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Ever wonder what Doctor Who would be like if its most iconic moments went differently? Explore the alternate paths the show almost took, from Sarah Jane Smith's originally planned tragic death to the Tenth Doctor's early regeneration and a universe without the Daleks. These are the turning points that nearly changed everything.
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00:00It's fitting that for a show about time travel, there are so many alternate paths and major turning points in
00:06Doctor Who history.
00:07Some of the most notable of these would have reshaped Doctor Who as we know it, for better or for
00:11worse.
00:12So join us as we ponder, what if?
00:15What if Sarah Jane Smith was killed off?
00:19Fourth Doctor serial, The Hand of Fear, was the final regular appearance of Sarah Jane Smith,
00:23with the Doctor casually dropping her off in Aberdeen instead of her home in South Croydon.
00:28For Sarah, this obviously wasn't ideal, but considering the alternate ending the showrunners originally had in mind,
00:33it sort of worked out for the best.
00:35After Elizabeth Sladen informed the producers that she wished to depart the show, attention was turned to developing her exit.
00:42Around this time, Who veteran Douglas Canfield was commissioned to write a serial called The Lost Legion,
00:48a four-part story involving a conflict between two groups of aliens.
00:52This story was set to be Sladen's last, and the plan was to have one of the aliens kill her
00:56off,
00:57making her one of the few companions in the show to actually die, with a capital D.
01:01However, when the showrunners grew concerned about the progress being made on The Lost Legion,
01:06it was abandoned, and The Hand of Fear, including Sarah Jane's new ending, was readied in its place.
01:11Just imagine if she'd been killed off, though.
01:14Part of the reason the early New Who years are considered such a golden period is because of spinoffs like
01:19The Sarah Jane Adventures.
01:20Would a similar spinoff still have happened or not?
01:23Either way, the Hooniverse wouldn't have been the same, and frankly, just having less Elizabeth Sladen in our lives would
01:28have been a disaster full stop.
01:30All the more when you consider she was taken from us far too soon as it is.
01:35What if the Tenth Doctor regenerated early?
01:38Despite being little more than a ruse to get bums in seats the following week,
01:42the cliffhanger to the stolen Earth still stands as one of the greatest WTF moments in Doctor Who history.
01:48We all thought Russell T. Davis had committed the ballsiest of ballsy acts,
01:53killing off the nation's golden boy in a truly shock twist,
01:56only for him to cop out within the first few seconds of Journey's End.
01:59But what if?
02:01Well, interestingly, Russell T. Davis had thought about recasting Tennant at this stage,
02:06albeit only for a scene or two.
02:08He said, quote,
02:08If I had my time again, I'd have milked that.
02:11I'd have cast a whole new Doctor, a superstar for one scene,
02:15Ian McKellen, Judi Dench,
02:17have them run around the TARDIS, then discover the hand and regenerate back.
02:21Imagine!
02:22Why didn't I?
02:23Celeb cameos aside, having the Doctor actually regenerate here
02:26would have made the numbering simpler to track, if nothing else.
02:29That, and it would have helped his vanity issues.
02:32Getting the next proper Doctor introduced in the middle of the finale would have been bizarre though,
02:36and it's easy to see how it wouldn't have worked.
02:39Plus, having the most popular Doctor ever go out by getting sucker punched by a bronze dustbin
02:44while doing a slow-mo Baywatch run wouldn't have been the most epic of endings, would it?
02:50What if there were no bug-eyed monsters?
02:53Doctor Who without Daleks is like existing without pizza.
02:56It's not even worth thinking about.
02:58The show probably wouldn't have succeeded if the immense popularity of the Daleks
03:02hadn't boosted its ratings sky high.
03:05However, Sidney Newman's vision for Doctor Who was predominantly educational,
03:08and he adamantly did not want any bug-eyed monsters.
03:12Producer Verity Lambert took a gamble on the Daleks, and boy did it pay off!
03:16Dalek mania was huge, and their very presence has contributed to Doctor Who's enduring popularity.
03:22Everyone is excited to see when a new Doctor will be pitted against them,
03:25and it's almost like a rite of passage, though not every incarnation gets the chance.
03:30As such, it's difficult to even contemplate a world without the Daleks.
03:33Sure, the show's creativity and fantastical concepts would probably have made it worth checking out,
03:38especially in the early 60s when there was nothing else like it,
03:41but the Daleks quickly became the core of the show's appeal,
03:44and were what made Doctor Who a household staple.
03:47If the Daleks had never trundled onto the show,
03:49Doctor Who might not have made it out of the 60s,
03:52and we'd know it as some weird old TV show in which an old man lived in a tiny box
03:56with a teenager.
03:57So thank you, Verity Lambert.
04:00What if the tweet-alongs never happened?
04:03The last few seasons of Doctor Who can all be traced back to Doctor Who fan and journalist Emily Cook
04:09organising a number of episode watch-alongs during the COVID-19 pandemic.
04:13Fans came together virtually to re-watch episodes like The Girl in the Fireplace,
04:17The Doctor's Wife, and The Day of the Doctor.
04:19And these events got so big that they attracted national news coverage,
04:23along with actual Doctor Who creatives joining in and providing live Twitter commentary.
04:28One of those creatives was Russell T. Davis,
04:30who tweet-alonged The Stolen Earth and Journey's End on the 19th of April 2020,
04:35alongside David Tennant and Catherine Tate.
04:38Reconnecting with Doctor Who in this way got the trio chatting about a potential return,
04:43which led to Russell contacting the BBC, and the rest is Disney.
04:47It's fascinating to consider what might have happened had those tweet-alongs never gone ahead.
04:52There would almost certainly have been a larger gap between The Power of the Doctor
04:56and the next episode of the show than the 13-month wait we had until the Starbeast,
05:00because the BBC wouldn't have had such an obvious successor to Chris Chibnall right at their doorstep.
05:05In hindsight, some would argue that it would have been for the best had Russell not returned,
05:10but at the same time, we'd never have got great episodes like Wild Blue Yonder,
05:14fantastic villains like Lux, and I wouldn't have had a cameo in Lucky Day.
05:18I'm kidding, guys.
05:19It wasn't me.
05:20At the very least, Russell kept the lights on,
05:23preventing The Power of the Doctor from marking the start of a two- or even three-year wait until
05:28the next series.
05:30What if the TV movie was a hit?
05:33Starring the lovely Paul McGann as the dashing eighth Doctor,
05:36the 1996 TV movie was meant as a backdoor pilot for a US-produced continuation of the show.
05:42Unfortunately, the US ratings weren't great, and its reception wasn't exactly sparkling either,
05:47which killed those hopes and dreams of further episodes to come.
05:50But what if the TV movie had succeeded?
05:53Its UK ratings were actually pretty good, so this wasn't a million miles away from happening.
05:58We'd have entered an era of a very Americanised Doctor Who series,
06:01which us Brits may lament, but considering that this whole endeavour was backed by American companies
06:07and targeted American audiences, you can't really blame them.
06:10With Doctor Who continuing in this way, and with Paul McGann sticking around as the eighth Doctor,
06:15it's possible the 2005 revival wouldn't have happened, which would have been a travesty, quite frankly.
06:20We'd probably also have seen some crazy canon changes too,
06:24with stuff like the Doctor and the Master being revealed as brothers,
06:27and the Doctor searching for his father all featured in early versions of the TV movie's Bible.
06:32The big net gain here is getting much more of Paul McGann as the eighth Doctor,
06:36although even his biggest fans probably wouldn't sacrifice the 2005 revival for that.
06:42What if William Hartnell left in The Celestial Toymaker?
06:46It's no secret that William Hartnell became difficult to work with during his latter years on Who.
06:52Illness began to take its toll, coupled with his increase in frustration towards upper management.
06:57This reached its apex when John Wiles took over as producer from Verity Lambert.
07:01It got so bad that Wiles couldn't even speak directly with Hartnell, and tensions continued to rise.
07:06Something had to change, and this is essentially where regeneration was born.
07:10At least, this is where the idea for the Doctor to change his face was born.
07:14Wiles tried to use Brian Hale's script The Celestial Toymaker to write out Hartnell
07:18by having him become invisible due to the villain's fantastical powers within his imaginary reality.
07:24Upon returning to the screen in a physical form, Hartnell's Doctor was to be replaced by another actor,
07:29with the narrative reasoning explained as a by-product of the Toymaker's games.
07:33But this idea never came to pass.
07:35Things would have been fascinating had Wiles got his way,
07:38kicking Hartnell out of the TARDIS five stories prior to his actual exit.
07:42Regeneration wouldn't have been a properly established element,
07:45nor a reasoning behind the Doctor's sudden change,
07:47meaning the longevity of Doctor Who would have been left in the air.
07:50The show simply might have ended with whoever took over from Hartnell in The Celestial Toymaker,
07:54or the producers would have been forced to come up with other bizarre scenarios to recast the title role.
08:01What if the 2005 revival never happened?
08:04It's difficult to imagine things playing out any other way,
08:07but yes, indeed, we very nearly lived in the worst timeline where the 2005 revival never happened.
08:13In June 2004, less than a year before the Ninth Doctor exploded his way onto television,
08:18newly appointed Director General of the BBC, Mark Thompson, who clearly hates fun,
08:23made it one of his first ports of call to try and axe the first series of Doctor Who before
08:27it entered production.
08:28It would appear that this request came down from Doctor Who's old nemesis, Michael Grade.
08:34Grade, at this point, was chairman of the BBC Board of Governors,
08:37and was one of the people involved in Doctor Who's hiatus and near cancellation in the mid-1980s.
08:42Fortunately, it was quickly deemed that things were just too far along,
08:46and that cancelling Doctor Who at this stage would represent a significant waste of time and resources.
08:51But just think how different things could have turned out if Thompson had got the job a few months earlier.
08:56He would have likely been able to put a stop to the show for good,
08:59killing one of the BBC's biggest cash cows of the 21st century in the process.
09:04Doctor Who might never have returned, and if it did,
09:06it wouldn't look anything like the 2005 revival we did get.
09:09Russell T. Davis wouldn't have took the helm,
09:12we might not have seen Moffat or Chibnall as showrunner,
09:14we wouldn't have got about a billion average Mark Gatiss episodes,
09:17and worst of all, Rory's ponytail in Amy's choice would never have come to pass.
09:22Thank God Thompson's request was slapped into another timeline.
09:27What if we saw the ninth Doctor in The Day of the Doctor?
09:31Christopher Eccleston having a starring role in the 50th anniversary
09:34is one of those great Doctor Who what-ifs that most fans would give their right legs to see.
09:39Okay, maybe not that far, but we all want to see it, don't we?
09:42The Day of the Ninth Doctor actually came closer to happening than you might think, too,
09:46because not only did Stephen Moffat plan the story with Nine involved,
09:50he actually spoke to Eccleston about doing it.
09:52That's sadly where the story ends, though, because Eccleston politely declined.
09:56As a result, Moffat created the War Doctor to fill the gap that was intended for Nine,
10:00as he didn't believe Paul McGann's Eighth Doctor was a suitable one to have fought in the Time War.
10:04Not only would an episode with Matt Smith, David Tennant, and Christopher Eccleston
10:08have been brilliant to witness,
10:10it would have also kept the canon of the show a bit neater
10:13by not having a bonus Doctor sandwiched in the middle as great as John Hurt was.
10:17The Day of the Doctor was already huge,
10:19but can you imagine how much bigger it would have been with Eccleston along for the ride as well?
10:23It might have also signalled the repairing of Christopher Eccleston's relationship with Doctor Who,
10:27and led to further appearances in the show over the last 10-plus years,
10:30although probably not when a certain someone returned in 2023.
10:35What if Peter Capaldi stayed for Series 11?
10:39We haven't yet had a modern Doctor who's survived a change of showrunner,
10:43but it hasn't been for lack of trying.
10:45In early 2016, with the switch from Steven Moffat to Chris Chibnall looming,
10:48Peter Capaldi revealed that the BBC had asked him to stay on in the role,
10:52but that he hadn't yet made up his mind.
10:54Moffat himself would later add,
10:56quote,
11:01So what if Capaldi had stayed?
11:03Series 11 is one of the most criticised series in the revival,
11:07so how would it have fared with Capaldi at the helm?
11:09The stories would perhaps have been different,
11:11but either way, Capaldi had already demonstrated a knack for elevating weaker material.
11:16At the same time, the show's ratings have been dwindling by Series 10,
11:19so another year of the 12th Doctor might have left Doctor Who in a more precarious position.
11:23Series 11 saw a spike in ratings due to the novelty of the first female Doctor,
11:28so without that, how would Doctor Who have fared?
11:31The biggest change, of course, would have been not getting a female Doctor for Series 11,
11:35although you have to imagine that change would have simply occurred for Series 12,
11:39given that it's difficult to imagine Capaldi staying that long.
11:41Interestingly, this would have meant the 13th Doctor only got one full series
11:45before being derailed by the pandemic,
11:48which would have made that era feel even more curtailed than it was.
11:52What if there was a female Doctor in the 1980s?
11:56Doctor Who's struggles in the mid-to-late 80s are well-documented,
12:00but what isn't as well-documented is the completely different path it almost took.
12:04In a pitch dated October 1986,
12:07Doctor Who co-creator Sidney Newman presented his ideas for how he would reverse the show's fortunes,
12:13which included bringing back Patrick Troughton as the Doctor in an effort to steady the ship.
12:17This would then pave the way for a bigger transformation altogether,
12:21the first female Doctor.
12:22Newman's pitch read in part,
12:24quote,
12:25At a later stage, Doctor Who should be metamorphosed into a woman.
12:28This requires some considerable thought,
12:30mainly because I want to avoid a flashy Hollywood Wonder Woman,
12:33because this kind of heroine with no flaws is a bore.
12:36Given more time than I have now, I can create such a character.
12:39He then also requested a substantial fee,
12:42his name in the credits, and also to become the show's executive director.
12:45I mean, you can't blame the guy for trying, can you?
12:48It goes without saying that Newman was a highly respected name in TV circles,
12:52and in Doctor Who circles especially,
12:54but his ideas were ultimately discarded.
12:56However, it's interesting to consider how different Doctor Who would have been
12:59had the seventh or eighth Doctor been a woman.
13:02Doctor Who was already beyond saving at this point,
13:04so it probably would have still been cancelled,
13:07and you can imagine how that would have been twisted by some
13:09into blaming the Doctor's new form.
13:11Would we have seen another female Doctor before Jodie Whittaker,
13:14or would things have played out exactly like they did?
13:16Well, we will never know,
13:18but the history of the show would have been radically different indeed.
13:23And that concludes our list.
13:25Well, we've taken a look at moments that almost changed Doctor Who forever,
13:28so why not check out ten moments that changed Doctor Who forever?
13:31In the meantime, I've been Ellie for Who Culture,
13:33and in the words of Riversong herself,
13:35goodbye, sweeties.
13:36Yes.
13:38Do this.