As several people have already mentioned.... We've got an official air date!! Mark your calanders everyone, because series 6 starts on April 23rd! Also, following the trend of the latest Christmas special, Doctor Who will air the same day in America as in Britian! At last! The insurmountable distance across the pond has been.... surmounted? Is that a word? Better be, because I like insurmountable.....
Secondly, two comic relief shorts for charity will be airing this upcoming Friday (the 18th). Not sure if those of us outside the UK will be able to watch these on a live stream of the program or anything like that, so start stalking Youtube on Saturday and post links when you find them! Moffat, unfortunately, made a couple typical Muppet about them, but I want to see the specials anyway.
Alright, spoiler time!
First up: Spoilery updates!
The press has been diligently stalking the episode 12 film crew and have gotten some really good shots AND a full conversation out of it! There's so much more to this story that I don't want to post all of it! The spoiler blog doesn't want to spoil everything for it's readers. All I will say is that everything from the villain to the Doctor's second companion in this story have been found online and Ten's obsession with shops reaches a climax.
Onward and upward to things that are actually less spoiler-y because people are keeping their mouths tightly shut!
The Neil Gaiman episode (currently slated to be number 4) is set on a junkworld and will be an episode that "people will remember forever." Gaiman's words, not mine. The central figure in all this is a character named Idris who will be played by Suranne Jones who also played the Mona Lisa in the Sarah Jane Adventures. (She was actually pretty good as the Mona Lisa even though I kept on getting distracted because she didn't look like the painting enough. There was a lot of scenery to chew in that episode and she gnawed with the best of them.)
So why do we care about a one-off character that is destined to die and/or be left behind by the Doctor once the adventure is over? Because, supposedly, we're going to know who she is. Idris is someone the Doctor knows from his past with a new face!
Granted, with everyone being so hush hush about this episode with 12 is filming in the streets, not many people are in full spec mode over who Idris could be. Most are assuming it's probably Jenny, especially since Idris apparently bites the Doctor, who's regenerated since her last appearance. However, there's one comment that seems a little strange from the announcement of Suranne Jones' hiring. From the mouth of Moffat; "What can I tell you about next series? The startling truth about Idris’ new soul – even the Doctor doesn’t believe her!"
New soul? Now, granted, it is the Muppet here. He could be spouting out stuff to throw us off. However, 'new soul' doesn't sound much like regeneration to me. Has Idris somehow captured or been captured by the soul of someone the Doctor once knew? You know what that sounds like, don't you?
So tell me. Could this face be the face of the new Master?
Also! Free bonus for reading all of this! Deleted script scene from the episode! It's on Gaiman's blog.