{"id":245985,"date":"2025-10-28T16:36:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-28T16:36:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/245985\/"},"modified":"2025-10-28T16:36:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-28T16:36:07","slug":"disney-is-no-longer-backing-doctor-who","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/245985\/","title":{"rendered":"Disney Is No Longer Backing ‘Doctor Who’"},"content":{"rendered":"

The BBC has confirmed, after months of speculation<\/a>, that\u00a0Doctor Who will return at Christmas next year\u2014and when it does, it\u2019ll do so without the support of Disney.<\/p>\n

The British broadcaster confirmed in a statement today<\/a> that after two seasons (and the upcoming spinoff\u00a0The War Between the Land and the Sea),\u00a0Disney will not renew its partnership<\/a> to co-fund and distribute Doctor Who. The show will return at Christmas 2026 for a new special written by current showrunner Russell T Davies.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d like to thank Disney+ for being terrific global partners and collaborators over the past two seasons, and for the upcoming\u00a0The War Between the Land and the Sea<\/a>. The BBC remains fully committed to Doctor Who, which continues to be one of our most loved dramas, and we are delighted that Russell T Davies has agreed to write us another spectacular Christmas special for 2026,\u201d Lindsay Salt, director of drama for the BBC, said in the statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can assure fans, the Doctor is not going anywhere, and we will be announcing plans for the next series in due course which will ensure the TARDIS remains at the heart of the BBC.\u201d<\/p>\n

The BBC has yet to confirm whether Davies will carry on as\u00a0Doctor Who\u2018s showrunner or who will actually star in the 2026 special. The 2025 season concluded<\/a> with Ncuti Gatwa\u2019s Doctor making a surprise exit, regenerating into the appearance of Billie Piper, who played companion Rose Tyler when the show returned after decades of hiatus in 2005.<\/p>\n

The news of Disney\u2019s exit comes after months of uncertainty<\/a> following the conclusion of the 2025 season, with neither the American studio nor the BBC itself willing to commit to continuing Doctor Who with the announcement of a new season. Going into Gatwa\u2019s second season<\/a>, Disney had said it would wait to see what audience numbers would be to determine continuation of its deal. Ultimately, the 2025 season averaged viewership of just 3.2 million over the course of its eight episodes, down from the already-low averages of Gatwa\u2019s debut season in 2024 by about half a million viewers.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll bring you more on the BBC\u2019s plans for\u00a0Doctor Who\u2018s future\u2014which now also include the launch of a new animated iteration<\/a> of the series aimed at preschool audiences the BBC is currently seeking a production partnership for\u2014as and when we learn it.<\/p>\n

Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel<\/a>, Star Wars<\/a>, and Star Trek<\/a> releases, what\u2019s next for the DC Universe on film and TV<\/a>, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The BBC has confirmed, after months of speculation, that\u00a0Doctor Who will return at Christmas next year\u2014and when it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":245986,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[13698,49,48,3494,112488,75],"class_list":["post-245985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-bbc","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-disney","tag-doctor-who","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=245985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245985\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/245986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=245985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=245985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=245985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}