Paul McGann On A Five(ish) Doctors Sequel And A Female Doctor
This article is more than 2 years old
As much as we loved The Day of the Doctor, one of our favorite parts of the whole Doctor Who 50th anniversary hooplah was The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot. The half-hour short film starred former Doctors Peter Davison, Paul McGann, Colin Baker, and Sylvester McCoy playing fictionalized versions of themselves as they attempted to scheme and sneak their way into the anniversary special. It was a great riff on the fan resentment that so many of the living Doctor actors weren’t invited to participate in Day of the Doctor, and it was pretty damn hilarious to boot. Well, it sounds like we won’t have to wait another 50 years to see the five(ish) Doctors reunited, as McGann has revealed that a sequel is in the works.
McGann revealed the awesome news while speaking at the Cambridge Union Society, an organization founded in 1815 and “famed for inviting international politicians and academics to speak or to attend its regular debating sessions.” Sadly, the simple existence of the project was all McGann shared, and at this point we don’t know who will be involved, although it’s probably a good bet that the titular five(ish) Doctors will be back in the saddle again, as the original short, written and directed by Fifth Doctor Peter Davison, was very clearly a labor of love. Maybe they’ll try to kidnap Twelfth Doctor Peter Capaldi this time around.
McGann also sounded off on a subject that gets a lot of play anytime the hunt is on for a new actor to play the Doctor — namely, whether we will someday get a female version of the time lord. McGann called the role of the Doctor “one of the greatest characters ever written,” and said he thought the show’s producers had “missed a trick” by not casting a female for the Twelfth Doctor. McGann even offered up his picks for which female actors would be perfect for the role: Tilda Swinton (Adaptation, We Need to Talk About Kevin) and Diana Quick (Law & Order: UK).
McGann played the Eighth Doctor in the 1996 Fox Doctor Who TV movie, opposite Eric Roberts (eeesh) as the Master. For the longest time, it looked like that was all we’d get to see on screen of his Doctor, although he has reprised the role in various Doctor Who audio dramas over the years. Thankfully McGann got to return to the role, however briefly, in the “Night of the Doctor” minisode that led into Day of the Doctor, and which showed us how the Eighth Doctor wound up regenerating into John Hurt’s “War Doctor.” He was so good in that short that many fans wish the BBC would find some way to give him more work as the Doctor, perhaps in an animated series. Sadly, at this point at least, that remains only wishful thinking.
You can watch The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot and “The Night of the Doctor” below. I personally can’t wait to see The Five(ish) Doctors Sequel.
