Ivan Radford | On 24, Dec 2023

Warning: This contains spoilers.

One Doctor regenerating into another is always a tricky and emotional thing – doubly so in the case of The Giggle, Doctor Who’s third and final 60th anniversary special, which not only has to introduce Ncuti Gatwa as the Fifteenth Doctor but also bid farewell to David Tennant for a second time, this time as the Fourteenth Doctor. Never one to be outfoxed or out-Whoed, Russell T Davies simply takes a massive hammer to the whole problem – and the reverberations will be felt fo a long time to come.

We begin with the Doctor (Tennant) and Donna (Catherie Tate) back on Earth to find humanity tearing itself apart. It’s a humdinger of a problem, becaus Davies isn’t interested in just having a monster of the week, but taking the chance to do something with it. Humans have started to go crazy, we discover, thinking they’re each 100% right and everybody else is wrong – a conviction that emanates from the very first TV broadcast back in 1925 (when John Logie Baird did actually film “Stooky Bill”, a puppet). Interfered with here by the Toymaker (Neil Patrick Harris), that TV image contains his evil, infectious giggle, which has been echoing through screens for decades.

There are no points for spotting the criticism of our moden, technologically driven age where everyone so easily retreats into their own echo chambers of opinions – regardless of what is factually or morally right. But there are points for Davies, who, fresh from Years and Years and It’s a Sin, reminds us that sci-fi at its best has something to say – it’s a bold political statement during a family hour of TV that builds on the heartfelt inclusion of the first two anniversary specials, and remind us all, in Tennant’s words, of humankind’s capacity to hate one another.

If that were all this episode did, that would be a commenable piece of teatime showstopping – but The Giggle is just getting warmed up. Taking on the Toymaker is a whole new level of UNIT, which comes complete with the return of Jemma Redgrave’s Kate and Ruth Madeley’s Shirley, plus Bonnie Langford’s Classic Doctor Who companion, Mel, and a massive new Avengers-inspired towering HQ in the middle of London. Russell T Davies is in full Torchwood mode here, and the potential for a spin-off – thanks to that new injection of Disney money – is so glaringly obvious that they might as well announce it already.

Amid all this intentional franchise-bulding, it could be easy for Neil Patrick Harris to get lost. Except, of course, he’s Neil Patrick Harris, and he’s a seamless addition to the Whoniverse as the rejigged version of a problematical character from Classic Doctor who – playfully riffing on his history just as he toys with the very fabric of the show. Director Chanya Button does brilliant work here, as the Doctor and Donna vernture in the Toymakers’ haunted house realm, surrounded by creep marionettes and haunting taunts – balanced out by a sprinkling of Scooby Doo-esque corridors and doors. An inspired sequence involving the Spice Girls’ Spice up Your Life, meanwhile, is one of the best things you’ll see on TV this year.

It’s in the final showdown with the Toymaker that Harris and Tennant really get to sink their teeth into the anniversary specials’ over-arching theme – that of the Doctor coming to terms with their own past. After the multiple canon-shaking events of the Chris Chibnall era, this is a smart, necessary (and respectful and compassionate) pause before moving forwards – after all, what else are annivesaries for? And so we see the Doctor reminded of the colalteral damage from their travels (#justiceforMartha), particularly the trauma of the Flux and the chunk of the universe that was destroyed by it. In the wake of the Timeless Child revelations during Jodie Whittaker’s run in the TARDIS, Tennant delivers a moving portrait of someone reconnecting with who they are, often just through facial expressions alone.

When the time does come for Tennant to say goodbye again, Davies doesn’t make it that straightforward. Instead of a typical regeneration, he coins a “bigeneration”, which sees Ncuti Gatwa step into frame 20 minutes earlier than anyone might have expected. What dos mean for Tennant? It means that he winds up – thanks to a swing of the Toymaker’s hammer, claiming a prize from beating the Toymaker at his game – with his very own copy of the TARDIS and a chance to live out his years on Earth quietly with Donna, Rose and the family.

If that sounds like a bit of cheat, the way it’s done makes sure that nobody – including Ncuti Gatwa, most importantly – is short-changed. Gatwa emerges, fully formed but half-clothed, in a glorious burst of humour, wit, smarts and enthusiasm, but also with a wonderful compassionate show of maturity: he’s the one who takes Tennant into his arms and gives him a hug.

“I got you,” he says to the broken Fourteenth Doctor, before describing the duplicate TARDIS as an opportunity for Tennant’s Doctor to go through rehab – after running on fumes for so many years, he can take time out and recover from burnout with people he loves. It’s surely only because Tennant’s Doctor has gone through that process of self-care that Gatwa’s Doctor can leap out into the Whoniverse with such vigour and composure.

Davies has since speculated that, in the moment of the TARDIS being duplicated and the bigeneration occuring, the ripple spread throughout the Whoniverse to all previous Doctors – perhaps tying in with the presence of the past Doctors and companions sharing memories of old adventures in the anniversary miniseries Tales of the TARDIS. With Tennant effectively parked, and expected to stay grounded and live out his years of recovery in peace, Davies’ move feels less about appeasing fans and more about giving a happy ending to this phase of the show – but it also smartly opens up the opportunity in the future for Doctors to crossover with, and spin-off from, each other in countless combinations, without needing to worry about continuities matching up precisely. In other words, the MCU era of Doctor Who has arrived.

Crucially, though, Gatwa doesn’t feel overshadowed or diminished by all those moving parts, which is partly thanks to his own sheer charisma. The fact that he gets to spend his Doctor Who debut playing a literal game of catch in his underpants is oddly fitting: he’s a confident, funny presence with immediate sass and warmth. The result lays out the canvas of the Whoniverse’s future with a tender nod to the years gone by, while gently pressing the reset button for what comes next with a thrilling sense of potential, promise and possibilities. Roll on the next 60 years, starting with Ncuti’s first Christmas special.

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