Russell T Davies’ shock return to the Doctor Who showrunner position 12 years after he left the show has set an intriguing new precedent – but another modern Doctor Who showrunner says that he’s still sure he won’t make a similar comeback.
“I think I can confidently say I’m done showrunning Doctor Who,” Steven Moffat (who was in charge of Doctor Who from 2010 to 2017) told RadioTimes.com at the Radio Times Covers Party.
“Everyone can stop worrying. I did it for six seasons on the trot. And I cannot imagine going back into doing that. I cannot. I simply cannot picture it.”
He added: “I loved the show. I don’t want anyone to think I didn’t love the show. And I loved every second I spent on it, although some of them were hellish. But I’ve done that. I have done it and I did it a lot.
“So no offence and no disrespect and certainly no disdaining of wonderful memories. But no, I will not be showrunning Doctor Who again.”
Moffat also noted that despite actually kicking off modern Doctor Who in 2005, Davies worked on the show for a slightly shorter time than he had, joking that his old collaborator needed to “catch up” to even the score.
“I did six seasons, and he’s got two seasons to catch up on. So that’s fine,” he told us.
“I actually don’t mind that, I would quite like him to overtake me. Because it’s really weird. It’s weird and strange and wrong for your own favourite show to be the one […] that you wrote the most of. That’s wrong.
“So I’d be quite happy for Russell to scoot ahead of me. That’d be nice. That’d be good.”
But who knows? With rumours swirling of old Doctors returning and the Doctor Who 60th anniversary celebrations looming, we’d have to note that Moffat doesn’t specifically deny that he’s done writing Doctor Who entirely – just showrunning it.
And given Matt Smith’s latest comments on the matter, we can’t rule out the possibility that he and his old screenwriter have another shot at the Whoniverse on the cards. Unless they don’t – in which case, ignore the final two paragraphs of the article.
See more photos from the Radio Times Covers Party 2022 in the new issue of Radio Times magazine, on sale Tuesday 5th April. Subscribe now to get each issue delivered to your door, and for more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to the Radio Times podcast with Jane Garvey.
Doctor Who: Legend of the Sea Devils comes to BBC One and BBC iPlayer on Sunday 17th April. For more, check out our dedicated Sci-Fi page or our full TV Guide.
