10 Times Doctor Who Appeared In Other TV Shows

Speaking of showrunners who have a soft spot for Doctor Who, Netflix horror king Mike Flanagan has admitted that the main reason he cast Karen Gillan in his debut feature, Oculus, was because he loved her work as Amy Pond.

Flash-forward several years, and his love for Doctor Who found its way into the costuming for his 2020 horror mini-series The Haunting Of Bly Manor - although, hilariously, Flanagan didn't actually know this was happening.

Instead, it was actor Rahul Kohli who was responsible for this Doctor Who shoutout, with his character wearing a bow-tie/jacket combo that looks almost identical to the costume worn by Matt Smith's Eleventh Doctor in the latter half of Series 7.

On Twitter, Kohli noted that he was aware of Flanagan's Doctor Who obsession, so when the time came to decide on a costume, he requested this particular look as an homage to one of his showrunner's favourite characters.

Bly Manor also has another, far more subtle (and possibly unintentional) Doctor Who reference, with a line in the final episode "You said it was a ghost story... it isn't. It's a love story", sounding very similar to a line from the Eleventh Doctor episode Hide:

"This isn't a ghost story, it's a love story!"

Coincidence? Well, taking Flanagan's Doctor Who credentials into account, there's a good chance it's not!