Series 14

**Series 14** of Doctor Who ran from 25th December 2024 to 25th December 2025. It was the first series produced by BBC Essex in cooperation with Disney+ and the BBC. It starred Adrian Lester as the Sixteenth Doctor and Francesca Henry as Elise Jackson. The series opened with The Secret War Of 1941 and concluded with The Christmas Riot.

## Production Team

### Writer/s

Andy Wilkins, Rona Munro, Neil Gaiman, Maxine Alderton, Nina Metivier, Ben Aaronovitch, Steven Moffat

### Director/s

Rachel Talalay, Jamie Magnus-Stone, Graeme Harper

## Overview

Series 14 introduced the Sixteenth Doctor, along with new companion Elise Jackson. It deals with a revelation involving the Doctor's family on Gallifrey with the second half of the season putting emphasis on the Doctor trying to overcome the realisation of what is revealed in "The Family Of The Doctor" before having to deal with a Time Lord Civil War at the conclusion of the season.

## Television stories

### Story formats and arc

Series 14 saw a recreation of the show's format for its episodes. All of the episodes were one-part stories spaced over the whole series, concluding with a two-parter finale with an increased 16 stories with 2 movies added in.

## Cast

* The Doctor - Adrian Lester
* Elise Jackson - Francesca Henry

### Recurring

* The Master - John Simm
* The Rani - Joanne Froggatt
* Jenny - Georgia Tennant >
* Rassilon -
* Borusa -
* Daleks - voiced by Nicholas Briggs

## Production

Series 14 consisted of 15 stories and sixteen episodes. Its head writer was Andy Wilkins who succeeded Chris Chibnall in the role, and thus the series was the start of what fans colloquially refer to as the "Wilko Universe era",

Under Wilkins' leadership, a number of past writers and directors returned to the programme whilst bringing in new talent who had previously written fan fiction. The likes of Ben Aaronovitch returned in capacities not seen since before the programmes cancellation in 1989.

However the decision to move the production making of the series from Cardiff to Wilkins' home city of Southend-On-Sea proved to be a new vision and one that was appreciated by those who had felt quite distant from the programme over the previous twenty years of production overseen in Wales. Series 14 saw an unexpected success with the British public following its return to its traditional Saturday night viewing slots whilst ensuring it was also accessible on streaming platforms to those overseas following its Disney+ deal which saw an increased budget for the programme in general.

Series 14 was aired overseas to those through the aforementioned deal with Disney+ with the summer movie "Doctor Who vs Super Sentai vs Kamen Rider" being a joint airing collaboration with Disney+, the BBC and Netflix who had recently obtained the broadcast viewing rights to both Super Sentai and Kamen Rider from parent company Toei.

Production filming began in late 2023 with the episodes blocked into two episodes a piece.

## Promotional trailers

For the series, several promotional trailers were created, utilising shot footage of and

* Several short, wordless five-second "stings" were also produced. These showed close-ups of the Doctor and the TARDIS. No series logo or title is shown, with only a snippet of the *Doctor Who* theme or the TARDIS sound effect to identify the programme.