Doctor Who: Jodie Whittaker talks Bradley Walsh and Tosin Cole leaving the series

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Exclusive: SFX catches up with Jodie Whittaker before the Doctor Who festive special: "The fam as a four is no more"

Doctor Who
(Image credit: BBC)

Doctor Who returns this New Year's Day for a festive special, Revolution of the Daleks, and while that's certainly some much-needed good-news, the return of Thirteen will be tinged with sadness: Bradley Walsh and Tosin Cole, who play companions to the Time Lord, are leaving the series. 

"Well, as the Doctor I will say that the fam as a four is no more," Jodie Whittaker tells SFX magazine in the new issue, which features a huge Doctor Who preview. 

"On a personal note, I’m absolutely devastated," she continues. "Without going into any specifics about anything to do with what happens, just purely knowing it was the last scenes for myself with those actors. Both of them carried me to my trailer. I’ve not cried like that for such a long time. Brad couldn’t cope with it at all. Tosin was like, 'I really can’t cope with you getting that upset'. I think that sums up how I feel. Then I was like [feigns crying] 'Don’t leave me with her!'"

Chris Chibnall, who acts as showrunner on Doctor Who, also spoke about the two actors departing the series and teased what's to come in Revolution of the Daleks.

“It’s a 70-minute episode,” Chibnall reveals. “It is Ryan and Graham’s final episode in the show. So it’s big, and it’s epic. It’s emotional. We’ve got Captain Jack back in that episode as well. So there’s plenty going on in the special before you even get to the future. The future is very, very exciting, I would say.”

Of course, he’s not giving anything away about how Tosin Cole and Bradley Walsh depart the show, or if the door is open for their return. “I can tell you that it’s very emotional – we’ve all been in tears watching it. It’s a really important part of the mix of the special, where you get lots of thrills, lots of spills, lots of humour, lots of Daleks and lots of emotion.”

Chibnall and Whittaker talk further about Doctor Who: Revolution of the Daleks in the new issue of SFX – available now. The festive special airs on New Year's Day on BBC One.

Darren Scott
Darren Scott
SFX Editor

I'm the Editor of SFX, the world's number one sci-fi, fantasy and horror magazine – available digitally and in print every four weeks since 1995. I've been editing magazines, and writing for numerous publications since before the Time War. Obviously SFX is the best one. I knew being a geek would work out fine.