10 Huge Doctor Who Moments Everyone Was Waiting For (That Never Happened)
Of course Ruby's mother wasn't The Rani, who gave you that idea?
With six decades of continuity whizzing around our heads, us Doctor Who fans can go into new episodes with some very lofty expectations.
Due to the nature of modern media, every casting announcement, set photo, or stray bit of dialogue generates reams of speculative articles, tweets, and TikToks about "What This Means For The Future Of Doctor Who!"
And generally what it means is, "not the thing you expected."
Remember that photo of Rachel Talalay and Peter Capaldi out for coffee during filming of The Star Beast? Sometimes coffee is just coffee. However, the Doctor Who production team can also take some of the blame for misleading viewers and building their hopes up for things that won't happen.
For example, Doctor Who set reporters claimed they heard production staff discuss the Daleks while filming Ncuti and Bonnie's moped ride in Empire of Death. If that gets out, people expect yet another RTD Dalek finale, only to be pleasantly surprised when Sutekh shows up.
While that's a positive example of Doctor Who misleading its audience, RTD and others are guilty of some more egregious red herrings, just as much as fans are guilty of building up expectations in their heads!
10. Davros In The Parting Of The Ways
Fans were so convinced that Davros was going to return in Series 1 finale The Parting of the Ways that they edited the episode's IMDB page in the week leading up to broadcast.
Even so, the casting choice of Red Dwarf's Norman Lovett should've been a pretty big sign that the editor was taking the piss.
Elsewhere, message boards were alight with theories that Adam Mitchell would be revealed as Davros, having presumably stuck a blue eyeball in his forehead hole. None of this was substantiated, and likely originated with a classic "I've got a source in Cardiff" post, but the whispers soon took on a life of their own.
That was until The Parting of the Ways revealed the much more impressive Emperor Dalek, who dwarfed Davros and established the ambition and scale of 21st century Doctor Who once and for all.
Davros would eventually return in Series 4, though if we're honest, he should've been hiding out in the Empire State Building in Series 3. Compared to Davros and the Emperor, Dalek Sec looked like that weird uncle nobody wants to talk to at family gatherings.