Five New Easter Eggs For Doctor Who You May Not Have Seen Elsewhere... For Whitsun

What will survive of us is Doctor Who fan speculation.

Bleeding Cool was the first website to notice that the actress Susan Twist was playing repeat characters in the current Doctor Who run, even on the clifftop in the trailer that will be resolved next week. As well as suggesting this may be a big pun on Russell T Davies' part to bring back the character of Susan, the Doctor's granddaughter, possibly as The One Who Waits teased by The Toymaker. Since then, there have been more signs, with the Devil's Chord having the Doctor specifically talk about Susan, believing she is dead. Susan Twist has turned up in more roles and is due to play a character called Susan Triad, where S Triad is an anagram of TARDIS, and Russell T Davies does love an anagram as well, Torchwood being an anagram of Doctor Who. Lots of people have found lots of other references that may lead to something being unpicked, from the Moon and the President’s Wife to Patrick Troughton playing Speed Bonnie Boat on his recorder, but here are five that I haven't seen discussed elsewhere and may suggest something else, either linked to Susan, Susan Twist or are just clever in their own right. So I thought I’d post them on Substack today for Whitsun. More on that in a minute.

1. Fanfare For The Common Men

Twist At The End was the song used at the end of The Devil's Chord. An original song in a sixties style appears listed on the new TARDIS Jukebox credited to John Smith And The Common Men. From the very first episode of Doctor Who, An Unearthly Child, we previously noted. John Smith And The Common Men was the fictitious band that Susan was listening to at school in the very first episode of Doctor Who, An Unearthly Child, interrupted by her teachers, Barbara and Ian.

BARBARA: Susan?
SUSAN: Oh, I'm sorry, Miss Wright. I didn't hear you coming in. Aren't they fabulous?
BARBARA: Who?
SUSAN: It's John Smith and the Common Men. They've gone from nineteen to two.
IAN: John Smith is the stage name of the Honourable Aubrey Waites. He started his career as Chris Waites and the Carollers, didn't he, Susan?
SUSAN: You are surprising, Mister Chesterton. I wouldn't expect you to know things like that.
IAN: I have an enquiring mind. And a very sensitive ear.

Notably, in The Devil's Chord, there is a big billboard for Chris Waites and the Carollers. But it turns out that, as John Smith And The Common Men, they had a much bigger role in that episode. Does this, even more, suggest the return of Susan? Or is John Smith, the One Who Waites?

2. Making It Up As We Go Along

The Land Of Fiction was the setting of The Mind Robber, the Second Doctor adventure picked by Russell T Davies for the Tales Of The TARDIS episode. In it, the Doctor and companions get shunted into a fictional world which they have to escape from. A kitschy idea, it was genuinely horrifying in places and may suggest a return given that we have characters breaking out into song, and with The Doctor, Mrs Flood and The Maestro breaking the Fourth Wall, and rules of storytelling being talked about by Ruby Sunday. This has been seen as suggesting they are part of a Pantheon of Gods, able to break boundaries of reality, but could it be The Land Of Fiction seeping through into the Doctor's world, courtesy of the Toymaker? The Land Of Fiction was controlled by the Master - not that one, a different one, played by Emrys Jones - an English writer from 1926 who was controlled by a Master Brain computer. The Master wanted to escape and for the Doctor to replace him, while the Master Brain plans to take over the Earth. Might this be a time to align one Master with another?

3. Religious Sundays Part One

Her name is Ruby Sunday. Working as a DJ, when the goblins pulled the power, Susan Twist called out if they could play Gaudete, a familiar seventeenth-century carol, which saw some suggest that she was The Meddling Monk, the Time Lord who was the first recurring villain on Doctor Who, and whose first appearance in The Time Meddler was also picked for the Tales Of The TARDIS episodes.

Well, Gaudete Sunday is also a religious Sunday in the run-up to Christmas. It is the third Sunday of Advent in the Anglican Church and falls from the 11th to the 17th of December. In the Catholic Church, it is also noted by lighting pink/purple candles. That may be described as being Ruby-coloured. But it is also known as "Rose Sunday." Seriously.

4. Religious Sundays Part Two

In Boom, The Doctor quotes from Philip Larkin's poem, An Arundel Tomb, "what will survive of us is love". A famous poem, loved by English GCSE and A-Level school examinations, but what observers haven't picked up is that it is from the book of poems, Whitsun Weddings. Whitsun marks the Anglican holy day of Pentecost and falls on the seventh Sunday after Easter, commemorateing the descent of the Holy Spirit upon Christ's disciples. And yes, that episode was full of Anglican soldiers, something Moffat has returned to, as well as war manufacturer planet Villengard. But in 2024, Whitsun falls today, the Sunday right after Boom aired. To quote River Song, "you know what that's not? A coincidence." What it means, that may mean more digging. Is it all part of a Land Of Fiction?

5. Stand And Deliver

Back to Susan Twist, when we see her as a tea lady in Devil's Chord, she replies to the Doctor's outrage at the cost of a cup of tea.

DOCTOR: That is daylight robbery. Oh.
TEA LADY: That's me, Margaret Lockwood in The Wicked Lady. Now, there was a woman. Statuesque.

In the 1945 film The Wicked Lady, Margaret Lockwood plays a noblewoman who disguises herself as a highwayman and takes to the English highways to steal from the public. Susan was a Time Lord... a noblewoman of Gallifrey, what has she become now? When she was abandoned by the Doctor and had to wait for his return, wait a very long time, going the long way around? Or is this the Meddling Monk who was trapped by the Doctor and also had to wait so, so long?

6. It's Never The Rani.

And finally, not really an easter egg, more of an observation because, I know, I know, the Doctor dropped her name. But it is never the Rani. And also remember, that while with Steven Moffat plots the truth is always more complex than fan speculation, with Russell T Davies it's always a lot simpler, such as Bad Wolf... still, it's always fun to play.