Speculating on The Fall of the Eleventh
Guest contibutor Liam Catterson gives some thoughts on how Matt Smith will bow out.
As the days march down to the death of the Eleventh Doctor, we are pondering, day to night, weeks to months, on how Eleven will fall and become Twelve. This will no doubt be sadder than the moment Amy Pond said, “Raggedy Man, goodbye” (Although that seems almost impossible to beat). We can trust Moffat and his team to come up with the ultimate tearjerker to say our farewell to Eleven. But how is he going to perish? This is the big question and what I am about to do is dive into some scenarios in which I feel would be suitable for the fall of the Eleventh…
Death by radiation poisoning? No thank you!
Now I highly doubt we will see this materialising again. The Ninth fell to something similar; not radiation but the Time Vortex energy that Rose absorbed so she could save the Doctor. The Tenth, as we all know, fell victim to radiation poisoning after sacrificing his life to save Wilfred Mott’s. Who knows what John Hurt’s Doctor died from (If he is the Eccleston’s predecessor)?
Now I am not going to say they are bad ways to kill off a Doctor, but a similar scenario should not be the way for Eleven to die. In my opinion, it wouldn’t suit his farewell, but I also thought that with David Tennant’s Doctor and it turned out to be the saddest regeneration of all. Plus, this has been done twice already, thrice if you count Eccleston’s. So if Smith wants to save Clara or River Song, or who knows, a little kid who just met him, he should not poison himself in doing so, or we may find ourselves with a Doctor who won’t want to save any more lives.
What SHOULD be the cause for regeneration?
I was reading an interview with Moffat the other week and there were so many things that would make sense for Smith to bow out. For example, there is the possibility to feature the Silence or maybe the Weeping Angels (But I don’t see the Angels killing off Eleven). Of the two, the Silence would be the PERFECT way to get rid of Matt Smith, to put it bluntly. Ever since Smith was blessed to see he had legs in an exploding TARDIS, the Silence have been the main attraction to his storyline.
Silence will fall when the question is asked.
In Name of the Doctor, what silence fell? Maybe the audience viewers, but not the Silence itself, so it is possible that there is more on Trenzalore than what we already know, and if so, maybe The Name of the Doctor arc can still press forward? It is really a storyline that shouldn’t be contained to just one episode, so maybe this can continue in the 50th and Smith’s finale.
So what should he regenerate from? Bodily injuries from the Silence? We know how powerful their electric bolts are. Maybe he could sacrifice himself to the Silence to save Clara (as payback for Clara saving his life so many times). That is likely IF the Silence are in Smith’s finale. Maybe the Daleks or Cybermen will kill him (If so, I will not be happy). Maybe Clara does! What a bombshell that would be! I could see other reasons for killing off Eleven, like the Master coming back for revenge. But really, I don’t think there is any more suitable way for Eleven to go out than to face his incarnation’s greatest foe, and that is the Silence.
May I also ask everyone, what actually happened at The Fall of the Eleventh? Nothing has, because unless I missed something, “The Fall” has not occurred yet, unless that hoo-ha turned out to be the Great Intelligence on Trenzalore (Which does not make sense as he corrupted not just the Eleventh Doctor but every other incarnation). So I suspect we’ll be coming back to Trenzalore once more.
How emotional will the regeneration be?
I choked when David Tennant said ‘I don’t want to go’. I can pledge that Matt Smith is going to make us cry. Whereas the Tenth Doctor could see all his companions one last time, Amy and Rory can’t see the Doctor again. River Song’s timeline is scrambled, so who knows what is next for River, if anything. Unless Moffat is uncreative and writes the Doctor hiding in the shadows to see Amy and Rory again, I can’t see a goodbye akin to Tennant’s.
By the sounds of Moffat’s teasing, he has something heart-breaking lined up and to add insult to injury, you all know how crippling Murray Gold’s music is. I can already tell that I am going to be so sad. He is my Doctor and when he goes, I don’t know if I will be able to accept Twelve straight away. But what you can expect is possibly a contest to discuss which regeneration between Tennant’s and Smith’s was more depressing!
Conclusion
This Christmas is going to be another one where it’ll be impossible to keep our eyes off the TV. Forget your soaps; forget anything apart from Doctor Who. This episode is going to be the one to watch. Whenever the Doctor regenerates, it’s always a must-see moment in Who history. I think the episode will have a lot packed in the space of an hour. Whatever the cause of his regeneration is, and whoever the main enemies are, I thank you for reading and I welcome you to make comments with your own predictions.
