10 Shocking Classic Doctor Who Era Cliffhangers
8. The End Of The World (Inferno)
Inferno is without a doubt my favourite Third Doctor serial. It has an intense, and suspenseful atmosphere, revolving around the idea of the end of the world. Like all good sci-fi plots revolved around drilling operations digging deep into the Earth, there's always a terrible consequence, alongside the head scientist unable to see sense no matter how bad the situation gets.
Naturally, the Third Doctor gets frustrated by all this, and attempts to use the operation to fuel his own experiments, i.e. getting his TARDIS up and running again to free himself from his exile. However, this goes terribly wrong and he ends up travelling to a parallel universe, where he inevitably witnesses what will happen in his own universe should the drilling operation not be stopped.
What makes matters worse is all his friends are now his enemies, and it's an upward battle for the Third Doctor to find a way out of this. In the end we're left with a darkening cliff-hanger, which leaves us unsure as to whether the Third Doctor will escape back to his own reality, as the world comes to an end. Despite later knowing the Time Lord escapes safely, you're still left with the grim image of the parallel versions of characters meeting a sticky end, having become trapped as a wave of lava flows towards them.