Russell T Davies is out as Doctor Who showrunner and the BBC wants pitches for a reboot

Russell T Davies is stepping down as Doctor Who showrunner. He's not coming back for a third time. The guy who revived the show in 2005 and returned again in 2023 is officially handing off the TARDIS keys.

The BBC has launched a competitive tender process, inviting producers to pitch their vision for a Doctor Who reboot. That's a formal way of saying they want fresh blood and new ideas. This isn't a quiet handoff to an internal successor—it's an open call.

Who might take over?

Jed Mercurio, the creator behind Line of Duty, has thrown his hat in the ring. His company Hat Trick Mercurio submitted interest in taking over production. Mercurio knows how to build tension and twist a plot, so that could be interesting. Whether the BBC picks him or someone else, we won't know for a while.

Davies said production on the show with a new Doctor and companion should start in summer 2027. That's a couple years out, which gives whoever lands the job time to plan and cast without rushing.

AI drama at the BBC

Meanwhile, BBC director general Matt Brittin stirred up trouble at the Royal Television Society conference. He said he received a fully AI-generated Doctor Who episode and that it was "pretty good." That did not go over well.

Davies called the comments clumsy and said his inbox was flooded with reactions. He also noted that Brittin hasn't worked in television for long and suggested he might be more cautious with opinions in the future. Translation: the creative side of the BBC is not thrilled about the boss casually praising AI-written scripts.

What this means

Doctor Who has been through a lot of changes over six decades, but this feels like a real reset. Davies brought the show back from the dead once and gave it a second wind recently. Now someone else gets to define what comes next.

If you grew up watching the reboot or got into it during the Tennant or Smith years, this is the end of an era. The show will keep going, but it's going to be someone else's vision. That could be great or it could be a mess. We'll find out in a few years.