Martin Clunes filming final season of Doc Martin

Martin Clunes has returned to Cornwall to film Doc Martin for the final time.

Clunes returns as Dr. Martin Ellingham, the GP with a brusque bedside manner and a phobia of blood, in eight new episodes set in the idyllic hamlet of Portwenn in Cornwall.

Buffalo Pictures will also be making a Christmas special to bid a final farewell to Doc Martin.

A documentary, provisionally titled “Doc Martin – A Celebration” will also highlight the longevity and impact both locally and around the world, as well as giving the audience a glimpse behind the scenes of the final series with the cast and crew.

Regular cast reprising their roles are:

Caroline Catz plays Doc Martin’s wife, Louisa Ellingham, who resigned from her job as headmistress at the local school to pursue a new career in child counselling.

Also returning for the finale are Dame Eileen Atkins who plays Doc Martin’s formidable Aunt Ruth. Ian McNeice is back to play Bert Large, with Joe Absolom as his son Al. John Marquez is PC Joe Penhale, Jessica Ransom is the doctor’s receptionist Morwenna Newcross and Selina Cadell is pharmacist Mrs Tishell.

At the end of the last series the Doc decided, after having his medical career scrutinised by the General Medical Council because of his blood phobia, that he would resign from being Portwenn’s GP.

This final series sees the Doc making efforts to overcome his phobia, and beginning to question whether he made the right decision about resigning. He and Louisa have also welcomed a baby daughter, Mary Elizabeth, a sister for four-year-old James Henry.

With Louisa pursuing her new career as a child counsellor in his old surgery, the Doc is left literally holding the baby, and indulging his hobby of repairing clocks on the kitchen table. But does he really want his old job back?

Martin Clunes said, “I have loved going to Cornwall to make Doc Martin over the last 18 years, and I have looked forward to returning to this beautiful county this year for the tenth and final series. The people of Cornwall, and Port Isaac in particular, have always been so helpful to us when we are making the series. We have some great story lines for the new series, and for the Christmas special, which I hope Doc Martin fans will love. I shall miss Cornwall, and all the lovely people we have worked with. But it is the right time to say farewell to the Doc, and Portwenn.”

Doc Martin screens in Australia on ABC and UKTV.