RTD Reveals Series 14 Was Planned to Air Much Sooner, But Hit By FX Delays

Russell T Davies has explained the reason why Series 14’s broadcast didn’t follow Ncuti Gatwa’s debut sooner.

Gatwa completed filming on his first full season back in the summer of last year, so some might have expected it earlier than May of this year. On top of that, the first RTD era favoured early spring broadcasts.

Now speaking in the latest issue of Doctor Who Magazine (Issue 600), Davies revealed that the original plan was to air much earlier in 2023.

Davies said: “There’s still a lot of work to do. Tons and tons. In an ideal world, we might have followed ‘The Church on Ruby Road’ with a full series of Ncuti and Millie in January, and believe me, we tried. Way back in 2022, we juggled schedules and budgets and capacity, but… nope. We’d have ended up spending money on the rush, rather than on the programme itself.”

He continued with the main source of the hold-up: “It’s the FX, really; people keep telling me how fast and easy FX are, and I hear the distant sobs of our FX teams. This stuff takes ages! Look at that gorgeous UNIT Tower. The Not-things. The Meep! It’s months and months of hard work, and well worth the wait.”