The Doctor Who rumor mill is spinning again, this time claiming that the next season of the show will see star Jodie Whittaker leave along with showrunner Chris Chibnall. The story comes from Gary Buechler of Nerdrotic, who says he cannot verify any of this information but that “sometimes rumors can become stories.” Fair enough.
He claims that:
“It looks like Chris Chibnall and the first female Doctor, played by Jodie Whittaker, who we will lovingly call Doctor Karen, might be on their way out. … this does come from the same source who told me that they would be swapping the Doctor’s original gender. That the Doctor would originally be a female and that they would be retconning the Doctor’s past and that is what we saw play out in “The Timeless Children.”
Well, let’s leave aside the weird Doctor Karen comment and the fact that it’s usually best to ignore anyone that uses the term “a female” when talking about people and focus on the claims. Could season 13 really be Jodie Whittaker’s last season in the TARDIS?
Well, yeah. Every Doctor since David Tennant’s Tenth has gotten three seasons and there’s no reason to think Jodie Whittaker’s Thirteenth Doctor will be any different. So, as far as “rumors” go, season 13 being her finale isn’t exactly ‘stop the presses’ material.
What’s a little more juicy is whether Chris Chibnall will continue as showrunner. I thought he dropped the ball in season 12, though things picked up a bit in the latter half. As such, it’s plausible that the BBC will put some soft pressure on him to depart alongside Whittaker and let someone else take over to write the fourteenth Doctor.
Buechler goes on to claim that season 13 might be split into two halves due to Coronavirus delays, that there’s no decision been made as to whether the next Doctor will be a man or woman and that the BBC isn’t set to retcon the revelations of “The Timeless Children.” How much credence you want to give these rumors is up to you, but to me they sound like stories you don’t really need inside sources to come up with.
No word yet on when season 13 Doctor Who will air, but the Christmas special “Resolution of the Daleks” is still on track for the end of December