The Doctor Falls (TV story)

, 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 after ensuring the end of. 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.

The story featured several connections to the 1966 serial The Tenth Planet, including a story featuring humans from Mondas and featured appearances by the Cybermen from said planet. More surprisingly, 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. The Doctor starts wondering which side she is on.

Nardole, who had commandeered a shuttlecraft, lands near the roof to help escape, but the Doctor is electrified by a Cyberman before he boards. Missy and the Master try to convince Nardole to abandon the Doctor, but Bill prevents the shuttle from leaving until they rescue him.

They escape to a higher floor on the ship, where time moves slower. They find themselves on solar farm, where some of the humans and a large number of children protect themselves from the early Cybermen prototypes from Operation Exodus. The Doctor to recover, but he shows early signs of regeneration which he keeps from Bill. Bill finds that though she thinks she is human, she is still a Mondasian Cyberman in appearance, created by a perception filter, according to the Doctor. She sheds a tear when she realises the humans are frightened of her, and the Doctor wipes it away, noting it unusual.

Missy discovers a camouflaged lift in the nearby forest, which she suggests they can escape to the bridge, but when she calls it, it brings up an advanced Cyberman from the lower floor, which they quickly destroy. The Doctor warns that through the Cybernet, they will now have much more time to plan, and they must prepare for a battle. While Nardole discovers that the floor below this one has many fuel pipes that he can detonate as weaponry against the Cybermen, the Doctor finds a conduit to another solar on a higher floor that can be used to evacuate the children, knowing this is a fight they will likely lose. The Master and Missy decide to leave and plan to find the Master's TARDIS at the lowest floor, despite the Doctor's request to stay and help. At the lift, Missy betrays the Master and fatally stabs him, forcing his next regeneration. She announces she will return to help the Doctor, but when she turns her back, he fires his laser screwdriver at full blast, also fatally wounding her and disabling her regeneration. They both laugh as they die.

An initial wave of Cybermen arrive, but using Nardole's tricks with the explosives, they are able to make the humans appear more powerful, forcing the Cybermen to retreat and develop a new plan, giving the humans more time. Against Nardole's protests, the Doctor sends him to help evacuate the children, intending to stay alone to fight the Cybermen. Bill also insists on staying with the Doctor. With all the humans evacuated, the Doctor ignites all the pipes below the floor, engulfing it all in a wave of destruction. All the Cybermen are killed, but the Doctor is severally wounded. Bill, still as a Cyberman, comes to mourn the Doctor's body, but suddenly she finds herself out of the Cyberman suit, seemingly human, thanks to Heather ("The Pilot") who found her by her tear and restored her to by like she is now. They take to the Doctor's body to the TARDIS, and Heather, as the Pilot, directs the TARDIS to a new location, while offering Bill to live out a different life, and Bill accepts.

The TARDIS lands on a snowy planet. The Doctor, struggling to hold back his regeneration, steps outside and hears a voice addressing him, that of the First Doctor.

Cast

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

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.

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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 naturally from Mondas (AUDIO: Spare Parts, TV: The Tenth Planet) Telos, (PROSE: Doctor Who and 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)
 * Missy is able to provide the Master with a dematerialization circuit by telling him to always carry a spare, similar to how the Tenth Doctor told the Fifth how he could stop the TARDIS exploding (Time Crash).
 * Missy telling her previous incarnation she loved being him mirror also the Tenth Doctor, as he made a similar speech to his fifth incarnation. (TV: Time Crash)
 * 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 Time Lords)
 * The Master moves the Doctor around in a wheelchair. (TV: Last of the Time Lords)
 * 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 Manhattan, Donna Noble from Partners in Crime, Jack Harkness from Utopia, Vastra from The Name of the Doctor, Jenny Flint from The Crimson Horror, Sarah Jane Smith from The Stolen Earth, Amy Pond from The Impossible Astronaut, River Song from The Pandorica Opens, and even Clara Oswald from Last Christmas.
 * When waking up after his pre-regeneration flashbacks, the Doctor says "Sontarans! Perverting the course of human history!". They were the first words of the Fourth Doctor after regenerating. (TV: Robot). He said the same statement after he woke up in the TARDIS during TV: Listen.
 * 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) as well as the final words the Tenth Doctor stated before his aborted regeneration. (TV: The Stolen Earth)
 * The Doctor resists regenerating. He has previously done this when nearing the end of his fifth (TV: The Caves of Androzani) and tenth incarnations. (TV: The End of Time)
 * The Doctor offers people jelly babies. (TV: The Three Doctors, Robot, et. al)
 * 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)
 * As the Doctor leaves the TARDIS the Cloister Bell is heard ringing.
 * The Twelfth Doctor, and later the First Doctor, describe themselves as "the Doctor, the original you might say." The First Doctor previously said this exact phrase in TV: The Five Doctors, the first and only other televised story to feature the First Doctor portrayed by an actor other than William Hartnell.

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