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Doctor Who: "Lucky Day" Writer Pete McTighe on Penning Ruby's Return

"Lucky Day" writer Pete McTighe discusses joining the Doctor Who universe and this weekend's Ruby Sunday (Millie Gibson)-focused adventure.

Pete McTighe has been a major part of Doctor Who for the last few years – he wrote "KABLAM" for Chris Chibnall and Jodie Whittaker's run, he has written the short films featuring past Doctors and companions for the new remastered Blu-Ray season boxsets that also serve as trailers for those releases, and has written episodes of Tales of the TARDIS streaming on the iPlayer, and is co-writer of the upcoming spinoff The War Between the Land and the Seas wtih showrunner Russell T. Davies. This week's episode, "Lucky Day," is his first solo episode for this season of Doctor Who, featuring the return of Millie Gibson as Ruby Sunday as she tries to live a normal life after leaving the TARDIS. The BBC released an interview with McTighe, who shared some insights from both sides of the camera regarding this weekend's "thrilling" (McTighe's one-word description) episode.

McTighe on Writing for "Doctor Who": "'Doctor Who' is the reason I'm a writer, the reason I work in TV. It's my favourite thing in the world. So, it feels like coming home. This was *my* lucky day! Working with Russell T. Davies and the Bad Wolf team is always such a brilliant experience. I've created and showrun my own shows and written hundreds of hours of TV, but nothing beats Doctor Who – I've literally had the best couple of years of my career, working with Russell on 'Tales of the TARDIS,' 'Lucky Day,' and 'The War Between The Land And The Sea.' It's been a total joy.

McTighe Teases "Lucky Day": "What I loved about writing this episode was being able to explore what happens when the Doctor isn't around, when he's off saving other planets. Instantly, without the Doctor, there's more jeopardy for the human characters, the stakes are higher, and they're pushed to places they wouldn't necessarily have to go if he was there to save the day. Of course, the Doctor *is* in the episode, in a very significant way, but really 'Lucky Day' is Ruby's story. I love what Millie Gibson did in her first season, so being able to come in and develop her character even further was really exciting.

Throughout all of 'Doctor Who' – with the exception of Sarah-Jane Smith – we've never really explored what happens to someone after they stop travelling with the Doctor, and how those adventures impacted them. I loved being able to delve into that aspect of the character. I also enjoyed developing Jonah Hauer-King's character, Conrad, Ruby's new boyfriend. He's someone who adores Ruby and wants to be as brave and heroic as the Doctor, but in doing so, he puts himself and Ruby in terrible danger.

We've got a great new monster in this episode as well, it's savage and terrifying and cannot be reasoned with. It was also a massive treat to be able to write for UNIT; for Kate, Shirley, and Colonel Ibrahim, who swoop in to help Ruby and Conrad from the horrors that have been unleashed. Oh, for classic series fans, we also have Paul Jericho in the episode – he played The Castellan, an officious, shady Time Lord during Peter Davison's era. He's playing a new character now, publican Alfie. Or is he? Maybe the Castellan wasn't killed in 'The Five Doctors" (1983), escaped the destruction of Gallifrey, and ended up running a pub in an English village? Much better, let's go with that.

Doctor Who: Lucky Day premieres this Saturday on BBC iPlayer and BBC One in the UK and Disney+ outside the UK.

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