In an interview with SFX Magazine, Russell T Davies explained his rationale for leaving some Doctor Who plot mysteries unresolved and unexplained.

According to Davies, the reason why characters break the fourth wall to talk to or wink at the audience is contained in a scene which never made it to the screen in an early draft of the script for the 60th anniversary special The Star Beast. He doesn’t necessarily intend to explain the reason in a future Doctor Who episode.

“That hasn’t been explained, and it might never be, frankly. It’s very interesting, within the Doctor Who offices, we know exactly why that happens and yet I’m showing no sign of putting that on screen. There is actually a reason for it that was in a very early draft of The Star Beast.”

“But I see no need to explain it whatsoever. My sister watches that, she doesn’t blink. She actually doesn’t blink when a character turns to camera and gives them a wink. I mean, you would if it was Pride and Prejudice, that would be odd. But there’s something showy about Doctor Who, there’s something proscenium arch about it. There’s something arch about it, full stop. I think it’s a programme which you can very happily turn towards the audience. It’s a very fine, very simple tradition.”

After Isaac Newton conflated the word “mavity” for gravity in Wild Blue Yonder, the change looks to be permanent as a running Doctor Who joke from now on. Davies was described by SFX editor Darren Scott as banging the desk in his office a Wolf Studios to emphasize this point.

“It’s not resolved, it’s permanent. It’s absolutely permanent. That’s what gravity is. It’s funny. It’s very funny and it makes me laugh and it’s staying.”

“It’s enormously funny. All the comic strip people are having to do it, all the novel people are having to do it. How funny is that? I think people are kind of looking for a plot in it. I can’t imagine what that would be. What on earth would that be? If anyone came up with a good plot based on the fact that a word has changed two of its consonants then good luck. He said, having built entire plots out of puns!”

“In the end, it’s immensely creative. That’s what’s brilliant.”

Despite a new incarnation in the revolving parade of Doctors included in Rogue portrayed by Richard E Grant for the episode, there are no plans to explain or include the Doctor from the 2003 animated animated series Scream of the Shalka in future episodes. The script called for an ‘unknown Doctor’ within the parade. Grant was available and agreeable and a special photo shoot was set up to use his current likeness.

“Fun. Enormous fun, absolutely, literally. We talked about that many times with [writers] Kate [Herron] and Briony [Redman]. Just fun, a joke. It’s funny. It’s that simple.”

“Sometimes these things online are taken very seriously, but most people just burst out laughing. It doesn’t presage anything, it’s not the return of the “Shalka” Doctor. Or is it the Curse of Fatal Death Doctor? [the 1999 Comic Relief spoof in which Grant also appeared as the Doctor]. I don’t know. It’s the “Shalka” Doctor to me, I’ll be honest.”

“I wrote to [“Shalka” writer] Paul Cornell the night before, saying, ‘Please watch tomorrow because there’s such a treat in store,’ and he was so delighted. But it’s really nice when you can do things like that. That was a really nice moment between me and Paul, we’re old friends going back decades. It was lovely.”

“A little bit of payment there because he created the Ninth Doctor with the Shalka and we completely replaced him with Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor. So how nice all these years later, to take a little lean back and sort of say, the door’s open now, thanks to The Timeless Child, and you can come in and own your Doctor again. Really, it’s not just fun, it’s a nice thing to do.”

Davies explained that he is leaving the door open to future interpretations of unresolved mysteries in television episodes, audio dramas, books and other mediums.

“So there’s a gap in the narrative there in which people write stories. The whole Big Finish is dedicated to gaps in the narrative, writing stories. So actually, this is very creative, very funny. One day, you can probably rest assured that in 30 years’ time, someone will write a novel in which the mavity/gravity pun turns out to be absolutely essential, the Doctor uses it to save the world. ‘Look, you missed out a letter,’ he says and presses a button, and so you can happily hand that over to viewerships.”

“I might take the piss out of the discourse, but actually it’s terribly creative and I kind of know that by leaving gaps in shows that this gets filled. It doesn’t remotely bother me that the woman in 73 Yards doesn’t get fully explained. I know exactly what’s going on and I haven’t seen anyone else guess what’s going on, but it’s actually very clear what’s going on. But that’s creative. Let people be talking about it for years to come.”

Doctor Who returns this Christmas with the special Joy to the World, written by Steven Moffat and starring Ncuti Gatwa, Nicola Coughlan, Joel Fry and Timothy West.

SFX Magazine 381 is available at newsstands in the UK on July 10 and is also available as a digital issue.