Fun, flirty and far too brief: why did Ncuti Gatwa leave Doctor Who so soon?

Young, beautiful and queer, the first Black man to hold the sonic screwdriver made waves before his shock regeneration – but his time in the Whoniverse was the shortest in 20 years. What next for him … and the show?At the weekend, Doctor Who attempted to pull off the holy grail of a surprise regeneration, with Billie Piper appearing to step into the shoes of the departing 15th Doctor Ncuti Gatwa in a move that, unless you are constantly online in the fandom rumour mills, would have come as a shock. Gatwa’s exit gives him one of the shortest ever tenures in a role that has been a fixture of British television for more than six decades.Fresh from making waves in Sex Education, 32-year-old Gatwa is young and beautiful in a way that the Doctor has not always been. His incarnation of the Time Lord delivered scenes it is hard to imagine most of the other actors inhabiting – whether that was him clubbing, pulling off a 1960s dance number, using a glitter-canon to fly through space, or saying “babes” a lot. Continue reading...

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