Doctor Who Releases Anniversary Special Cast Pics, Plus The Official Comic Drops A Major Clue

The Day of the Doctor is nigh.

By David Wharton | Updated

This article is more than 2 years old

Who5We’re a little over a month away from the premiere of the much-anticipated Doctor Who 50th anniversary special The Name of the Doctor and the BBC has seen fit to share the first official cast pics from the program. There are no big surprises in the pictures unless you’ve somehow avoided the casting news or haven’t seen the end of season seven, but our discussion does get specific and spoilery below them, so mind the big orange spoiler warning!

Tally ho, spoilers below!

First off, how cool is that top shot of three Doctors all lined up: Matt Smith’s Eleventh, David Tennant’s Tenth, and John Hurt’s 8.5/Secret Ninth? It’s just a great shot and gets me even more excited to see Smith and Tennant sharing the screen, much less acting against the legendary John Hurt.

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You also get a shot of the Doctor dangling from the TARDIS, a sequence shot at London’s National Gallery, and a picture of Clara (Jenna-Louise Coleman) alongside Jemma Redgrave as Kate Stewart, the Brigadier’s daughter.

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The wardrobe on Hurt’s character is worth special attention. It’s been pointed out before that Hurt seems to be wearing two very recognizable pieces of clothing: Paul McGann’s vest and Christopher Eccleston’s leather jacket. The fact that Hurt’s Doctor is wearing them would seem to add fuel to the speculation that his “secret Doctor” fits between the Eighth and Ninth (which again raises the question of whether Eccleston’s Ninth was actually the Tenth, Tennant the Eleventh, and so on.) We’ve included shots of McGann and Eccleston in costume for comparison.

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And on the subject of Hurt’s Doctor, here’s another intriguing tidbit from the official Doctor Who comic published by IDW. Specifically from issue #12, written by Andy Diggle, and pointed out by the folks at Bleeding Cool. The pages give us a glimpse of the last days of the Time War on the Doctor’s home planet of Gallifrey. Take a look at the pages below and ask yourself: if the actions of John Hurt’s Doctor weren’t done “in the name of the Doctor”…could they have been done in the name of the Renegade?

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