New Doctor Who short story finds the Doctor and her companions in lockdown

Ready for the next Doctor Who short story? While everyone has been languishing in quarantine, past and current Doctor Who writers have been penning new adventures for us to read involving a variety of iterations of the Doctor, and it doesn’t look like the trend it going to end. The latest comes from former series writer Paul Cornell. If you’ve been wondering what the current Doctor and her team of companions would do during a lockdown, “The Shadow Passes” will fill you in.

Told from the perspective of companion Yaz (Mandip Gill), “The Shadow Passes” takes our heroes to the planet Calapia. Things take a turn, and the Doctor and her companions have to spend three weeks in an underground shelter, which might feel familiar to a lot of people right about now:

"The Calapian who’d opened the door of the shelter when they’d knocked on it had been shocked to find there were still tourists who didn’t know about the Death Moon that passed over the planet every 64 years. They had quickly ushered the Doctor and friends inside and had assigned them a room. They’d asked if they had any hats and had seemed pleasantly surprised when they hadn’t. Hat storage alone, they’d said, was taking up a whole corridor down here.‘How long’s it going to be? I mean, this is a moon, that’ll come and go in a night, yeah?’ Ryan had asked.The Calapian had looked awkward on all six of its faces. Then it had told them they would be down here for three of their Earth weeks. There were only minutes before the passage would begin. They had had no hope of getting back to the TARDIS.‘Brilliant,’ the Doctor had said, a word which had been completely at odds with the sort of words Yaz had been about to utter. It hadn’t matched the looks on the faces of Graham and Ryan either. ‘Three weeks of indoor games! Result!’"

The story comes at a time where many are in need of support and encouragement. Just like us, the Doctor and her friends are in isolation and helping one another get through it. Thank you, Doctor Who, for giving us all this original content — we are ever so grateful for it, especially now. You can read the story here.

Speaking of extra content, ex-showrunner Steven Moffat revealed something interesting on Twitter this week. Think back to the season 9 episode “Heaven Sent,” where the Twelfth Doctor (Peter Capaldi) was locked in a waterlogged castle and hounded by a mysterious creature. According to Moffat, a classic Doctor Who villain was set to appear but didn’t:

"I originally planned for it to be a Weeping Angel. Oh, I’d forgotten that!!"

Um, excuse me, what?! WEEPING ANGEL?! That would have been epic. Hands down, they are the scariest villains of Doctor Who. You all remember “Blink”, don’t you?

“Heaven Sent” was this week’s virtual watchalong episode, held in honor of Peter Capaldi’s birthday. And there are more virtual watch parties on the way, including one this upcoming Sunday, April 19: a double-feature of the season 4 episodes “The Stolen Earth” and “Journey’s End.”

Between these two episodes, we get appearances by all of the Tenth Doctor’s companions including Rose Tyler (Billie Piper), Donna (Catherine Tate), and Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman). Not to mention, Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman) is a part of the fun too.

I’m pretty excited about it, especially since former showrunner Russell T Davies is promising “extra surprises on the day.” I feel like Doctor Who fans have been spoiled rotten as it is, and now we have even more to look forward to? I simply can’t wait!

To stay up to date on everything fantasy, science fiction, and WiC, follow our all-encompassing Facebook page and sign up for our exclusive newsletter.

Get HBO, Starz, Showtime and MORE for FREE with a no-risk, 7-day free trial of Amazon Channels

h/t RadioTimes.com (short story, Steven Moffat, Russell T Davies)