Former Doctor Who showrunner reveals dark twist that was never filmed

Doctor Who cast and crew members have been consistently entertaining the fandom during this lockdown period with behind-the-scenes information we never knew we wanted. Just the other day, former showrunner Russell T. Davies revealed that he would have loved Ian McKellen or Jedi Dench to play the Doctor (just for one scene) after David Tennant’s time was up. The virtual rewatches are a font of info!

In the latest rewatch, Davies was at it again, spilling some tea about the season 4 finale, “Journey’s End.” Apparently, he’d considered going with a dark twist involving David Tennant’s Tenth Doctor…and I lowkey wish we could have seen it go down. Tennant’s time as the Doctor is one of my favorite stretches, and when I read about this twist, I could see it all play out in my head. And you will too.

If you recall, in the season 4 finale, there was a clone of the Tenth Doctor, aka “metacrisis Doctor” that emerged as a result of the extra regeneration energy from the beginning of the episode. Well, Davies reveals that originally he meant for this clone version to go down a very different path:

Um, wow. Imagine the Doctor — or a more “wild” human clone of the Doctor — inciting a war between the Daleks and the Judoon! This is something I would have definitely liked to see play out. I know it’s a little far afield of what usually happens on the show, but doesn’t it sound like it would have been pretty cool anyway?

Of course, Doctor Who fans know that what does end up happening is that the clone Doctor disregards the real Doctor’s wishes and goes against the Daleks. As a result, he’s banished off to the parallel world where Rose (Billie Piper) is living.

The idea didn’t go to complete waste, however. As Davies points out, he was able to use that darkness in another episode.

I know some of us may not want to, but can you imagine Tennant’s Doctor going rogue and dark like Davies originally planned? I mean, we all saw Tennant as Kilgrave on Jessica Jones, right? The guy is capable of going dark, and I mean very dark.

At this point, I’m just looking forward to what interesting revelation the cast and crew serve up next!

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h/t RadioTimes.com