Doctor Who showrunner Russell T Davies put a name to the phenomenon by which enabled the villainous Toymaker and his legions to enter the known universe in his script for The Church on Ruby Road posted on the BBC Writers website.

In a scene which wasn’t included in the special where the Fifteenth Doctor and Ruby Sunday are in the kitchen while Ruby’s Mother Carla is out shopping, the doctor describes to Ruby the apparent magic they encountered earlier in their encounter with goblins as a “language” and “a different form of physics” inadvertently brought into the world.

“There was. An incursion. Into this world. D’you know the giggle? When everyone went mad? That was caused by a Drastic Transgression known as the Toymaker. And he brought his legions with him. This is his legacy. Forces of nature, but forces of a different nature. Writing their own rules. And I’m out of my depth. Got no rules. I love, love, love the rules!”

This is a first mention of the Drastic Transgression, and it is also mentioned in the novelisation of the episode.

In the script for The Giggle, the Fourteenth Doctor claims responsibility for the incursion by his invoking of a superstition with the Not-things on the alien spaceship in Wild Blue Yonder which involved a line of salt.

“And I think. It’s all because of me. Cos I got clever, didn’t I? I cast that salt at the edge of the universe, I played a game. And let him in. An elemental force with the power of a God…”

This incursion of the Toymaker’s legions will have repercussions continuing into the 2024 Doctor Who series, according to Davies.

A new 8-episode Doctor Who series starring Ncuti Gatwa and Millie Gibson will debut in May 2024.