2023 is almost over, but Doctor Who fans have a lot to look forward to in these remaining weeks. Along with David Tennant returning for the 60th anniversary, we’ll formally meet Ncuti Gatwa’s Fifteenth Doctor, who’s taking over the show following Tennant’s short outing as the Fourteenth Doctor. While it remains to be seen if these two Doctors will share any screen time together, Gatwa has revealed that there’s an upcoming scene between his Doctor and William Hartnell’s First Doctor, and I’m so jazzed to see how they did it.
Hartnell was the first actor to bring Doctor Who’s title Time Lord to life, leading the program from 1963 to 1966, and then briefly reprising the role for the 10th anniversary story “The Three Doctors.” The actor passed away in 1975, but while being honored by GQ Magazine at the Men of the Year ceremony (via Mirror), Gatwa shared that the late actor will somehow factor into an upcoming Fifteenth Doctor story:
It has been a crazy year. I shouldn’t say this but I shot a scene, somehow, with the first-ever Doctor, William Hartnell. We end up in the same scene together at some point.
This won’t be the first time that William Hartnell has been utilized in the modern Doctor Who era. In 2013’s “The Name of The Doctor,” colorized and edited footage from one of the First Doctor stories was manipulated to make it look like he was talking to a Gallifreyan version of Jenna Coleman’s Clara Oswald, and later that same year, another snippet of the character was briefly shown in the 50th anniversary special “The Day of The Doctor,” though the voice was provided by a different actor. Then in 2017’s “Twice Upon a Time,” footage of Hartnell bookended the episode that chiefly saw David Bradley playing The First Doctor.
Given Bradley’s outing in both that episode and last year’s “The Power of The Doctor,” as well as having played William Hartnell in the TV biopic An Adventure in Space and Time, it’s interesting that The First Doctor is being brought back to Doctor Who through old footage of Hartnell rather than bringing Bradley back again. More importantly, the First Doctor and Fifteenth Doctor will somehow share a scene together, which had to be quite the feat of digital wizardry to pull off.
So now two questions come to mind. First, when will this pairing happen? While one might assume the 60th anniversary is the best bet for this given how massive an event it is (David Tennant has set expectations sky high for the three-parter), Ncuti Gatwa specifically mentioned shooting this scene as part of his “crazy year.” Doctor Who Season 14 began shooting towards the end of 2022 and wrapped in July, and Season 15 began last month, so it seems more likely it’ll happen when Gatwa is finally leading the show?
Second, how will the Fifteenth Doctor and First Doctor come face to face? Doctor team-ups are nothing new, but obviously it’s not feasible to dedicate an entire episode to 15 hanging out with 1, the latter of whom can only appear through decades-old footage. For now, my money’s us seeing a representation of Hartnell’s character within the Fifteenth Doctor’s mind, like how Jodie Whittaker’s Thirteenth Doctor saw versions of the First (played by Bradley), Fifth, Sixth, Seventh and Eight Doctors in “The Power of The Doctor.”
While it remains to be seen when this crossover will happen, Doctor Who fans can at least look forward to the beginning of Ncuti Gatwa’s Fifteenth Doctor journey beginning sometime during the 60th anniversary, with those three episodes releasing on November 25, December 2 and December 9. Doctor Who will continue airing on BBC in the United Kingdom and Ireland, but you’ll need a Disney+ subscription to watch new episodes going forward if you live elsewhere.
