Varada Sethu, who plays new companion Belinda Chandra in the next season of Doctor Who, says that Series 15 introduces a “whole new timeline” — and hints that she’s only staying for one season of the show.

Sethu says:

“Since I’ve started, it’s just been so much fun. It’s all been at breakneck speed: I got the script for Episode 1 about two weeks before we started. And then, obviously, each storyline and each setting is something else… It’s a new world. It’s a whole new timeline – appropriately enough! It’s absolutely incredible. It’s been a wild ride…”

The last line — “it’s been a wide ride” — is perhaps telling of how long Chandra will only be around for the next eight episodes of Doctor Who. Or maybe she’s just meaning in the sense that she’s finished filming for now. As is, we don’t even know whether Series 16 is happening, amid unconfirmed rumours that the programme is being rested.

And what of this “new timeline”? This could be that the Doctor or a monster changes time, with Chandra seemingly from the past, so a different stream is created. Nonetheless, it seems that things can’t diverge that much as UNIT and former companion, Ruby Sunday (Millie Gibson), will be in at least part of the rest of the season.

Or perhaps Varada didn’t mean it in the way we’ve taken it.

We shall hopefully find out when Doctor Who Series 15 begins next month.