Speculation Who

Every year since the new series - I've kept a notebook about Doctor Who – this year I thought I might as well put some of my current notes online. Well, I have started doing a Media course. So this reviewy - newsy, gossipy stuff is all good practice for me. Or so I can tell myself.

So even before the new series starts- the speculation has already been stacking up and up.

Fitting together what we know for certain with details that have been already confirmed is...

They'll be the usual 13 episodes this year – but the year after that there'll only be four specials.

The first episode of the new season is going to see the re-introduction of Donna as the season's new regular companion. [I am so worried about this. Please don't ruin it Catherine – oh, please don't ruin it.] It's likely to be called "Partners In Crime" and it's been written by RTD.
Ex-Coronation Street actress Sarah Lancashire will be in it playing a powerful businesswoman, very probably an eeeeeevil businesswoman - and at some point she will hold up a red and white pill and proclaim "This is the spark of life".

They're going to visit ancient Pompeii on volcano day. (Wonder if they'll cross paths with a young Captain Jack wandering around in the background back when he was a conman and long before he met the Doctor? Because I like the idea of that continuity being played out. But it's unlikely to happen I guess.)

This year the writer they're going to meet is Agatha Christie. No doubt this story line will feature that part of her life where she mysteriously vanished for a few days in 1929.

[The Doctor has now met on-screen Shakespeare, Dickens, and H G Wells, and I don't know who else in other media or spoken lines. I'll have to start a list.]

They're going to visit the planet of the Ood.

There's going to be a two-parter featuring the return of the Sontarians. One of whom is going to be played by that short actor bloke that used to be in 'the Young Ones'. Which strikes me as being -ood, sorry, odd. It's going to be called "The Sontaran Strategem" - and Helen Raynor is the writer.
[source.]

There's been heavy speculation that Davros will be the 'big bad' this season. Whether or not he'll be played by Ben Kingsley remains to be seen – I can easily see him in the part as a young Davros. And Kingsley certainly needs to redeem himself a bit after that dreadful Thunderbirds movie. I'm speculating that Dalek Caan has decided to have a quick temporal shift to visit the creator of the Daleks to help recreate the race – perhaps give Davros a few pointers on how to improve overall the traveling machine design. Something like that.
[another source.]

The finale is going to be a very big thing with four companions Donna, Martha, Sarah Jane, and Rose having to help or rescue the doctor or something. Will that be over two – or – three – or even four episodes? Will it spill over into next year somehow?


Extra links:
Helen Raynor interview.