Doctor Who Just Replaced Captain Jack Harkness In The Most Perfect Way

Warning: Spoilers ahead for Doctor Who season 15, episode 6, "Rogue."

* A new character in Doctor Who Season 14 is reminiscent of Captain
  Jack Harkness, hinting at a replacement for the iconic character.

* "Rogue" features Bridgerton -inspired elements while maintaining
   the sci-fi essence of Doctor Who .

* The unlikely return of Jack Harkness due to allegations against John
  Barrowman suggests he has been effectively replaced in the franchise.

Doctor Who season 14, episode 6, "Rogue," introduces a character very much
like John Barrowman's Captain Jack Harkness, meaning Barrowman's franchise
persona is now much less likely to come back. Debuting in Doctor Who season
1, episode 9, "The Empty Child," Jack Harkness went on to return to the show
several times and even became a main character in all four seasons of the
Doctor Who spinoff show, Torchwood. The character offered a great deal to the
franchise on the whole, but it looks as though he's been replaced by a member
of the Doctor Who season 14 cast.

"Rogue" leans very heavily into its Bridgerton-inspired elements, but it also
doesn't shy away from the sci-fi nature of Doctor Who. The episode's titular
character may feel familiar to long-standing members of the show, with those
who watched before Doctor Who's Disney era perhaps feeling a subtle bout of
nostalgia at the figure's presence. With Jack Harkness making his first
appearance during Russell T Davies' first spell in charge, it would make
sense that the returning showrunner may want to recreate certain aspects.

Doctor Who Season 14's Rogue Is Very Similar To Captain Jack Harkness:
In "The Empty Child," the Ninth Doctor and Rose come into contact with
Captain Jack Harkness during a period in Earth's history. Jack isn't native
to the era in which he's found, he's armed with advanced weaponry, and he's
even in disguise to blend in with the locals. All of these aspects of
Barrowman's character also apply to Jonathon Groff's Rogue, not to mention
both characters sporting suave American accents and being members of the
LGBTQ+ community. However, while Jack is human, Rogue's species is currently
unconfirmed.

"Rogue" was co-written by Kate Herron and Briony Redman. Herron was the
showrunner for Loki season 1.

Athough "Rogue" is one of the two Doctor Who season 14 episodes not written
by Russell T Davies, it's difficult to deny the strong possibility that
Barrowman's character has been used as a template to create Groff's. "The
Empty Child" was written by Steven Moffat, so there's even the connection of
both characters first appearing in scripts that haven't been penned by
Davies, despite being the showrunner in both instances.

Although Barrowman reprised his role as Jack when Jodie Whittaker was the
Doctor (despite the fact he was absent for the respective runs of Matt Smith
and Peter Capaldi), the possibility of his return in Doctor Who's new era is
low. Allegations of inappropriate behavior on the sets of both Doctor Who and
Torchwood may have cost him his role in the franchise. Speaking of the
complaints against him (via Sky News), Barrowman has referred to his antics
as "Silly behavior," and that he, "Would never do it now."

Barrowman has appeared as Captain Jack Harkness in 13 episodes of Doctor Who
, 41 episodes of Torchwood , and has reprised the role numerous times for
various podcasts and audio adventures.

Barrowman has appeared as Captain Jack Harkness in 13 episodes of Doctor Who,
41 episodes of Torchwood, and has reprised the role numerous times for
various podcasts and audio adventures. In the franchise's Disney era, his
return perhaps seems even less likely due to the studio's family-friendly
reputation. The ending of "Rogue" suggests that the Doctor hasn't seen the
last of Groff's bounty hunter character, and having Jack Harkness and Rogue
appear in the show at the same time seems awfully redundant. So, the
introduction of Rogue would seem to be effectively drawing a line under
Barrowman's Doctor Who tenure.

For all of Rogue's similarities to Jack Harkness, there's a much more direct
comparison between two Doctor Who characters. With the Doctor Who 2023
Christmas special serving as a soft reboot for the show, it was difficult to
ignore the connection between Millie Gibson's Ruby Sunday and Billie Piper's
Rose Tyler. Both women were 19-year-old blonde companions when they joined
the show, and their characters both have color-based first names. There's
also the fact that Ruby and Rose are both the first companions of new eras,
with Piper's character leading the 2005 revival and Gibson debuting during
Disney's reign.

Ncuti Gatwa's Doctor has been handled differently when it comes to the
presence of his version of the characters, with some mixed results.

So, Jack and Rose have now essentially been recast by Russell T Davies, while
leaving the original personas intact. The showrunner clearly has a certain
group of archetypes for whom he enjoys writing, so there could be more
replacements coming in the future to accommodate Davies' preferences. Of
course, the Doctor has also been replaced, but that's a writing mechanic
that's at the very heart of the show. Barrowman and Piper's younger
counterparts now stand the chance of being as influential as their Doctor Who
predecessors.

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Let's go Brandon!