Doctor Who: 15 Greatest NuWho Deaths So Far

15. Billy Shipton (Blink)

Sometimes, the death of a minor character can be almost as effective and saddening as the death of a major character, and that's definitely true of Blink's Billy Shipton. He gets a very limited set of scenes - one when he's telling Sally about the abandoned cars found outside the house haunted by the Weeping Angels, one meeting the Doctor after being sent back in time, and then the last in the hospital, seeing Sally for one final time. 

Billy is first introduced as a young, cocksure police officer. However, the Weeping Angels catch him and catapult him into the past, where he's forced to live out his life in order to make sure the Doctor's message gets to Sally Sparrow. Just a few hours after she meets the young version of him, Sally meets the old, dying version in hospital. The sudden gut punch of just how short life can feel makes the scene really affecting, and the reminiscent tone that Louis Mahoney (who plays old Billy) injects into his performance makes it sadder still.

The cherry on the top, if that's not too nice an image, is the fact that Billy knows he has until the rain stops to live. It's so hauntingly delivered by Mahoney that it makes the slower scene still more compelling and heart-wrenching.