Doctor Who: 13 Cool Details Russell T Davies Just Revealed About The Stolen Earth & Journey's End

7. Davies Underestimated How Big The Cliffhanger Would Be (And He Wishes The Doctor Had Regenerated)

Doctor Who The Stolen Earth David Tennant regeneration
BBC/Twitter: @russelldavies63

Even though Doctor Who is still big today, it was absolutely huge back in 2008. It was a staple of British households on every Saturday night, and Sunday was always filled with fervent discussions about the previous night's events, as well as what next Saturday's episode would bring.

And perhaps the most fervent Sunday discussion of the Tennant era came the day after The Stolen Earth had aired.

The end of the episode - where the Doctor starts to regenerate - is one of the biggest cliffhangers in Doctor Who history, and there was genuine uncertainty among fans about whether or not Tennant would actually turn into someone else. Bookies were even taking bets about which actor would replace him, and on the whole, it was an insanely huge time for the show - Journey's End's record-breaking viewing figures are proof of that.

But amazingly, Davies and his team had no idea that the cliffhanger would cause such a stir. In a tweet, the former showrunner attributed this naivety to the fact that he already knew what would happen next, but even still, it's hard to believe that he didn't realise the impact the episode would have.

In another tweet, Davies also mentioned that he wishes he would've cast a superstar actor to replace Tennant for a single scene - such as Judi Dench or Ian McKellen - before having the Doctor regenerate back into his tenth incarnation.

Imagine that.

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Danny has been with WhatCulture for over ten years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. In 2022, he took charge of WhoCulture and has grown it into the biggest Doctor Who channel on YouTube, and one of the biggest Doctor Who communities on the web full-stop. He has been writing and video editing since his early teens, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers, off the back of a burning obsession with the Matt Smith era of the show. Like many his age, he first got into Doctor Who with the 2005 revival, but has since gone back and fallen in love with the classic years too. If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order, or to give you a random factoid about the making of Gridlock, Danny is the person to ask!