Former Doctor Who boss Steven Moffat has shared his thoughts on the surprising regeneration at the end of The Reality War, which brought Billie Piper back to the show after many years.
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In the final moments of the episode, Ncuti Gatwa’s Fifteenth Doctor regenerated into Billie Piper’s character, making her return a major shock.
However, Piper wasn’t listed as The Doctor in the credits, something that usually happens when a new actor takes on the role.
This has left fans unsure if Piper will actually be playing the Sixteenth Doctor or not.
I genuinely don’t have any insider information, but they have hedged their bets. They’ve not said [she’s the Doctor] so I don’t know. I don’t even know if they know!
Asked about whether he thinks she’s set to play the Doctor, Moffat told RadioTimes.com
Clearly, he’s just as surprised as we are! Still, like the other showrunners, Moffat is one of the few people who truly understands what makes a great Doctor.
Attractive, but odd. There’s something utterly odd, a sort of benevolent, kindly, slightly incompetent impersonation of a human being. The Doctor is never quite right. He’s really trying, or she’s really trying. [They’re] not quite there. ‘I’m really cool because I got a bow tie’. ‘I’ve got a nice suit.’ ‘I put my trainers on.’ There’s just something off-kilter about them. Above all, it’s someone that little kids would want to run up and take that [person’s] hand and feel absolutely safe. That’s what the Doctor’s about. Somewhere between Indiana Jones and Willy Wonka. But also there’s got to be an edge, slightly dangerous – the most dangerous [person] in the universe. All of those things. It’s a tall order. This is such a minefield. I have to really engage with how I answer this. All I can say is I was approached very last-minute, and I can’t talk about in what capacity, but I found it very emotional to film and I think it’s a really great ending. As in, I just found it quite moving, and it was really fun to film because it had such a sort of cloak-and-dagger feeling about getting it made. So, yeah, I have to lie a lot about anything to do with Doctor Who, it seems.
When asked what he looks for in a Doctor and what qualities the Sixteenth Doctor should have – whether it ends up being Piper or someone else – he shared, Moffat added, Piper recently opened up about her return to Doctor Who, saying at Florida SuperCon
Source: RadioTimes