‘Doctor Who’ at Comic-Con@Home: ‘GoT’ Alum Joins, Season 13 Trailer & More (VIDEO)

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Is it going to be lucky Season 13 for Doctor Who? It’s certainly going to be an adventurous one, as the Comic-Con@Home panel did offer some teases about what to expect next from those traveling through space and time.

Showrunner Chris Chibnall and stars Jodie Whittaker (the Thirteenth Doctor), Mandip Gill (Yaz), and John Bishop (Dan) were joined by a very special surprise guest — Game of Thrones‘ Jacob Anderson (who played Grey Worm), playing Vinder — and dropped a trailer and new images (above and below) for Season 13, which will premiere later this year on BBC America.

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Season 13 begins with the Doctor and Yaz mid-adventure when they stumble across Dan. What makes it different from past seasons is “it’s all one story. Every episode is a chapter in a bigger story,” Chibnall revealed of what he’s called “the biggest story we’ve ever done.”

While they could’ve done smaller episodes in one room due to COVID conditions, instead, “we’re going to go to all kinds of different places, we’re going to have all kinds of characters and monsters, and it’s all going to be part of a bigger whole,” he previewed. “It’s definitely the most ambitious thing we’ve done since we’ve been on the series. It’s pretty epic and ambitious and we do go to a lot of places.”

As a result, “quite a few of the amazing guest actors [this season] recur across multiple episodes, which is very unusual for the show,” the showrunner noted. The only new character he could talk about was Anderson’s Vinder (who’s around “quite a lot,” according to Gill).

“He’s a gorgeous actor. He’s a brilliant human being,” Chibnall said of Anderson, whom he and Whittaker worked with on Broadchurch. “I was thinking about this character and he was the first name who came to mind. I sort of wrote it for him and then pitched it to him … He has that humanity, that warmth, but he can also play an action hero and he makes you root for him and he breaks your heart. He’s got the whole range.”

James Pardon/BBC Studios/BBC America

“I’m very excited to be joining Doctor Who Season 13 later this year, and I get to play one of my favorite people I’ve ever played, Vinder,” Anderson said in a message he recorded. “This is a real-life childhood dream to be a part of Doctor Who.” And in addition to feeling like he was 14 again by stepping into the TARDIS, “I got my own ship, and my own ship had its own world of buttons and levers and switches you could actually press and actually play with,” he teased.

As for what else you can expect in Season 13, there will be monsters (of course), both new and old — and “incredible interactions” with the latter, Whittaker said — as well as plenty of shocks and cliffhangers, especially due to the nature of it telling one story.

Watch the trailer below for a look at more of what to expect, including the new characters and Yaz’s ominous “you’re hiding something” presumably to the Doctor.

Finally, the panelists each used one word to describe Season 13: “riveting” (Gill), “inspirational” (Bishop), “mysterious” (Whittaker), and “swarm” (Chibnall).

Doctor Who, Season 13, TBA, BBC America