Another regeneration whoopsie occurred in Lets Kill Hitler when the Doctor was poisoned by Rivers kiss. In the TARDIS, his safe place for regeneration, he is told regeneration disabled not, youve used all your lives which we find later to be the case. But weve covered that previously so we wont go further there. Rather, this episode stands out, not for the botched assassination attempt, but for the rousing restoration of the eponymous Doc to full health, by way of River bestowing upon him the power of all her remaining lives. For the sake of pedantry, lets see if we can work out how many lives that is. When we first meet the young girl in the space-suit we hear her say its OK, Ive done it before so thats two lives down, tough paper round for such a young girl. When we see Mel about to regenerate into River Song she says that the last time this happened she ended up a young girl. So we have River, Mel, the young girl and one before her, thats only four. Leaving at least 7 or 8, allowing for error, lives to pass onto the Doctor. Quite why she needed to use all her remaining lives is up for debate but surely that act would have granted the Doctor at least one more regeneration before having to deal with the last life rather than shoe-horning it in. What could have been an interesting thread of story around the Doctor never knowing which life would be his last was instead swept under the carpet and dealt with all too quickly. There are of course others, so sound off in the comments with your favourite loose threads.
I.T. Consultant, technophile and Doctor Who fan. I like to talk about tech, take films apart and make excuses for Doctor Who's continuity errors. No other show has the power to make me feel like a big kid.
