The upcoming Doctor Who spin-off, The War Between the Land and the Sea, features a cast of familiar faces and fresh talent.
Some names come from official announcements and Doctor Who Magazine. The rest, exclusively revealed here, come from actors’ CVs as gleaned from clues found on talent agency websites and social media posts. Some don’t appear in all five episodes of the series.
The two main characters in The War Between the Land and the Sea are Barclay, an everyman office worker and Salt, a denizen of the oceans who enlists Barclay for help to attain peace between humans and the ocean-dwelling Sea Devils, who wage war on humankind for polluting their home.
Russell Tovey: Barclay
Gugu Mbatha-Raw: Salt (aquatic humanoid)
Involved in the conflict is UNIT (Unified Intelligence Taskforce), an international military organisation tasked to investigate and combat paranormal and extraterrestrial threats to Earth.
Jemma Redgrave: Kate Lethbridge-Stewart, Chief Scientific Officer
Ruth Madeley: Shirley Anne Bingham, Scientific Advisor 56
Alexander Devrient: Colonel Christofer Ibrahim UNIT Squad 5
Military organisations from multiple countries must band together to fight the threat coming from the oceans. Among them is General Austin Pierce, as seen in the Doctor Who spin-off Torchwood: Children of Earth.
Colin McFarlane: General Austin Pierce of the US Army
Stewart Alexander: General Oscar Gunsberg
John Addison: Captain Gaitz
Teri Ann Bobb-Baxter Captain Harper
Hannah Donaldson: Captain Louise Mackie
Fancesca Corney: Sergeant Hana Chakri
Iestyn Arwel: platoon leader
The remaining actors with character names portray members of the UK Honours System, a doctor and members of a special team pictured in the trailer for the spin-off.
Patrick Baladi: Sir Keith Spears
Adrian Lukis: Sir Jonathan Hynes
Eddie Elliot: Dr Iniko Bello
Ann Akinjirin: Barbara Dunpont
Manpreet Bachu: Ravi Singh
Antonia Bernath: Rose-Marie Hunt
Waleed Hammad: Tariq Hashim
Mei Mac: Min Tso
Carolin Stoltz: Elizabeth
Missing from the known cast list are actors portraying Sea Devils. None of the actors discovered so far have “Sea Devil” as a credit on their CVs.
Actors with yet unnamed major roles are Vincent Franklin, Barbara Probst and Fia Hadeed.
Other walk-on actors and supporting artistes portray a Prime Minister’s wife, reporters, protesters, a naval academy officer, UNIT soldiers, government officials, various international soldiers, paramedics, onlookers and a group of children.
Written by Russell T Davies and Pete McTighe and directed by Dylan Holmes Williams, The War Between the Land and the Sea will transmit on BBC iPlayer and BBC One in the UK, and exclusively on Disney+ outside of the UK (where available) some time in 2026.