Acclaimed Comic Book, TV and Fantasy Writer Neil Gaiman Wants To Write For BBC’s Doctor Who Season 11 With Thirteen Doctor Jodie Whittaker.
Digital Spy reports:
- Neil Gaiman wants to write a Doctor Who episode for Jodie Whittaker – and had a story planned for [Peter] Capaldi
The [comic book and] fantasy author last contributed to the BBC sci-fi series in 2013.
It’s been five years since he last hopped aboard the TARDIS, but now Neil Gaiman is keen to return to Doctor Who for a new adventure.
Speaking exclusively to Digital Spy, the Good Omens author confirmed that he’d love to follow up his two previous stories – 2011’s ‘The Doctor’s Wife’ and 2013’s ‘Nightmare in Silver’ – with a new script for Jodie Whittaker.
“If you examine my DNA and you go in deep enough, with a good enough microscope, you’re gonna see a TARDIS, with a little light blinking on the top!” Gaiman said.
“So the idea of writing for Jodie, or for her successor, whoever she / he / they happen to be, is… yeah, it’s Doctor Who! You can’t say no.”
In fact, Gaiman’s absence from Who over the past five years hasn’t been for lack of trying. He claims to have been in discussions with ex-showrunner Steven Moffat to write a story for Peter Capaldi’s Doctor, only for scheduling issues to get in the way.
“I was so frustrated over the last four years because I didn’t get to write for Peter Capaldi,” he said. “I even had a planned episode and did not get to do it, because I’ve been making Good Omens and that’s been my life.”
Maybe Gaiman could reunite with Douglas Mackinnon, who’s directed the upcoming Good Omens TV series? Having also helmed eight Doctor Who episodes between 2008 and 2015, Mackinnon told us that he too is keen to return to the show.
“I’d love to,” Mackinnon said. “Doctor Who’s the one call that I will always take. It’s like a drug. It doesn’t go out of your system.
“I actually directed an episode that [new showrunner] Chris Chibnall wrote, ‘The Power of Three’, and I think he’s a wonderful successor to Steven Moffat. It’s going to be fascinating to see what he does with the show, because he’s wanted to do it for so long.”
With the exception of Chibnall, the new series of Doctor Who has reportedly been scripted by a team of writers new to the show, including the 55-year-old show’s first ever writers of colour.
Doctor Who will return to BBC One this autumn. Good Omens will launch on Amazon Prime Video in 2019, with a BBC Two broadcast to follow.
