Doctor Who: What Happened To Each Doctor After They Left The Show?

6. Sylvester McCoy

Tom Baker Doctor Who Little Britain
Warner Bros. Pictures

Last Regular Episode: Doctor Who: The Movie

Sylvester McCoy was the final actor to play the Doctor before it was taken off the air in 1989, but the stink of the show's cancellation did not hinder his career in the slightest. In fact, his final appearance as the Time Lord came seven years later, when he regenerated in the 1996 TV movie.

Just like Colin Baker, he appeared in Casualty, The Bill, Hollyoaks, and Doctors after stepping away from the TARDIS, while also co-starring with the legendary Ian McKellen in the 2008 TV adaptation of Shakespeare's King Lear. Additionally, he popped up in season two of the Netflix series Sense8 as The Old Man of Hoy.

However, his most famous post-Doctor Who role - by far - came when he played the crazy wizard Radagast in Peter Jackson's recent Hobbit trilogy, which reunited McCoy with his King Lear co-star, McKellen.

Like Colin Baker, McCoy has yet to reprise the role of the Doctor in a proper episode of the show, but he has starred as Seven in a number of audio dramas.

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Danny has been with WhatCulture for almost nine years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. He has been writing and video editing for 10+ years, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers and uploading them to YouTube (they're admittedly a bit rusty by today's standards). If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order or to tell you about the making of 1988's Remembrance of the Daleks, Danny is the person to ask.