Doctor Who Reveals Where Ruth Doctor Fits Into The Timeline

Doctor Who: Flux has finally answered one of the biggest mysteries of the Chibnall era: the time period of the Ruth Doctor. Doctor Who: Flux is the final full season for star Jodie Whittaker and showrunner Chris Chibnall, who are both leaving the series after a string of specials in 2022.. The season consists of six episodes, all telling one story that looks to resolve many of the looming mysteries created in the previous two seasons.

The Ruth Doctor, also called the Fugitive Doctor, represents perhaps the greatest of those looming mysteries. Introduced in Doctor Who season 12, episode 5, “Fugitive of the Judoon,” this enigmatic regeneration appears to be from The Doctor’s past, but her specific place in the timeline was uncertain. While some fans have even speculated that she comes from a mythic “secret season” of the Second Doctor, actual details have remained scarce. So, what changed?

Ruth’s appearance in Doctor Who season 13, episode 3, “Once, Upon Time” confirms that she is a pre-Hartnell incarnation of The Doctor. While this position in the timeline may spawn further questions, and even generate a few potential Doctor Who plotholes, it’s all but confirmed. Her association with The Division was known in Doctor Who season 12, but her role in the secret Time Lord agency is now clearly defined in Doctor Who: Flux. That revelation means her spot in the timeline has been established as coming before the so-called First Doctor.

In “Fugitive of the Judoon” it was established that Ruth was pursued by The Division, leaving many fans to speculate that the Ruth Doctor was once a Division agent herself. “Once, Upon Time” confirms the theory, showing the Ruth Doctor on a mission, clearly identified as operating under the aegis of The Division. Season 12, episode 10, “The Timeless Children” previously established that The Doctor’s time working with The Division took place before her memory wipe and before her the life she’s known.

The mission depicted in “Once, Upon Time” also appears to take place in a time period known as, “The Dark Times,” an era going back to before the current reign of Doctor Who’s Time Lords, filled with chaos and monsters. Swarm says that The Division is acting as if their plan, “could bring the Dark Times to an end.” While time travel could always rear its head as a complicating factor, this puts the mission far back in The Doctor’s timeline and in the timeline of the universe itself, at the earliest moments of Time Lord rule.

Doctor Who: Flux’s reveal that Ruth was a Division agent is sure to spur on its own wave of speculation. But even with these lingering mysteries yet to be resolved, Doctor Who: Flux has put a footprint in the timeline. The complicated canon means that new twists and turns are always possible, but all signs point to the Ruth Doctor as a pre-Hartnell regeneration.

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