A two-part Doctor Who special will be broadcast during the 2009–2010 Christmas season.This will be the last story for David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor prior to the character's regeneration into his eleventh incarnation, which will be played by Matt Smith.It will also be the last Doctor Who story written by Russell T Davies, who shepherded the series' return to British television in 2005 and has been the series' executive producer and chief writer since.Davies will be succeeded as executive producer and showrunner by Steven Moffat.
Bernard Cribbins, who appeared in the story "Voyage of the Damned" and throughout Series 4 as Wilfred Mott, grandfather of Donna Noble, will act as the Doctor's companion in this two-part story.Catherine Tate,who played Donna,will also appear,as will Jacqueline King,who played Sylvia Noble,Donna's mother.Other cast members seen during filming include John Simm,Jessica Hynes,Elisabeth Sladen,Tommy Knight,David Harewood,June Whitfield,Barry Howard and Karl Collins.
Precise dates for the broadcast have not been announced, but the second part may be broadcast in early 2010.
Writing
Davies described the story as "huge and epic, but also intimate.Davies had been planning the story for some time,indicating that it continued the trend of series finales being progressively more dramatic:
I knew I'd write David's last episode one day, so I've had this tucked away.You do think: 'How can the stakes get bigger?'And they do.They really do.I don't mean just in terms of spectacle,but in terms of how personal it gets for him.
—Russell T Davies
The Christmas specials constitute Davies'last script for Doctor Who and Julie Gardner's last job producing the series.It also is the last episode Tennant is appearing in,having elected to leave with Davies and Gardner to allow Davies' successor Steven Moffat to start with a clean slate.In Doctor Who Magazine 407, Davies wrote about the night he finished the script:
I've had these last pages ready in my head for months and months.Years,to be honest. It takes as long to write as it does to type.So I keep rattling away until...The last words.Trouble is,last words don't really exist.In ten minutes time,I'll change my mind about Scene 25,and go back to write something different.Then I'll get up tomorrow and change all sorts of stuff,before sending it to the office. And then the proper rewrites start.Even then,you keep writing; you keep writing; you think of lines people should have said for the rest of your life.Still, what the hell,let's allow a bit of ceremony.The last words. Maybe I should sit here for hours,deliberating over them.But I know exactly what they are.I type them out. Times like this,typewrites would be better.Typewriters are romantic.A little metal letter should fly.It should hit the paper,whack! Tiny particles of ink should puff and settle.But no,there's just a plastic keyboard.I press the key.The final letter is n.Then a full stop.And that's it.Save.Done.Good.
—Russell T Davies, Doctor Who Magazine issue 407,Production Notes.
When asked about the emotional impact of writing his last Doctor Who script,he said,I would have thought that when I handed in the last script I might have burst into tears or got drunk or partied with 20 naked men,but when these great moments happen you find that real life just carries on. The emotion goes into the scripts.Tennant and Julie Gardner seperately said that they cried when they read the script.The last three specials of 2009 were foreshadowed in the episode "Planet of the Dead",when the low-level psychic character Carmen gave the Doctor the prophecy:
You be careful,because your song is ending,sir.It is returning,it is returning through the dark.And then... oh,but then...he will knock four times.
—Carmen,"Planet of the Dead"
The prophecy was designed by Davies to be a classical science fiction prophecy which evoked memories of the Ood prophecy to the Doctor and Donna in"Planet of the Ood" and foreshadowed the remaining specials.Tennant explained the prophecy meant that the Doctor's"card had become marked" and the three specials would thus be darker—characterising"Planet of the Dead"as the"last time the Doctor gets to have any fun and that the subject of the prophecy was not the obvious answer
