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If Amy was The Girl Who Waited, then Whovians are definitely The Fans Who Waited.
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00:00Doctor Who is a show all about time travel, so the Doctor can experience events in very complicated ways,
00:05and their timeline might not always give them the quickest way to a resolution.
00:09Look at Riversong. The Doctor met her at the end of her life when she knew him very well.
00:13They dropped in and out of each other's lives for years, and it was, to put it simply, complicated.
00:18There's such a rich history in Doctor Who which allows current writers to look back and make as many connections
00:24as they want to the past.
00:25For example, in 1983's The Five Doctors, the Doctor steals the seal of the High Council from the Master.
00:31It wouldn't be until 2013's Time of the Doctor that he would actually use it, and remind us that I
00:36knitted off the Master in the Death Zone.
00:38With a new series on the way, and David Tennant, Catherine Tate, Bernard Cribbins, and the rest of Donna's family
00:43all confirmed to return,
00:45it looks like we might finally be getting a payoff to the story where Donna couldn't remember the Doctor without
00:49potentially dying.
00:50A story that was set up 14 years ago.
00:53So, with that in mind then, I'm Ellie with Who Culture, here with 10 Longest Payoffs in Doctor Who History.
01:02In Season 1, we keep seeing the words Bad Wolf.
01:05In Season 2, we had Torchwood.
01:07In Season 3, we spotted Votes' Saxon posters.
01:09And in Season 4, we kept being told that planets and bees were disappearing.
01:14Each of these mysteries was developed over their respective seasons,
01:17with information slowly being gradually drip-fed as we progressed through the story.
01:21The arcs would all last for an entire season, and then hit us hard at the end.
01:25The best of these arcs was in Season 4.
01:27Multiple threads ran through the episodes, the disappearing planets and bees, the return of Rose Tyler,
01:32mentions of the Doctor Donna, the Medusa Cascade, and there's something on your back.
01:36All of these things would return towards the end of the season to bite us on the backside when it
01:41all came together.
01:42Season 4 was an absolute masterclass in storytelling from Russell T Davies and his team,
01:46and these arcs are something we're really excited to see when RTD returns.
01:50We can only wonder what he's got up his sleeve, but we know it's going to be good.
01:55Number 9. He will knock four times.
01:58When the master appeared in Season 3, it seemed he was defeated by the end,
02:01but we knew he'd be back after the mysterious woman retrieved his ring from the ashes.
02:06She would, of course, go on to revive the master for the 2009 special The End of Time,
02:10which aired two and a half years after the master's last appearance.
02:14During the course of the specials leading up to this story, the Doctor learns of the prophecy that claims he
02:18will knock four times.
02:20Fans instantly connected this to the master.
02:22However, when the moment came, it was actually Wilf who knocked four times after being trapped in a glass case
02:27that's going to fill with radiation,
02:29leaving 10 in a moral predicament.
02:31He thought he had cheated death and was suddenly confronted with the fact that he had to die to save
02:35his friend.
02:36This twist of fate had been a long time coming.
02:38He met Donna in 2006 and came across Wilf in 2007.
02:42He found Donna again and travelled with her again in 2008, then dropped back into Wilf's life in 2009.
02:49Fate was pulling him towards this for a very long time.
02:52Even more surprising is it looks like they're being pulled back together now, 14 years later.
02:588. Rose Gets Her Doctor
03:0010 and Rose had a romantic connection that sadly ended before they could fully confess their feelings.
03:05The tragic events of Doomsday, which led to Rose being sucked into an alternate dimension,
03:10and 10 burning up a son to say goodbye, emotionally ruined us all and left us devastated that neither of
03:16them got their happy ending.
03:17A couple of years later, in Season 4, Rose made a surprise return from her alternate dimension as the walls
03:23between realities began to break down.
03:25She spends the entire series reaching out to the Doctor, and when they're finally reunited, the Doctor is exterminated by
03:31a Dalek, only to regenerate back into himself.
03:34This unconventional regeneration scene leaves the Doctor with a Metacrisis clone.
03:38At the end of the arc, once everything is worked out, the Doctor leaves his Metacrisis clone with Rose.
03:43This version of the Doctor is the same as ours, but will age and live as close to a human
03:47life as is possible.
03:49Seeing 10 leave Rose with the him that he could never be is absolutely heartbreaking.
03:53But it's a payoff that was unexpected, and even addressed the Doctor's final words to Rose which were cut short.
03:58Still, he doesn't get to say outright that he loves her.
04:017. Clara Goes Too Far
04:03Clara's arc saw her build herself up to believe she's on the same level as the Doctor, and act like
04:08she's invincible.
04:09It was an interesting study of what can happen when people get too close to the Doctor if he builds
04:14them up as he did with Clara.
04:16Of course, she also had the impossible girl story to back her up too.
04:19She had been the most important person in the Doctor's life, with fragments of her scattered through space and time
04:25that were designed to die to keep the Doctor safe.
04:27Clara is often criticised as a prime example of being a Mary Sue character, but under the surface there's a
04:32lot of psychological damage to her.
04:34This led her to make so many brave yet rash decisions, and eventually sent her to her death.
04:39It's genuinely harrowing how her character develops so drastically, and makes us view the Doctor who encouraged her in an
04:46entirely different way.
04:47Clara's death wasn't the end, though.
04:49During the events of Hellbent, it was made clear that her Mary Sue-style storyline even managed to help her
04:54escape death and fly off in her own TARDIS.
04:56Maybe it is a fitting full-circle ending for the companion who became too much like the Doctor.
05:01Number 6. Yaz's love for Thirteen
05:04Some say that Yaz's love for the Thirteenth Doctor has come from nowhere, and has been shoehorned in too little
05:10too late.
05:10However, lots of fans spotted it way back in the early days of her run in Season 11.
05:15It began with Yaz's reaction when her mum asked if her and the Doctor were together.
05:19Throughout their adventures, the way Yaz looked at the Doctor said everything.
05:22It becomes very obvious when you add in moments like in Can You Hear Me, where Yaz ran away from
05:27home after suffering from a mental health breakdown, and her ability to call out the Doctor when she needs to.
05:33Her behaviour when the Doctor returns in Revolution of the Daleks, where she gets mad and pushes her, always felt
05:38extreme for just a friend.
05:39And the way she keeps replaying and reacting to the hologram in Flux is rooted in a deeper love.
05:44These are just a handful of examples, but guaranteed on a rewatch, it'll be very obvious that Yaz was always
05:49in love.
05:50It's a shame it took until Eve of the Daleks, almost four years after her debut, for her to admit
05:55it, but it's nice to see some LGBTQ plus representation being handled sensitively and sweetly.
06:01It was even more exciting, but equally heartbreaking, to see the Doctor handle the situation the way that she did.
06:06Number 5. Silence Will Fall
06:09Eleven's era began in 2010, and was haunted by the sinister phrase, silence will fall.
06:14The Ark incorporated the cracks in space and time, the terrifying silence monsters, and the fields of Trenzalore, where the
06:21Doctor's tomb resides.
06:22In the Season 7 finale, The Name of the Doctor, the Doctor must speak his name to enter his tomb,
06:27but refuses to speak.
06:28Instead, River Song, who is a ghost, says his name and opens the tomb without us hearing it.
06:33Later on in 2013's Christmas special, The Time of the Doctor, it was revealed that the Time Lords were on
06:38the other side of the crack,
06:39and they wanted the Doctor to confirm his name and help them to return.
06:42Still, the Doctor refused to answer, because the Time Lords' return would trigger another time war.
06:47At this time, we see the Kavarian sect split from the church, a moment that triggered the Silence Will Fall
06:53arc that we've already lived through.
06:55It's a confusing arc, but one that lasted an entire Doctor's era.
06:58All of this chaos is dedicated to prevent the Doctor from revealing his name, and continue the mystery of Doctor
07:04Who.
07:05Number 4. River Song at the Singing Towers
07:07When the Doctor first meets River in the library in 2008's Silence in the Library, she sacrifices herself to save
07:14the day.
07:15River is heartbroken that this Doctor doesn't know her, and promises that she knows him very well, even hinting that
07:21they are married.
07:22In her dying moments, she name-drops certain adventures and talks about their last meeting,
07:26when the Doctor turned up with a haircut, a new suit, and took her away for a romantic getaway at
07:31the Singing Towers of Deryllium.
07:33River returned multiple times over the next few years, appearing in the adventures that she had mentioned in her final
07:39moments, like the crash of the Byzantium.
07:41Her time with Eleven saw their relationship blossom through their adventures and lead up to their marriage.
07:46After the Eleventh Doctor regenerated, the Twelfth Doctor wasn't lucky enough to meet River until after Clara's death.
07:52It was 2015's Christmas episode, The Husbands of River Song, that took us to Deryllium.
07:58The episode's closing scene shocked viewers by appearing from nowhere and showing the heartbreaking scene which had been mentioned almost
08:04eight years ago.
08:05Needless to say, the emotional scenes in this unexpected payoff ruined everyone's Christmas.
08:11Number 3. The Time War Genocide
08:13The Doctor returned in the first series of New Who, having been through hell.
08:17We learn about the Time War, which wiped out the Time Lords and left the Doctor as the last of
08:21their kind.
08:22As the series progress, we discover more when Ten talks more about the Time War and their home planet being
08:27decimated, and we learn even more so from Eleven.
08:30For seven seasons, we see a character shaped by the pain of the horrors they endured and choices they made
08:36in this war,
08:37most notably in moments seen in Gridlock and the Rings of Akaten.
08:40It took until the 50th anniversary episode in 2013, a whole eight years after the revival began, to finally get
08:48to see a real glimpse of the Time War.
08:50We even learn about a secret incarnation that we had never known about.
08:53In the day of the Doctor, we see Ten and Eleven meet the Forgotten War Doctor and help him come
08:58to terms with what he has to do.
09:00They stand by his side and comfort him as he prepares to destroy all of the Time Lords to win
09:05the Time War.
09:06But thankfully, they realise they don't need to commit genocide, and can instead save Gallifrey with the help of every
09:11Doctor.
09:12It was a surprising payoff at the end of a long, tragic arc, and finally allowed the Doctor a reason
09:17to celebrate.
09:19Number 2. Twice Upon a Time
09:21In Capaldi's last outing as the Twelfth Doctor, he met up with his first incarnation at the end of his
09:26life.
09:27With both Doctors refusing to regenerate, the story follows the pair as they eventually help each other accept their impending
09:33regenerations.
09:34While this didn't directly mirror events from the Tenth Planet, it was a beautifully thought-out tie-in that made
09:39a strong, poignant finale to the Twelfth Doctor's reign,
09:42which had been built on the foundation of being the Doctor who saves people.
09:46The themes of death weren't just limited to the Doctors. It also involved a couple of soldiers from the First
09:51World War,
09:51frozen in a moment, struggling with being able to kill each other.
09:55They're eventually saved when the Christmas Day miracle begins and all soldiers famously put down their weapons and come together.
10:01Seeing the good influenced by Twelve, the first Doctor decides he's ready to move on and goes back to his
10:06TARDIS.
10:07In this moment, the episode cuts back to the original footage of the regeneration,
10:11bringing us full circle to the moment that had taken place 50 years previously.
10:15Number 1. The Morbius Doctors
10:17The Morbius Doctors appeared way back in 1976's serial The Brain of Morbius.
10:23Their inclusion was said to hint at the potential of multiple lives before Hartnell's Doctor,
10:27but for years it was completely overlooked or dismissed.
10:30Some fans were convinced it meant something, though, and theories about the forgotten lives have caused controversy for years.
10:36After the Timeless Child twist in 2020, the Morbius Doctors were no longer possible to ignore.
10:41The modern twist proved that the Doctor had lived many lives before becoming what we knew as the first Doctor,
10:46and the Timeless Child story has become a major source of division between fans.
10:50Whether we love it or not, the Timeless Child is a part of Doctor Who now,
10:54and it does manage to make sense of the Morbius Doctors by giving us a payoff that goes beyond the
10:58show's beginnings in 1963.
11:00This takes us way back beyond the life of the first Doctor,
11:03and into a distant past that we were completely unaware of.
11:06The earlier mention of keeping the mystery of Doctor Who has really been emphasised with this development,
11:11which keeps us guessing and wondering how much we'll be able to learn about this mysterious past.
11:16This is definitely a payoff that's still paying off, and will continue to for a very long time.
11:20And that concludes our list.
11:22If you can think of anything we missed, then do let us know in the comments below,
11:25and while you're there, don't forget to like and subscribe and tap that notification bell.
11:29Also, head over to Twitter and follow us there, at WhoCulture,
11:32and I can be found across various social medias just by searching Ellie Littlechild.
11:36I've been Ellie with WhoCulture, and in the words of Riversong herself, goodbye, sweeties.
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