Series Three Writers Announced

The new issue of "Doctor Who Magazine" (#369) announces much of the third series writing team. Russell T Davies will himself write the 2006 Christmas special, the first episode of the season and "three or four more" episodes, while he also confirms that the script written by Stephen Fry for this season and announced as moved to next year will be produced then. Four new names have now been confirmed as well for the third series, including two from previous seasons:Steven Moffat ("The Empty Child," "The Doctor Dances," "The Girl in the Fireplace") will return with "an idea which [he] came up with way back in the planning of Series One" to write "at least another 45 minutes", which he guarantees "will not be as good as 'The Empty Child'"; and Paul Cornell ("Father's Day") is contributing a two-parter story. There are also two new names for the season: the author of several DWM comic strips, a Ninth Doctor BBC novel, BBCi's 'Attack of the Graske' and this year's Tardisodes, Gareth Roberts, will write one episode, while new series script editor and writer for the Torchwood spin-off series Helen Raynor will contribute a two-part story -- Helen promises "BRILLIANT monsters!" As with Series Two and Torchwood, Russell T Davies says that there have been extra scripts commissioned from other writers -- a total of 16 scripts including 'over-commissions' are currently being worked on, allowing "flexibility … to shape the series" and leaving "material in place for the fourth run", if Series Four is commissioned. On the subject of which, Davies stresses that it's "just a personal hope, absolutely nothing has been decided yet within the BBC."