The BBC's Doctor Who wrapped its 11th (or 37th) season Sunday night, with Jodie Whittaker (Broadchurch) in the iconic role—the first woman to portray everyone's favorite Time Lord. It was a solid, promising season overall, with a terrific cast and some genuine standout episodes. But there's still plenty of unrealized potential in terms of the writing.

Ratings-wise, Whittaker's incarnation has been a smashing success. Nearly 11 million people worldwide watched the premiere episode ("The Woman Who Fell to Earth"), the largest audience for the series since 2013's Christmas special, "The Time of the Doctor," marked the transition from Matt Smith's 11th Doctor to Peter Capaldi's 12th. The new series as a whole averaged more than 8 million viewers per episode. And the reviews have been almost universally positive.

(Some spoilers for season 11 below.)

Much credit for this goes to Whittaker's performance. Yes, the Doctor regenerates and takes on a new face and body every time, along with some individual quirks. But he (or she) is still the same Doctor. That has always been the challenge for any actor taking on the role: keeping the fundamental personality intact while putting their own unique mark on the character. Whittaker nails it with infectious enthusiasm. There's a pinch of David Tennant's rapid-fire diction and purposeful stride, a dash of Matt Smith's scattered effervescence. But ultimately, it's all Whittaker, right down to the androgynous new outfit: cropped trousers, boots, and suspenders over a colorful T-shirt, topped off with a long coat.

We have a brand-new set of companions to keep our latest Doctor company on her adventures.

The Doctor wasn't the only new thing this year. We have a brand-new set of companions to keep our latest Doctor company on her adventures. Right after regenerating, the Doctor lands in Sheffield, sans TARDIS, just as an alien from the warrior Stenza race named Tzim-Sha (the Doctor calls him "Tim Shaw") has arrived to ritually hunt a human to advance his status. She teams up with some locals to defeat the alien: Graham O'Brien (Bradley Walsh, Coronation Street) and his wife, Grace (Sharon D. Clarke, Holby City); her grown son Ryan Sinclair (Tosin Cole, Hollyoaks); and Ryan's old school chum, Yasmin "Yaz" Khan (Mandip Gill, also from Hollyoaks), a rookie police officer eager to prove herself.

The Doctor has a new sonic screwdriver that she makes herself. And when she finally reunites with her TARDIS—"Come to daddy... um, mummy," she croons—it has a gorgeous new interior, courtesy of concept artist Darren Fereday. Among other perks, the revamped TARDIS has a biscuit dispenser.

Shiny and new

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Longtime showrunner Steven Moffat left the show and was replaced by Chris Chibnall, who not only wrote for Who and its spinoff Torchwood but was also the creator of the successful Broadchurch series (which featured Whittaker and Tennant). He brings some of that series' focus on psychological drama to his vision for the Whoverse. Storytelling-wise, Chibnall made some bold creative decisions right out of the gate to keep things fresh and demonstrate that we are indeed entering a new era for Doctor Who. Fan favorites like the Daleks and the Cybermen are nowhere to be found. (I never found them all that interesting, but I do miss the Weeping Angels, possibly the most sinister sci-fi monsters ever.)

Chibnall also brought on a diverse writing team for a show that traditionally has been written by white men. Frankly, the best episodes this season were penned by the new writers, even though none had worked on a sci-fi series before. "Demons of the Punjab" (by Vinay Patel), in particular, shows what is possible when you have writers who understand the nuances of historical and cultural contexts and can weave them into the narrative seamlessly.

Yaz convinces the Doctor to take them to her grandmother Umbreen's past in the Punjab. They arrive on August 14, 1947, the eve of India's partition, with hostilities running high between Hindi and Muslim factions. Umbreen is Muslim, about to marry a Hindu man named Prem—a part of her grandmother's early life that Yaz had never suspected. But they run afoul of Prem's younger brother and a group of armed Hindu nationalists, with tragic consequences. It's a touching personal glimpse into the human toll of a major historical event and a thoughtful reflection on the secrets we keep even from beloved family members.

One of the weaker episodes is "Rosa" (by Chibnall and Malorie Blackman), in which the foursome find themselves in 1955 Alabama the day before Rosa Parks' famous refusal to give up her seat on the bus. Another time traveler is trying to screw with the timeline to undermine the Civil Rights movement and targets Rosa. The episode is well-intentioned but just a bit too heavy-handed and didactic, almost lecturing the audience about Parks' historical importance and how racism still exists. That point comes across more effectively by watching Ryan, in particular, struggle to navigate a world where racial segregation is still the norm.

"The Witchfinders" (by Joy Wilkinson) brings a lighter touch to the inevitable culture clash when the Doctor finds herself in the midst of a witch hunt in 17th-century England. Naturally, she is suspected of being a witch. She also gets to experience patriarchal condescension firsthand when she encounters King James I—a delightfully over-the-top performance by Alan Cumming (The Good Wife)—who simply dismisses, out of hand, the notion that a woman could hold any authority, let alone be a (gasp) doctor.

Just a traveler

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Gentle, good-hearted Graham stands out among the Doctor's new companions, having lost his wife, Grace, in the first episode. Traveling with the Doctor is his way of dealing with the grief and trying to bond with his equally grieving step-grandson. That's what fuels the penultimate episode, "It Takes You Away" (by Ed Hime). It almost has the feel of a fairy tale, as the group encounters a young blind girl named Hanne in a cabin in the Norwegian woods. Her father, Eric, has disappeared through a portal to a parallel universe, seemingly reunited with his dead wife. It's an apt metaphor for the grieving process and how hard letting go of our loved ones can be.

That brings us to the season finale, the Chibnall-penned "The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos," in which we come full circle, and the team runs into Tzim-Sha again. Responding to nine different distress calls, the TARDIS deposits the crew on the mysterious titular world, rife with debris from long-ago battles. It has been 3,407 years since Tzim-Sha was blasted into the past by the Doctor, and he's been plotting his revenge ever since.

Frankly, the plot is workmanlike and unmemorable, but the characters and the issues raised give the finale its heft. Who would have thought the Big Bad would turn out to be "Tim Shaw"—an unintended consequence of the Doctor not realizing how serious a threat he posed when she first encountered him. Meanwhile, kind, good-hearted Graham is tempted to exact revenge for Grace's death, despite the Doctor's warning that this goes against her moral code, and he won't be welcome to travel with her if he kills the Stenza warrior.

Chris Chibnall succeeded in making his Doctor Who fresh and memorable.

Each episode this season was designed as a standalone, with no multi-part episodes or season-long narrative arcs—another departure from past seasons. That's not a bad thing in moderation; some prior seasons went a little overboard with the intricate plotting, multiple timelines, and resulting, baffling paradoxes. The tradeoff is that there was no gut-wrenching "The Angels Take Manhattan" level of writing this season—not even for the season finale.

Chibnall succeeded in making his Doctor Who fresh and memorable. Now I'm hoping he'll up the stakes a bit and give us more of the classic Whovian tropes we've come to know and love. I'm confident that will come as we spend more time with this new crop of time travelers and the writers find their creative feet. Alas, we won't be seeing Whittaker's return as the 13th Doctor until 2020. But at least there's going to be a New Year's special (replacing the traditional Christmas episode), titled "Resolution," to tide us over.