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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 as 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 knitted 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 all 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 potentially dying.
00:51A 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.
00:59Number 10. RTD Arcs.
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.
01:10And 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.
01:37All of these things would return towards the end of the season to bite us on the backside when it all 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.
01:559. He Will Knock Four Times
01:57When 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.
02:05She 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,
02:16the Doctor learns of the prophecy that claims he will 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
02:25after being trapped in a glass case that's going to fill with radiation,
02:29leaving Ten in a moral predicament.
02:30He thought he had cheated death and was suddenly confronted with the fact
02:34that he had to die to save his friend.
02:36This twist of fate had been a long time coming.
02:38He met Donna in 2006 and came across Wilf in 2007.
02:43He found Donna again and travelled with her again in 2008,
02:46then 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
03:00Ten and Rose had a romantic connection that sadly ended
03:03before they could fully confess their feelings.
03:06The tragic events of Doomsday, which led to Rose being sucked into an alternate dimension,
03:10and Ten burning up a son to say goodbye,
03:12emotionally ruined us all and left us devastated that neither of them got their happy ending.
03:17A couple of years later, in season four,
03:19Rose made a surprise return from her alternate dimension
03:22as the walls between realities began to break down.
03:25She spends the entire series reaching out to the Doctor,
03:27and when they're finally reunited, the Doctor is exterminated by a Dalek,
03:32only 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,
03:41the Doctor leaves his Metacrisis clone with Rose.
03:43This version of the Doctor is the same as ours,
03:45but will age and live as close to a human life as is possible.
03:48Seeing Ten leave Rose with the him that he could never be is absolutely heartbreaking,
03:53but it's a payoff that was unexpected,
03:55and 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.
04:01Number 7.
04:02Clara goes too far.
04:04Clara's arc saw her build herself up to believe she's on the same level as the Doctor,
04:08and acts like she's invincible.
04:10It was an interesting study of what can happen when people get too close to the Doctor,
04:13if he builds them up as he did with Clara.
04:15Of 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,
04:22with 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,
04:31but under the surface, there's a lot of psychological damage to her.
04:34This led her to make so many brave yet rash decisions,
04:38and eventually sent her to her death.
04:40It's genuinely harrowing how her character develops so drastically,
04:43and makes us view the Doctor who encouraged her in an entirely 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
04:53even managed to help her escape 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.
05:02Number 6.
05:03Yaz's love for Thirteen.
05:04Some say that Yaz's love for the Thirteenth Doctor has come from nowhere,
05:08and has been shoehorned in too little too 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.
05:23It becomes very obvious when you add in moments like in Can You Hear Me,
05:26where Yaz ran away from home after suffering from a mental health breakdown,
05:30and her ability to call out the Doctor when she needs to.
05:33Her behaviour when the Doctor returns in Revolution of the Daleks,
05:36where she gets mad and pushes her, always felt extreme 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,
05:47it'll be very obvious that Yaz was always in love.
05:50It's a shame it took until Eve of the Daleks, almost four years after her debut,
05:54for her to admit it, but it's nice to see some LGBTQ plus representation
05:58being handled sensitively and sweetly.
06:01It was even more exciting, but equally heartbreaking,
06:03to see the Doctor handle the situation the way that she did.
06:06Number 5. Silence Will Fall
06:09Eleven's era began in 2010,
06:12and was haunted by the sinister phrase,
06:13Silence Will Fall.
06:15The arc incorporated the cracks in space and time,
06:17the terrifying silence monsters,
06:19and the fields of Trenzalore, where the Doctor's tomb resides.
06:22In the Season 7 finale, The Name of the Doctor,
06:24the Doctor must speak his name to enter his tomb,
06:27but refuses to speak.
06:28Instead, River Song, who is a ghost,
06:30says his name and opens the tomb without us hearing it.
06:33Later on in 2013's Christmas special, The Time of the Doctor,
06:36it was revealed that the Time Lords were on the other side of the crack,
06:39and they wanted the Doctor to confirm his name and help them to return.
06:43Still, the Doctor refused to answer,
06:45because the Time Lords' return would trigger another time war.
06:48At this time, we see the Kavarian sect split from the church,
06:51a moment that triggered the Silence Will Fall arc 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,
07:02and continue the mystery of Doctor Who.
07:05Number 4.
07:05River Song at the Singing Towers
07:07When the Doctor first meets River in the library in 2008's Silence in the Library,
07:12she sacrifices herself to save the day.
07:15River is heartbroken that this Doctor doesn't know her,
07:18and promises that she knows him very well,
07:20even hinting that they are married.
07:22In her dying moments, she name-drops certain adventures,
07:25and talks about their last meeting,
07:27when the Doctor turned up with a haircut, a new suit,
07:29and took her away for a romantic getaway at the Singing Towers of Deryllium.
07:33River returned multiple times over the next few years,
07:36appearing in the adventures that she had mentioned in her final moments,
07:39like the crash of the Byzantium.
07:41Her time with Eleven saw their relationship blossom through their adventures,
07:45and lead up to their marriage.
07:46After the Eleventh Doctor regenerated,
07:48the 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's Song that took us to Deryllium.
07:58The episode's closing scene shocked viewers by appearing from nowhere,
08:01and showing the heartbreaking scene which had been mentioned almost eight years ago.
08:05Needless to say, the emotional scenes in this unexpected payoff ruined everyone's Christmas.
08:10Number 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 their kind.
08:22As the series progress, we discover more when Ten talks more about the Time War
08:26and their home planet being decimated, 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,
08:35and choices they made in 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,
08:44a whole eight years after the revival began,
08:47to finally get to 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
08:57and help him come to 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 the Time War.
09:06But thankfully, they realise they don't need to commit genocide,
09:09and can instead save Gallifrey with the help of every Doctor.
09:12It was a surprising payoff at the end of a long, tragic arc,
09:15and finally allowed the Doctor a reason to celebrate.
09:19Number 2. Twice Upon a Time
09:21In Capaldi's last outing as the Twelfth Doctor,
09:24he met up with his first incarnation at the end of his life.
09:27With both Doctors refusing to regenerate,
09:29the story follows the pair as they eventually help each other accept their impending regenerations.
09:34While this didn't directly mirror events from the Tenth Planet,
09:37it was a beautifully thought-out tie-in that made a 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.
09:49It also involved a couple of soldiers from the First World War,
09:52frozen in a moment, struggling with being able to kill each other.
09:55They're eventually saved when the Christmas Day miracle begins,
09:58and all soldiers famously put down their weapons and come together.
10:01Seeing the good influenced by Twelve,
10:03the first Doctor decides he's ready to move on and goes back to his TARDIS.
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.
10:16Number 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,
10:32and theories about the forgotten lives have caused controversy for years.
10:36After the Timeless Child twist in 2020,
10:38the Morbius Doctors were no longer possible to ignore.
10:41The modern twist proved that the Doctor had lived many lives
10:44before 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
10:56by giving us a payoff that goes beyond the show'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
11:08has 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,
11:18and will continue to for a very long time.
11:20And that concludes our list.
11:22If you can think of anything we missed,
11:23then do let us know in the comments below,
11:25and while you're there, don't forget to like and subscribe,
11:27and tap that notification bell.
11:29Also, head over to Twitter and follow us there,
11:31at WhoCulture,
11:32and I can be found across various social medias
11:34just by searching Ellie Littlechild.
11:36I've been Ellie with WhoCulture,
11:37and in the words of Riversong herself,
11:39goodbye, sweeties.
11:40And I'll see you next time.
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