Doctor Who has dropped the first teaser trailer for its upcoming season 13 during the show’s Comic-Con@Home panel last Sunday.
The 43-second clip doesn’t reveal many details about the new season, but it gives fans their first look at the new character Dan Lewis played by Skins alum John Bishop. Dan replaces the thirteenth Doctor’s (Jodie Whittaker) previous companions Ryan Sinclar (Tosin Cole) and Graham O’Brien (Bradley Walsh), whose story arcs wrapped up at the end of the Doctor Who special episode Revolution of the Daleks last January.
“If I could tell my younger self that one day I would be asked to step on board the TARDIS, I would never have believed it,” said Bishop during the show’s panel, which was also attended by Whittaker, their co-star Mandip Gill, and showrunner Chris Chibnall. “It’s an absolute dream come true to be joining Doctor Who, and I couldn’t wish for better company than Jodie and Mandip.”
The trailer also includes a glimpse of Game of Thrones actor Jacob Anderson, who is guest-starring as Vinder in the new season.
Though Chibnall didn’t share any particular storyline from season 13, he did say that the upcoming season will only tell a singular story and will only be comprised of eight episodes, instead of 10.
“Before we started making it, there were times when we thought we were going to be unable to do the show under Covid conditions this year… there were two ways you could go,” Chibnall explained. “You could go ‘let’s do lots of tiny little episodes in one room, with no monsters,’ or we could throw down the gauntlet and do the biggest story we’ve ever done. We’re going to go to all kinds of different places, we’re going to have all kinds of characters and monsters, and it’s all going to be part of a bigger whole. It’s definitely the most ambitious thing we’ve done since we’ve been on the series.”
Doctor Who season 13, which is still in production, doesn’t have an exact release date yet. The trailer, however, notes that it will premiere sometime later this year.