The BBC and Disney may have announced they’re going their separate ways after two seasons of “Doctor Who” — the show will return with a Christmas special in 2026 — but there’s still one more collaboration to come. The famous Time Lord is sitting this adventure out, but “The War Between the Land and the Sea” is very much a part of the Whoniverse.
Following in the footsteps of previous “Who” spin-offs “Torchwood”, “The Sarah Jane Adventures”, and “Class”, the new five-part series resurrects classic “Doctor Who” monsters, the Sea Devils, aka the Silurians’ watery cousins. They’re not happy about the way the human race has been mistreating the oceans, and are ready to take the fight to the land.
Long-serving “Doctor Who” boss Russell T Davies is the brains behind a new drama that’s targeting an older demographic than the Doctor’s ongoing adventures in the TARDIS. He’s also assembled a big-name cast — including some familiar friends from UNIT — for a series that’s set to make its long-awaited debut in December 2025. Here’s everything you need to know about “The War Between the Land and the Sea”.
“The War Between the Land and the Sea” release date
(Image credit: BBC)
The BBC has confirmed that “The War Between the Land and the Sea” will make landfall in the UK on Sunday, December 7, 2025. The five-part season will kick off with a double bill, launching simultaneously on BBC One and BBC iPlayer at 8.30 pm GMT.
Subsequent episodes will debut through December, with showrunner/creator Russell T Davies confirming that, “All five episodes will combine to make a terrific box set to watch over the Christmas holidays.”
Unfortunately, however, viewers residing in other regions of time and space will have to wait. While the last two seasons of “Doctor Who” have dropped simultaneously on the BBC in the UK and on Disney+ in other territories, “The War Between the Land and the Sea” won’t launch until 2026 on Disney+ (date TBC).
How to watch “The War Between the Land and the Sea”
“The War Between the Land and the Sea” will be available to watch in the UK on BBC iPlayer from Sunday, December 7, 2025. International viewers will have to wait until 2026 for the five-part series to hit Disney+.
If you’re a UK resident travelling overseas when it launches, you can still watch “The War Between the Land and the Sea” for FREE on BBC iPlayer.
Unfortunately, geoblocking restrictions mean that iPlayer doesn’t work outside of the UK, but a VPN can solve that problem. A VPN, or Virtual Private Network, allows you to stream your favourite content from anywhere by changing your IP address to one in a different country, letting you access streaming services just as if you were sitting on your sofa back home.
What is the plot of “The War Between the Land and the Sea”?
(Image credit: BBC)
Much like “Children of Earth”, 2009’s brilliant third season of “Torchwood”, the latest “Doctor Who” spin-off sees the human race dealing with a threat to its very existence — but crucially, without the help of the Doctor.
In “The War Between the Land and the Sea”, an ancient aquatic species known as the Sea Devils emerges from the oceans, introducing themselves to their land-dwelling neighbors (us) and kicking off an international crisis in the process. The alien experts at UNIT (Unified Intelligence Taskforce) subsequently play a pivotal role in negotiations, as a lowly agent named Barclay (Russell Tovey) reluctantly enters talks with Sea Devil counterpart Salt (Gugu Mbatha-Raw).
“[The Sea Devils] wake up and they see the state of the oceans that we have put [them] in,” Davies said at San Diego Comic-Con in 2024. “We have wrecked the place, and it is war. And it’s war on an epic scale.” (If “Children of Earth” is anything to go by, the fact that this particular problem is of our own making is presumably the reason for the Doctor’s no-show.)
With its environmental edge and darker themes, the new drama is targeted at a more grown-up audience than the parent show. “I wanted to show the BBC what this universe is capable of, and the potential that it has, and the punch that it can deliver,” Davies told Empire in November. “It’s very 2025 in its bones. We even deal with the water companies and their profiteering bosses, laughing in our faces. In a series about the water you have to!”
Where have we seen the Sea Devils before “The War Between the Land and the Sea”?
(Image credit: BBC)
Descended from the land-based, prehistoric Silurians, the Sea Devils are an ancient reptilian race, and one of the few “Doctor Who” antagonists to have originated on Earth.
They made their first appearance opposite the Third Doctor (Jon Pertwee) in 1972 “Doctor Who” serial “The Sea Devils”, and have since faced off against Peter Davison’s Fifth Doctor (in 1984’s “Warriors of the Deep”) and the Thirteenth Doctor (2022’s “Legend of the Sea Devils”).
The fact that the Sea Devils already existed in “Who” canon was a blessing for Davies and the story he wanted to tell.
“When they first approached me about coming back to ‘Doctor Who’ in 2021, [‘The War Between the Land and the Sea’] was the first bit of my pitch,” he told Radio Times. “I had this idea separately first. But weirdly, it needs the ‘Doctor Who’ setting. If I just go and pitch this cold, saying, ‘There is a race of creatures that live in the sea…’, they’d say, ‘Really? You sure?’ The pre-existence of the Sea Devils takes all the problems out of it.”
Any fans watching the Sea Devils’ previous appearances (in which they looked more like bipedal turtles than humans) will have noted that the species has been through something of a makeover for “The War Between the Land and the Sea”. While the first trailer (see below) features a brief sighting of a more traditional member of the species, lead Sea Devil Salt (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) looks distinctly more human than her predecessors — an evolution akin to the glow-up given to Madame Vastra and other Silurians in the new “Who” era. It’s not yet clear whether there’s an in-universe explanation for this new, more human styling — is Salt a homo sapien/Sea Devil hybrid, perhaps? — or whether it’s a storytelling decision to make it easier for a pivotal character to express her emotions.
One other thing to note about the latest generation of Sea Devils: Davies has revealed that, I the new show, “It’s racist to say Sea Devil” — apparently they now prefer to be called “Homo Aqua”.
Is there a “The War Between the Land and the Sea” trailer?
The War Between the Land and the Sea | Trailer – BBC – YouTube
The first teaser debuted on May 31, 2025 (see above). In the “The War Between the Land and the Sea” trailer introduces the key players in the drama (Barclay, Salt, some friendly UNIT faces), as well as military hardware, epic political meetings, and what appear to be Sea Devil eggs. There are also, as you’d expect, plenty of shots of both the land and the sea.
“We could make a difference, you and I,” Salt tells Barclay in her voiceover. “End the conflict between our species. Before it’s too late.”
Unfortunately, Barclay appears to be rather less certain about his suitability for this unexpected new role: “I don’t know why you chose me, for any of this,” he counters.
He has until December to work that out — the fate of two worlds could depend on it…
“The War Between the Land and the Sea” cast
(Image credit: BBC)
There are plenty of familiar “Doctor Who” faces in “The War Between the Land and the Sea” cast, though two of them have brand new roles.
Russell Tovey (“Being Human”, “Years and Years”) previously played Midshipman Alonso Frame in the 2007 Christmas special “Voyage of the Damned”, while Gugu Mbatha-Raw (“Loki“, “Surface”) was Tish Jones, sister of “Doctor Who” companion Martha, in the third season of the show’s 21st-century revival.
Tovey will play Barclay, a low-level UNIT operative who unexpectedly becomes humanity’s representative in negotiations with the Sea Devils. Mbatha-Raw, meanwhile, is buried under extensive prosthetics as Salt, a member of the Sea Devil delegation who makes waves at a global summit on the Thames.
Jemma Redgrave is back to head up UNIT in her recurring “Doctor Who” role as Kate Lethbridge-Stewart, alongside fellow “Doctor Who” vets Alexander Devrient (the sensitive face of UNIT muscle, Colonel Christofer Ibrahim) and Ruth Madeley (scientific advisor Shirley Bingham).
Traveling further back into Whoniverse history, Colin McFarlane reprises his “Children of Earth” role as General Austin Pierce, a representative of the US military. Going on previous form, don’t be surprised if Pierce’s presence gets in the way of peace negotiations.
Other members of “The War Between the Land and the Sea” cast — exact roles yet to be officially confirmed — include Adrian Lukis, Patrick Baladi, Francesca Corney, Mei Mac, Vincent Franklin, Waleed Hammad, Iestyn Arwel, Hannah Donaldson, Manpreet Bachu, and Ann Akinjirin.
“The War Between the Land and the Sea” crew
(Image credit: Matt Winkelmeyer / Getty Images)
“Doctor Who” overlord Russell T Davies is creator, executive producer, and showrunner on this new spin-off show, working alongside regular collaborators Joel Collins, Julie Gardner, and Jane Tranter from production company Bad Wolf.
Davies has shared writing duties with Pete McTighe, whose previous credits include long-running Aussie soap “Neighbours”, “Prisoner Cell Block H” reboot “Wentworth”, supernatural Sky drama “A Discovery of Witches”, and BBC One thriller “The Pact”. McTighe also has plenty of “Doctor Who” on his resumé, including Thirteenth Doctor era episodes “Kerblam!” and “Praxeus” (he also wrote the Target novelization of “Kerblam!”), Fifteenth Doctor adventure “Lucky Day”, and a couple of vignettes in 60th anniversary anthology “Tales of the TARDIS”.
Dylan Holmes Williams, who helmed “Who” episodes “73 Yards” and “Dot and Bubble“, is the director for all five episodes of “The War Between the Land and the Sea”. Lorne Balfe (whose numerous screen credits include “Black Widow”, “Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning”, and Wallace & Gromit’s most recent outing, “Vengeance Most Fowl”) is on soundtrack duty.
Where can I watch the previous Sea Devils episodes?
(Image credit: BBC)
As with most episodes of “Doctor Who”, “The Sea Devils”, “Warriors of the Deep”, and “Legend of the Sea Devils” are all available on BBC iPlayer.
A new, re-edited version of the original “The Sea Devils” from 1972 will debut on BBC iPlayer and BBC Four on December 7, transforming the original six-part serial into a 90-minute TV movie. It’ll also feature updated sound design and an “enhanced score”.