newer sci-fi for TV like Silo, Pluribus and Severance may somehow be earning more attention, Whovian hopes that Doctor Who on TV can still be saved are to be admired. As Terrance Dicks once commented: “It’s a question of how you do it.” So let’s especially hope that recent mistakes can finally be learned from.
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Hi scifimike,
Thanks for your comments.
Despite there being no ‘Doctor Who’ Christmas Special this year, maybe and hopefully there’s a chance I can check out and share my thoughts on the fan films ‘Besieged’ and ‘Power of the Daleks’ (2012), which I’ve been meaning to do. I’d like to do that whilst revisiting the ‘Doctor Who’ stories featuring Nyssa. Hopefully, ‘Doctor Who’ will come back to TV screens and lessons will be learned from what’s come before.
Best wishes,
Tim 🙂
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Very much recommend the Nick Scovell Power of the Daleks adaptation. There’s also a filmed copy of the Fury from the Deep stage-play if you know where to find it. *taps nose*
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Thanks Wolfie,
Looking forward to checking out Nick Scovell’s ‘Power of the Daleks’ when I get the chance to see it. Hopefully it’ll be this year’s Christmas viewing for me. And thanks for recommending the ‘Fury From The Deep’ stage play. Had no idea that was a thing. 😆 I’m sure I’ll know where to go to find it. 😃
Best wishes,
Tim 🙂
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Yes, the reality is that — even if we are stepping into a new Wilderness Years — we are not stepping back into the 1990s.
It’s the Information Age. The Amazing Digital Circus and Backrooms, two initially internet-exclusive stories, now have major theatrical releases. With staggering success. The emphasis in storytelling is coming off television and going into other mediums.
Perhaps, it’s time? Maybe Doctor Who needs to start looking into other mediums for its new zest for life? These digital mediums? Web series, podcasts, et al? It’s certainly where this much sought-after “new audience” is getting their storytelling from.
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Hi Wolfie,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. Maybe there’ll come a point where ‘Doctor Who’ (in the UK at least) will be streaming more on BBC iPlayer rather than being shown on BBC One, as there’s the likelihood more viewers went on BBC iPlayer for the neo-RTD era than via BBC One on TV. Maybe ‘Doctor Who’ is going in the same direction as ‘Star Trek’ is with being made available on Amazon Prime Video and Paramount+. Who knows? Only time will tell. In the meantime, there’s plenty of ‘Doctor Who’ content in other mediums like books, audios and DVDs/Blu-rays to keep us occupied.
Best wishes,
Tim 🙂
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Indeed, Tim. It will all depend on what the media landscape ends up looks like.
Russell T. Davies went from Doctor Who to writing Tip Toe (which ends with a queer character being lynched). In just the same way as Dana Terrace went from The Owl House to Knights of Guinevere (a damning indictment of the insincerity of the Disney brand).
I think Doctor Who will always have relevance, and will always have a place to tell its stories, but it needs to get the heck away from, well… A world run by creatures indistinguishable from Sil, the Collector, Davros and Nyder. A world run by Doctor Who villainy.
And that may lie in indie spaces now. Not with major corporations like the Beeb or Disney. It’s certainly pointing that way…
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Hi Wolfie,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I can’t comment on a show like ‘Tip Toe’ as I’ve not seen it at all on ITVX. But it’s likely that ‘Doctor Who’ fandom will veer more to stories produced by independent companies rather than corporate ones, especially as the corporate ones like the BBC and Disney aren’t as sincere as they used to be when producing the content that most fans love and enjoy. It does highlight why the blame shouldn’t always be put on RTD for what happened in his neo-era considering the circumstances of how Series 15 turned out, particularly in ‘The Reality War’.
Best wishes,
Tim 🙂
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Im guessing it less like a goodbye but more like a see you later because what I took from it that even though it currently off TV it will come back hopefully better than ever with a new creative team.
My main question would be if Billie Piper is back permanently when returns or just a one off return
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Hi Lloyd,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
That is what seems to be implied about ‘coming back later’, and hopefully, that’ll come to pass. I won’t share any thoughts on that unless it’s actually confirmed. Whether Billie Piper will be back either as the Doctor or not, I don’t know. I’m guessing not since they probably would have to start again in a completely fresh direction with a new production team, but we’ll have to wait and see.
Best wishes,
Tim 🙂
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