It goes without saying that in this era of Doctor Who, secrecy is particularly abundant around pretty much everything when it comes to the show's production. Rumours rife and the occasional fragments of info scoured from sources close to set and articles related to bits of information coming from passersby whenever Doctor Who shoots on location in and around Cardiff, Sheffield or the city that I've called home for the last few years, Bristol.
So naturally, we simply don't know as much about the upcoming series as we would do if we were still in the Steven Moffat era of the show when secrecy was rather sparse compared to now. However, like any show that's in the public eye like Doctor Who has continued to be, not everything, much to Chris Chibnall's chagrin, can be kept totally secret.
So what do we know about Series 12?
Truthfully, we still don't know very much, certainly not as much as we did about Series 11 when it had wrapped principal photography. By that time, there'd been huge leaks involving its premiere episode having a fifty-two second clip from the post production office shared around the internet which caused something of a meltdown from the BBC. On top of that, there'd been a fair amount of low quality photos taken inside Roath Lock Studios that were incredibly spoilery, including the first and incredibly bad look at the Arwel Jones TARDIS interior that lacked any of the finesse provided by the full lighting in the show as well as various recording & sound equipment which provided slight looks at monsters and various characters.
Series 12 has been without anything quite as bad as that. Our first official look at the upcoming series came with the announcement that the Judoon would be returning to do battle with the Thirteenth Doctor and Team Tardis, a little over five months ago. Since then we've had no more official announcements of any kind from official figures involved with the show. However, unofficially, there's a few things we do know. Thanks to the CV's of selected writers, we know that the Series 12 writers room will be made up of Chris Chibnall, Ed Hime, Prasanna Puwanarajah, Victoria Asare-Archer and Maxine Alderton. Vinay Patel is also rumoured to return for an episode but this hasn't been confirmed yet.
The list of this series' directors also seems to be confirmed with Jamie Stone helming Blocks 1 and 5, Lee Haven-Jones on Block 2, Nida Manzoor on Block 3 and Emma Sullivan on Block 4. Lee Haven-Jones is also credited for a sixth block which is rumoured to be two additional special episodes to be broadcast in the festive 2019 and 2020 slot respectively.
We know very little about the cast for the upcoming series with the only cast members actually confirmed being Jodie Whittaker as The Doctor with Bradley Walsh, Mandip Gill and Tosin Cole reprising their roles as Graham, Yasmin and Ryan. Guest stars for this series (again, thanks to online CV's) include Stephen Fry, Maxim Baldry, James Buckley, Jo Martin and Neil Stuke. Also said to be appearing in Series 12 are Shobna Gulati and Daniel Adeboyega as Najia Khan and Aaron Sinclair respectively. A recent rumour however has suggested quite the casting for a big character as Line Of Duty & Marvel's Iron Fist actor Sacha Dhawan is reportedly taking on the role of The Master, taking over the role from both John Simm and Michelle Gomez who played the last incarnations of the character and as yet, we've seen no regeneration for either of them.
SPOILER WARNING
MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD - DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WISH TO BE SPOILED.
Series 12 will feature two more big monster returns as revealed by leaked photos from location shooting, the latest of which has revealed that one of the specials that was filmed as part of Block 6 will see the return of the Daleks in their instantly recognisable Russell T Davies bronze design along with what appears to be a full scale, black battle armoured version of the Reconnaissance Scout Dalek in a story that i'm told is written as a direct sequel to 'Resolution' and will reveal that the new black Dalek is in fact engineered by MDZ research and will face off against the bronze Skaro Daleks akin to 1988's 'Remembrance Of The Daleks'. This episode is believed to air in the 2020 Christmas/New Year 2021 slot.
Seemingly destined to also return to face the Thirteenth Doctor this series is none other the silver handle head foes, The Cybermen. Originally suspected to just be actors in knights armour, as more set photos came out (it was a closed set but filming on a mountain will attract some attention), we learned that the "knights" were in fact Cybermen with something of a redesign for the first time since 2013. The new design as you can see appears to be a unique mashup of models from 'The Invasion', 'Earthshock' and 'Rise Of The Cybermen' to create a new variant that seems to borrow a steampunk-esque aesthetic. It should be noted however that there WERE actors on location that were dressed as knights with swords, horses and such alike which suggests this episode does take place in the 1400-1600's.
The Sea Devils
This feels like an opportune time to address the elephant in the room as it were. There's been rumours for months that the Sea Devils would be returning for the first time since 1984. I unintentionally started this rumour when i was asked by somebody on Twitter to disclose spoilers about Series 12 and i knew this person wouldn't keep it to themselves as they'd previously mass shared the leaked clip to their friends after i told that person to not send it to anybody else and so gave them a completely false spoiler stating that The Sea Devils would appear in the fifth episode of Series 12.
The same person then listed a random actor as being a Sea Devil in that episode on the Internet Movie Database. Any rumours of Sea Devils that you see should be treated as absolutely false and i apologise that its gotten so out of whack but it proves that people will believe anything without a shred of actual evidence.
The Sea Devils aren't in Series 12, sorry.
What Next?
We still know very little given how close we potentially are to the premiere of Series 12. Doctor Who opted to skip SDCC this year as well as NYCC and didn't bother to utilise the opportunity of BAFTA Cymru to launch a trailer or any kind of actual marketing. However there is Children In Need coming up in a few weeks time which given its a BBC event that broadcasts live to millions of people, would be a perfect time for the BBC to launch a trailer for a festive special for either Christmas Day or New Years Day and it in turn could carry the full series 12 trailer at the end of it (see : 'The Return Of Doctor Mysterio') and an official series premiere date with it. We'll see what happens!
If there's any news in the coming weeks, i'll be sure to leave an update!
Update : Doctor Who will have a presence at Children In Need and a Series trailer will premiere on November 23rd 2019.
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