10 Doctor Who Deleted Scenes You Need To See
2. Cyberman Surprise!
The end-of-series cliffhanger became a staple of the first RTD era, with almost every finale leading into that year’s Christmas special.
The Parting of the Ways had the Tenth Doctor’s debut, Doomsday had Donna Noble’s surprise appearance, Last of the Time Lords had the space Titanic, and Journey’s End had… a soaking wet Doctor strip down (just to his shirt, mind you) and mope around the TARDIS.
But this wasn’t always the way.
As written and filmed, the episode’s closing scene saw the Doctor inspect a reading on the TARDIS scanner, while failing to notice two Cybermen creeping up behind him.
This scene would've led directly into Christmas special The Next Doctor, with the brief appearance of the Cybermen explained as them “falling through the vortex."
As documented in the fascinating behind-the-scenes book The Writer’s Tale, Russell T Davies felt that it was important to end the series on an upbeat note. But Doctor Who Magazine writer Benjamin Cook thought that this Cyber-scene detracted from the tragic end to Donna’s story. And on reflection, RTD agreed with him.
The cliffhanger was abandoned as a result, and a new ending was shot many weeks later during production of The Next Doctor.
RTD has since admitted that maybe they should've left this in, and it’s not hard to see why. After all, who doesn’t love a good “What? What?! WHAT?!”