Doctor Who's Chris Chibnall praises "wonderful" Davros reinvention
The former showrunner speaks on the importance of occasionally ripping up the rule book.
Former Doctor Who showrunner Chris Chibnall has heaped praise on Russell T Davies's reinvention of Davros in the recent Children in Need scene.
The new scene, which was set early in the Daleks' history, when the prototype was still being developed, saw David Tennant return as the Fourteenth Doctor and Julian Bleach reprise his role as the villainous Davros – but not in his wheelchair, as fans have previously known him.
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Speaking about how important it is to occasionally rip up the rule book, Chibnall exclusively told RadioTimes.com: "I don't think you would characterise our era as being scared to move the furniture about. Everybody who's run it, and everybody who writes it, everybody who works on it loves it. Anything that happens on it comes from a position of love.
"I think what's lovely about that sketch is Russell's just cheeky with it. Like, he's respectful and disrespectful and you sort of need to be that as a showrunner and it's delightful. But actually there's a lot to break down in that sketch, where you go – he's moved things on.
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"He's made some decisions, the decision around Davros, and stuff like that, [they're] really fantastic, wonderful decisions and it has to keep changing. It has to keep evolving, it has to keep checking itself against the world and being a little bit ahead of the world."
Chibnall added: "I think the joy of seeing David back on screen as the Doctor is really profound, and I'm sure it'll be profound for the whole country and, I think, hopefully, for the whole world. Even in that little Children in Need scene, just the joy that comes through and the 'he's back!'-ness of it – and he's one of the greatest actors in the world."
The writer went on to add that bold decisions are at the heart of the show, pointing out that the first regeneration is a classic example: "That's a choice somebody made three years into the show, when you go, 'Oh, we need a new lead actor, what do we do? Or do we stop the show?' And they went, 'No, no, no, we're gonna get this person in. And we're going to do that.' And then it changes the entire show, and then every time it happens, again, it changes the entire show.
"But somebody made that really bold decision. Imagine making a decision that bold about the show now – everybody would go nuts. But it's built on huge creative swings, huge changes, huge developments, and it's mainly built on those amazing lead actors. All of them are so wonderful and so different, and to think then that we're going to have an entirely new take on the Doctor, once again, is just thrilling."
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Davies recently explained the carefully considered thought process behind reinventing Davros's look for the Children in Need scene.
Speaking on new BBC Three companion series Doctor Who Unleashed, Davies said: "We had long conversations about bringing Davros back, because he's a fantastic character, [but] time and society and culture and taste has moved on.
"And there's a problem with the Davros of old in that he's a wheelchair user, who is evil. And I had problems with that. And a lot of us on the production team had problems with that, of associating disability with evil. And trust me, there's a very long tradition of this.
"I'm not blaming people in the past at all, but the world changes and when the world changes, Doctor Who has to change as well. So we made the choice to bring back Davros without the facial scarring and without the wheelchair – or his support unit, which functions as a wheelchair.
"I say, this is how we see Davros now, this is what he looks like. This is 2023. This is our lens. This is our eye. Things used to be black and white, they're not in black and white anymore, and Davros used to look like that and he looks like this now, and that we are absolutely standing by."
Davies added that Children in Need night felt like the perfect opportunity to debut the reimagined Davros.
"It's a night where issues of disability or otherness or being excluded from society come right to the front of the conversation. So of all the nights to make this change, I thought it was absolutely vital to do this. And I'm very, very, very proud of the fact that we have."
Read more:
- Take a trip back through 60 years of Doctor Who in Radio Times covers
- Doctor Who at 60: When the Time Lords assembled for Radio Times
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