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Doctor Who Showrunner Steven Moffat Nearly Brought Back The Rani

Steven Moffat originally wanted to briefly bring back The Rani during the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who, but was talked out of it.

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There are so many untold stories behind the scenes at Doctor Who that we can never know all of them, partly because many are private and confidential, but also because there are way too many, and it depends on when someone involved in the show decides to tell them. Take, for example, the 50th Anniversary of the series back in 2013. Steven Moffat, who was the showrunner at the time, nearly brought back the Rani then.

Doctor Who: Moffat Nearly Brought The Rani Back When He was Showrunner
BBC

Podcast host George Sheard revealed on social media that in an early draft of the script for the 50th Anniversary mini-episode prequel to the main special "The Day of the Doctor", the Rani would have made her first appearance in the modern series of Doctor Who where she was responsible for initiaating the dying Eighth Doctor's (Paul McGann) regeneration into the War Doctor (John Hurt) to fight the Time War. Sheard revealed a page from the script where The Rani, then still uncast, pulled the Doctor from the crashed ship to offer him a chance to regenerate into a form more suited to fighting the Time War in order to save everyone.

"I'd completely forgotten this," Moffat responded. "My script team felt I was throwing away the Rani on a minisode and we should hold her back – and while I didn't entirely agree, I took the point. Given that I was throwing a spanner into Who continuity (an extra Doctor!) I wanted some Who lore in there to compensate – hence the Sisterhood."

It didn't ake much to change it from The Rani to the Sisterhood of Karn, led by Clare Higgins who offered The Doctor a choice in what kind of regenerated form he would have. As a result, The Rani stayed banked for another twelve years before Russell T Davies finally brought her back bi-generated as played by Anita Dobson and Archie Punjabi in 2025 for the Disney+ season.

"I bet Russell was pleased I rethought," wrote Moffat. "But never mind, wasn't Clare Higgins amazing? I so loved her."

Fans had been clamouring for The Rani to return to Doctor Who since 2006. Now that she's been and gone, they can go back to arguing that Billie Piper can't be the Sixteenth Doctor.

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Adi TantimedhAbout Adi Tantimedh

Adi Tantimedh is a filmmaker, screenwriter and novelist. He wrote radio plays for the BBC Radio, “JLA: Age of Wonder” for DC Comics, “Blackshirt” for Moonstone Books, and “La Muse” for Big Head Press. Most recently, he wrote “Her Nightly Embrace”, “Her Beautiful Monster” and “Her Fugitive Heart”, a trilogy of novels featuring a British-Indian private eye published by Atria Books, a division Simon & Schuster.
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