The Doctor Falls (TV story)

The Doctor Falls
Doctor:	Twelfth Doctor
Companion(s):	Bill, Nardole
Featuring:	Missy, First Doctor
Main enemy:	Cybermen, The Saxon Master
Main setting:	Mondasian colony ship: Floor 1056 and Floor 0507
Key crew
Writer:	Steven Moffat
Director:	Rachel Talalay
Producer:	Peter Bennett
Release details
Story number:	275b
Premiere broadcast:	1 July 2017
Premiere network:	BBC One
Format:	1x60 minute episode
Doctor Who television stories
← Previous	World Enough and Time

The Doctor Falls, written by Steven Moffat, was the twelfth and final episode of the tenth series of Doctor Who produced by BBC Wales. It featured the departures of both Bill Potts and Nardole, and the apparent death of Missy after ensuring the end of her predecessor. Expanding on the Twelfth Doctor's regeneration teased in the previous episode, it saw him mortally wounded in battle against the Cybermen. The regeneration would be postponed, however, as the Doctor refused to change.

Finally, it featured the surprise return of the First Doctor now portrayed by David Bradley, who had previously portrayed William Hartnell in the docudrama An Adventure in Space and Time.

Plot

The episode opens to a group of farmers on Floor 0507 facing against the prototypes from Floor 1056, shooting them down by night to then restrain on wooden crosses by day. A school child is out in the field one morning when a shuttlepod blasts through the ground. From the rubble, a Cyberman walks out carrying an unconscious Doctor.

Sometime earlier, The Doctor awakes on top of the hospital, soon recalling how he was subdued by Missy and the Master. The Doctor, now restrained in a wheelchair, watches the two incarnations of the Master taunt him on the many deaths the Doctor has had and wanting to find out new ways to kill him. The Master and Missy dance and flirt with each other and gloat of their plan of the Cybermen converting all the humans on the ship. However the Master is stunned to find that the Cybermen are heading towards the building that they are perched on. The Doctor explains while he was knocked down by Missy, he altered the signal to focus on the Time Lords present and brags that he is the only one who has ever been able to stop so many Cybermen at once. Missy knocks the Master out and frees the Doctor from his restraints.

Cast

• The Doctor - Peter Capaldi
• Bill - Pearl Mackie
• Nardole - Matt Lucas
• Missy - Michelle Gomez
• The Saxon Master - John Simm
• Hazran - Samantha Spiro
• Alit - Briana Shann
• Gazron - Rosie Boore
• Rexhill - Simon Coombs
• Heather - Stephanie Hyam
• Voice of the Cybermen - Nicholas Briggs
• and The Doctor - David Bradley

Crew

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References

• Nardole pilots a shuttle labelled SL-16.

Story notes

• This marks David Bradley's first appearance as the First Doctor in a DWU television story. Bradley previously portrayed a fictionalised version of William Hartnell, the original actor to portray the First Doctor, in the non-DWU docudrama An Adventure in Space and Time, in which Bradley reenacted scenes from several First Doctor serials.

Ratings

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Filming locations

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Production errors

If you'd like to talk about narrative problems with this story — like plot holes and things that seem to contradict other stories — please go to this episode's discontinuity discussion.

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Continuity

• The Doctor recalls last seeing Missy's predecessor heading to Gallifrey, deducing that the Time Lords cured his "little condition" before kicking him out. (TV: The End of Time)
• The Doctor notes the Cybermen have risen from Mondas (AUDIO: Spare Parts, TV: The Tenth Planet) to Telos, (TV: The Tomb of the Cybermen) Earth, (TV: Rise of the Cybermen / The Age of Steel) Planet 14 (TV: The Invasion) and Marinus. (COMIC: The World Shapers)
• The Doctor recounts his various victories over the Cybermen: on Telos where he sealed them into their ice tombs, (TV: The Tomb of the Cybermen) Voga, (TV: Revenge of the Cybermen), Canary Wharf (TV: Army of Ghosts / Doomsday) and Planet 14. (COMIC: The World Shapers, TV: The Invasion)
• The Doctor reminds Bill how she remembered the truth during the reign of the Monks. (TV: The Lie of the Land)
• The Doctor reiterates his dislike of guns, (TV: The Sontaran Stratagem, The Doctor's Daughter, The Impossible Astronaut, The Curse of the Black Spot) despite having once willingly used one. (TV: Hell Bent)
• The Doctor reiterates River's words that Nardole once spoke to him from her diary. (TV: Extremis)
• Bill is reunited with Heather in the form of sentient oil. (TV: The Pilot)
• Missy uses her sonic umbrella. (TV: World Enough and Time)
• Missy says that she knows the Doctor has literally fell to his death, referring to how he once fell from a radio telescope. (TV: Logopolis)
• The Master uses a modified laser screwdriver. (TV: Last of the Timelords)
• The Master moves the Doctor around in a wheelchair. (TV: Last of the Timelords)
• The Doctor has a brief recall of some of his past companions from his ninth incarnation onwards, just before his body attempts to regenerate. The Fourth and Fifth Doctor similarly had this occur to him. Likewise, the last face he sees is the Master's. (TV: The Caves of Androzani, Logopolis)
  • He recalls Rose Tyler from Bad Wolf, Martha Jones from Daleks in Manhatten/Evolution of the Daleks, Donna Noble from Partners in Time, Jack Harkness from Utopia Vastra from The Names of the Doctor, Jenny from The Crimson Horror, Sarah Jane Smith from The Stolen Earth, Amy Pond from The Impossible Astronaut, River Song from The Pandarica Opens, and even Clara Oswald from Last Christmas.
• As he begins regenerating, the Doctor says "I don't want to go", the exact same words his tenth incarnation said before regenerating. (TV: The End of Time) He also reiterates the last lines of his eleventh incarnation. (TV: The Time of the Doctor)
• The Doctor resists regenerating. He has previously done this when nearing the end of his tenth incarnation. (TV: The End of Time)
• The Doctor offers people jelly babies. (TV: Mummy on the Orient Express)
• It was revealed Heather gave her tears to track Bill, explaining how Bill was still able to cry despite being a Cyberman. (TV: World Enough and Time)
• The Doctor meets his first incarnation. He has met this version of himself on numerous previous occasions. (TV: The Three Doctors, The Five Doctors, The Day of the Doctor)
• The Twelfth Doctor's regeneration is caused by the Cybermen, resembling how the First Doctor regenerated due to an encounter with them. (TV: The Tenth Planet)

Home video releases

DVD releases

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Blu-ray releases

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Digital releases

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External links

• Official The Doctor Falls page on the Doctor Who website