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^{Think I've pretty much got it now - just one specific word remaining to be found!}

Note first that this puzzle is tagged as wordsearch. This means that somehow or other we need to extract a grid of letters from this image. How? Well notice that if you look closely:

Noting that the longest symbol-line (circled in purple in the image) comprises 8 images, let's take that one and let it be a whole side of the wordsearch. (Since the additional hint explains that the wordsearch is indeed 8x8, this confirms this as a useful strategy.)

We can then squish together the remaining symbol strings, keeping them roughly in their relative positions in the diagram, to produce an 8x8 grid (with a central 2x2 hole) which looks like this:

13 words which relate to each of the names of the 13 actors to have played The Doctor. What now follows is my best attempt so far - but it is possible a little tweaking is required:



1. William Hartnell = HEART
2. Patrick Troughton = ???
3. Jon Pertwee = CHEEKY
4. Tom Baker = BREAD
5. Peter Davison = HARLEY (like Harley-Davidson)
6. Colin Baker = CAKE
7. Sylvester McCoy = REAL
8. Paul McGann = FILM (since McGann appeared only in a one-off film version, not the TV series)
9. Christopher Eccleston = BERNIE (like Bernie Ecclestone of Formula 1 fame)
10. David Tennant = RENTER (synonym of 'tenant')
11. Matt Smith = COMMON (as 'Smith' is a very common surname)
12. Peter Capaldi = HAT
13. Jodie Whittaker = CHOC (Whittaker's is a chocolatier and confectioner)

All that remains is to work out which word in the grid is intended to relate to the second Doctor, Patrick Troughton. There are plenty of other words in the grid (I have marked up ACHE, ADO, ASH, BEAN, BEE, DOE, ERA, FEEDER, HEM, REND, and SAM in light blue). He does have an acting grandson called SAM Troughton, but I'm not sure if that's really close enough a connection for this wordsearch's purposes...

Solved! Note first that this puzzle is tagged as wordsearch. This means that somehow or other we need to extract a grid of letters from this image. How? Well notice that if you look closely:

Noting that the longest symbol-line (circled in purple in the image) comprises 8 images, let's take that one and let it be a whole side of the wordsearch. (Since Hint 1 reveals that the wordsearch is indeed 8x8, this confirms this as a useful strategy.)

We can then squish together the remaining symbol strings, keeping them roughly in their relative positions in the diagram, to produce an 8x8 grid (with a central 2x2 hole) which looks like this:

13 words which relate to each of the names of the 13 actors to have played The Doctor. And here they are:



1. William Hartnell = HEART
2. Patrick Troughton = FEEDER
3. Jon Pertwee = CHEEKY
4. Tom Baker = BREAD
5. Peter Davison = HARLEY (like Harley-Davidson)
6. Colin Baker = CAKE
7. Sylvester McCoy = REAL
8. Paul McGann = FILM (since McGann appeared only in a one-off film version, not the TV series)
9. Christopher Eccleston = BERNIE (like Bernie Ecclestone of Formula 1 fame)
10. David Tennant = RENTER (synonym of 'tenant')
11. Matt Smith = COMMON (as 'Smith' is a very common surname)
12. Peter Capaldi = HAT
13. Jodie Whittaker = CHOC (Whittaker's is a chocolatier and confectioner)

Finally, to remark on the title question:

In all likelihood, there will indeed be more actors who take on the role of Doctor Who - thanks to The Doctor's ability to regenerate their body when it gets worn out, the role is able to be passed from one actor to the next and the change in physical appearance explained away as a plot point. All of this explains why the show has been on our screens since 1963 (with some breaks) and holds the Guinness World Record for being the longest-running sci-fi TV show in the world!

^{As comments appear to suggest several of us are attempting this and getting stuck, here's a partial answer to provide some visuals and maybe help us begin making some headway... (Now EDITED to match the amended puzzle.)}

Noting that the longest symbol-line (circled in purple in the image) comprises 8 images, let's take that one and let it be a whole side of the wordsearch. (Since the additional hint explains that the wordsearch is indeed 8x8, this confirms this as a useful strategy.)

We can then squish together the remaining symbol strings, keeping them roughly in their relative positions in the diagram, to produce an 8x8 grid (with a central 2x2 hole) which looks like this:

Well, these symbols bear a strong resemblance to the dots and dashes of Morse code, with single-pixel 'dots' and double-pixel 'dashes'. In order to extract valid letters out of them we need to read the horizontal strings from left to right, and the vertical strings from top to bottom (e.g. top left symbol is .-.. while the one immediately below it is -.-.).

Doing this for each symbol produces the following letter grid:



It is not clear at this stage whether it is vital to find the missing 4 central letters.

Treating this letter grid as a wordsearch, there are several words that are immediately obvious (which indicates to me that we have chosen the right cipher here), including:

ACHE, ASH, BEAN, BREAD (or READ), CAKE, CHEEKY (or CHEEK), CHOC, COMMON, DOE, ERA (or ARE), FEEDER (or FEED or FEE), FILM, HARLEY, HEM, and HEART (or ART, EAR or HEAR):



Of course this list is not comprehensive, and there will doubtless be more words to find in the grid if the 4 central squares can be successfully filled in the correct way.

It is not immediately clear to me what needs to be done with these (and how to resolve the missing letters), but aside from the usual consideration of "What about the unused letters in the wordsearch?" (which I can't see any progress with right now) here are a few further observations:

1. All of these words I have found so far begin with the letters A-H. (Significance unknown.)

2. With a few more words we have enough to constitute a connect-wall puzzle, where we might be required to look for connections between the words we have found.

3. Shy of a full connecting wall, it may still be possible to match some (subsets) of the wordsearch words into connected groups - for example:
- HEART+ACHE is a compound word,
- COMMON and ERA can be paired to form a real phrase,
- BREAD and CAKE are both baked items,
- FEEDER and HEART are both rock bands,
- HARLEY Quinn is a superHERO FILM character (since if there's an 'H' in the bottom-right blank space, we could also spell 'HERO'...).

Still much to be done, but here's something to get people's thought processes going good and proper...

^{Think I've pretty much got it now - just one specific word remaining to be found!}

Noting that the longest symbol-line (circled in purple in the image) comprises 8 images, let's take that one and let it be a whole side of the wordsearch. (Since the additional hint explains that the wordsearch is indeed 8x8, this confirms this as a useful strategy.)

We can then squish together the remaining symbol strings, keeping them roughly in their relative positions in the diagram, to produce an 8x8 grid (with a central 2x2 hole) which looks like this:

Well, these symbols bear a strong resemblance to the dots and dashes of Morse code, with single-pixel 'dots' and double-pixel 'dashes'. In order to extract valid letters out of them we need to read the horizontal strings from left to right, and the vertical strings from top to bottom (e.g. top left symbol is .-.. while the one immediately below it is -.-.).

Doing this for each symbol produces the following letter grid:



With no other segments to fill the central 2x2 gap, we need to add other letters in here - but what letters exactly?! Hint 3 suggests it is related to a symbol in the image. Well, seeing as the clockwise arrow is central to the image, it would probably make the most sense if that were the symbol of interest. The word which would lend itself best to making other words in the grid and also define the symbol itself is (to my mind) TURN, so let's add that to the grid too, starting in the tail of arrow and proceeding clockwise towards its head (as per Hint 3):

Treating this letter grid as a wordsearch, there are several words that are immediately obvious (helpfully confirming our choice of cipher), although not all of them are necessarily relevant. However, a bit of thought suggests what we should probably be looking for here...

- Hints 2 and 5 suggest there should be 13 words to find, since the wordsearch comprises 13 pieces...

- Hint 4 suggests specifically that the tenth word should be RENTER, a synonym of tenant...

- Hint 6 suggests the wordsearch theme is potentially something from popular culture - some kind of list that may continue to grow with future instalments...

Combine all of this information with the knowledge that we are looking for a final answer of the form (6,3) and I believe the wordsearch theme must be:

DOCTOR WHO, the British science fiction TV show! To date, thirteen actors have played The Doctor (in the official canon), the tenth of whom was David Tennant, and it is very probable that once the current Doctor (Jodie Whittaker) calls time on playing the role it will be given to another actor so the series can continue.

Knowing this, then, we now need to find:

13 words which relate to each of the names of the 13 actors to have played The Doctor. What now follows is my best attempt so far - but it is possible a little tweaking is required:



1. William Hartnell = HEART
2. Patrick Troughton = ???
3. Jon Pertwee = CHEEKY
4. Tom Baker = BREAD
5. Peter Davison = HARLEY (like Harley-Davidson)
6. Colin Baker = CAKE
7. Sylvester McCoy = REAL
8. Paul McGann = FILM (since McGann appeared only in a one-off film version, not the TV series)
9. Christopher Eccleston = BERNIE (like Bernie Ecclestone of Formula 1 fame)
10. David Tennant = RENTER (synonym of 'tenant')
11. Matt Smith = COMMON (as 'Smith' is a very common surname)
12. Peter Capaldi = HAT
13. Jodie Whittaker = CHOC (Whittaker's is a chocolatier and confectioner)

All that remains is to work out which word in the grid is intended to relate to the second Doctor, Patrick Troughton. There are plenty of other words in the grid (I have marked up ACHE, ADO, ASH, BEAN, BEE, DOE, ERA, FEEDER, HEM, REND, and SAM in light blue). He does have an acting grandson called SAM Troughton, but I'm not sure if that's really close enough a connection for this wordsearch's purposes...

ACHE, BEAN, BREAD (or READ), CAKE, CHEEKY (or CHEEK), CHOC, COMMON, DOE, ERA (or ARE), FEEDER (or FEED or FEE), FILM, HARLEY, HEM, and HEART (or ART, EAR or HEAR):



Of course this list is not comprehensive, and there will doubtless be more words to find in the grid if the 4 central squares can be successfully filled in the correct way.

ACHE, ASH, BEAN, BREAD (or READ), CAKE, CHEEKY (or CHEEK), CHOC, COMMON, DOE, ERA (or ARE), FEEDER (or FEED or FEE), FILM, HARLEY, HEM, and HEART (or ART, EAR or HEAR):



Of course this list is not comprehensive, and there will doubtless be more words to find in the grid if the 4 central squares can be successfully filled in the correct way.