Series 11, Episode 3 | 1 part | First broadcast: 21 October 2018 | Writers: Malorie Blackman and Chris Chibnall | Director: Mark Tonderai
Cast
- Jodie Whittaker as the Thirteenth Doctor
- Bradley Walsh as Graham O’Brien
- Tosin Cole as Ryan Sinclair
- Mandip Gill as Yasmin Khan
- Vinette Robinson as Rosa Parks
- Joshua Bowman as Krasko
Summary
Traveling to Montgomery, Alabama in 1955, the Doctor and her companions discover a time-displaced criminal named Krasko attempting to sabotage the timeline by preventing Rosa Parks from making her historic refusal to give up her bus seat, forcing the time travelers to subtly manipulate circumstances—at real personal risk and discomfort, especially for Ryan and Yasmin as people of color navigating the segregated American South—to ensure history unfolds exactly as it must, even though it means the group can only watch, unable to intervene, as Parks is arrested.
Interesting Facts
- This episode was co-written by celebrated author Malorie Blackman, the first Black writer credited on a Doctor Who script.
- It deliberately avoided a traditional monster, focusing instead on historical racism and segregation as the antagonist force alongside the time-tampering villain Krasko.
- The production consulted extensively with historians and considered the legacy of Rosa Parks to portray the events and dialogue with sensitivity and accuracy.
- The episode ends without a musical score over the final scene, using Andra Day’s song “Rise Up” instead, a rare deviation from the show’s typical scoring approach.
- It received widespread critical acclaim and several award nominations for its handling of a real historical civil rights event within a family sci-fi format.
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