Doctor Who spin-off Class: See first featurette

After nine seasons of traveling through time and space in the TARDIS, it’s time to explore a different part of the Doctor Who universe — and that’s just what BBC America’s Class wants to do.

“Being able to look at the Doctor Who universe from a different perspective, I would find that interesting as a viewer. That’s what I really wanted to do, as the writer of this,” said creator (and YA novelist) Patrick Ness in one of two new video featurettes the show released. “The Doctor’s come to this world and he’s done these things in this world, in this school. So what effect does it have on the people he leaves behind? How do they see it?”

The third and latest Doctor Who spin-off — following Torchwood and Sarah Jane Adventures — will chronicle the lives of four teenagers (played by Greg Austin, Fady Elsayed, Sophie Hopkins and Vivian Oparah) as they attempt to balance their school work and personal lives with whatever alien troubles they might encounter..

Considering they’re all students at Coal Hill Academy, an iconic location in the Who-niverse (not to mention a magnet for all kinds of space-and-time-related hijinks), it’s fair to say the four high schoolers will have a lot on their plate.

And not making things any easy for them is the faculty — or at least one faculty member in particular: Ms. Quill.

“[She’s] a teacher you never, ever want to have,” says Ness of the ominous-sounding character, who will be played by Katherine Kelly. “She is smarter than you and will let you know it.”

Given the young-adult themed tone of the series — which Ness describes as “Funny, exciting, scary and sexy” — it appears that Steven Moffat’s calling it the “British Buffy” might be right on the money.

Class premieres in Spring 2017.