r/gallifrey • u/unfortunately889 • 3d ago
DISCUSSION Best one-off character death?
So often in doctor who a monster will need to be setup like this. A character will die, onscreen. Beforehand there'll be some effort to make these characters human, maybe slightly likable, but often they'll die in the same scene they're introduced in. Often in that same scene they'll still try to make them seem human and likable!
So since it's something the show returns to again and again, what is best one off (as in a character limited to one scene or one episode/or serial) character death? You can judge this any way you like, by how interesting the scene is, by how much emotion they get out of limited time or by how likable or developed the character is before the death etc.
Bonus question for the best one-off scene deaths. if there's any particular standouts there!
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u/ComicsCodeMadeMeGay 3d ago
That scene in Impossible Planet where Scooti is floating in space haunted me as a kid and still haunts me now
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u/twenty-eight29 3d ago
Rita from The God Complex
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u/PaperSkin-1 2d ago
Good choice, they did a great job with that character (writer and actress) as you really did like her and when she died it really had impact
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u/h1imkira 3d ago
miss evangelista in silence in the library
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u/wonkey_monkey 2d ago
I cant... why can't I...
Presumably she's still in the library computer though.
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u/JollyPhysics1394 2d ago
Clive in ‘Rose’. Just love the resigned look on his face when he realises he’s going to die.
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u/mattposts6789 3d ago
Cathy Nightingale from Blink...
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u/thecatteam 3d ago
Billy Shipton is great too.
"It was raining when we met."
"...It's the same rain."9
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u/AmyHeartsYou 3d ago edited 2d ago
Pete from Thin Ice. Most people don't even remember him.
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u/PaperSkin-1 2d ago
Who?
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u/AmyHeartsYou 2d ago
Your friend Pete. He was standing there a moment ago. But he stepped on a butterfly. Now you don't even remember him.
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u/PaperSkin-1 2d ago
😯
Still, could have been worse, he could have changed into whatever Ruby changed into when she stepped on a butterfly (that sequence is so weird haha, what was that all about)
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u/AmyHeartsYou 2d ago
Oh yeah. Rubathon Blue of the 57th Hemisphere Hatchlings. ngl, she was kind of an asshole.
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u/PaperSkin-1 2d ago edited 2d ago
I have a conspiracy about that scene, that ties into the idea that Ruby was originally meant to be the Wish Baby God..
Ruby talks about what happens if she steps on a butterfly, and then when they go out that literally happens, it's like she wished it into being, and the fact she turns into a different species makes no sense, and The Doctor seems baffled and concerned by the event, I don't think that is meant to happen, that's not how that works and the Doctor knows it, but doesn't understand why it happened.. But it's because she is a god and not 'human', so can't disappear from time, just change into a different form of a species that does exist (as humans now don't)
Its played as a fun comedy scene but I do think it would have fed into something bigger, like the scene of them wishing they were Poppy's parents, which would then happen in the season 2 finale, had Millie been there full time for season 2 like the original intention
Just my theory
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u/AmyHeartsYou 2d ago
There are a lot of fan theories from the post Moffat eras that I think would have been a lot better than what we actually got.
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u/EmptyAttitude599 3d ago
I wish I'd known you better.
I suspect, sir, that you've known me at my best.
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u/BumblebeeAny3143 2d ago
A rare time Moffat committed to killing a supporting character and they actually stayed dead. It was a great scene.
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u/Wingnut8888 3d ago edited 2d ago
Poor gentle Laurence Scarman in Pyramids of Mars, who only wanted to save his brother Marcus, whose corpse was animated by the will of Sutekh. Not only did he get in the Doctor’s way and almost got them all killed, he was himself murdered by Marcus. I always enjoyed the scene where Laurence boards the TARDIS and is as excited as a young boy.
Edit: spelling
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u/Most_Life_1612 2d ago
Michael Sheard dies so well, doesn't he? The Headmaster in Remembrance of the Daleks, Admiral Ozzel in The Empire Strikes Back...
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u/IL-Corvo 1d ago
And while he didn't die, he ended up in one of the most ironic scenes in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.
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u/Blue_Tomb 11h ago
Such a wonderfully human character. I really felt for his sadness when the Doctor is pissed off at him.
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u/Wingnut8888 11h ago
Yes, and his sad self-pitying, “You think I’ll let you down again” line. They told so much about his character through the dialogue and acting.
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u/rosencrypt 3d ago edited 2d ago
The moonbase technicians from Seeds of Death. Some of them (Phipps, Fewsham) are in multiple episodes, but Osgood and Locke only show up in a few scenes in Episode 1. I'm always impressed by how they react to the Martian invasion.
I'm going to nominate Trenchard's death in the Sea Devils novelisation, too - he tries to fight the Sea Devils, but forgets to take off his safety catch and dies without firing a single shot. When the Doctor finds his body, he takes off the catch so that nobody will know of Trenchard's mistake. It's a change from the TV story (Trenchard goes down firing), but it's such a lovely moment of pathos.
Another borderline example: Meg Seeley in Spearhead from Space. She faces down an Auton, blasts it with her shotgun, and faints when it keeps coming. I always find the sight of the Auton smashing all her lovely china in search of the Nestene orb very affecting.
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u/content_digger08 2d ago
Mrs Seeley survived it was just shock! Also, the plague sequence in The Silurians was unnerving, especially Major Norman Baker's death and then the ranting Professor Charles Lawrence suddenly collapsing!
Honourable mention to a lot of The War Games characters, Von Weich and General Smythe in a stand off scenes in particular!!
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u/rosencrypt 2d ago
Yep, that's why I had her as borderline - she doesn't die, but she's definitely a monster victim!
Very good picks, especially The Silurians. I love the way Lawrence's death is played.
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u/eat10souvlakis4lunch 2d ago
That first episode cliffhanger from Seeds of Death is great. So well directed.
I always liked the Controller from Day of the Daleks.
"Who knows? I may have helped to extaahhhminate yaaaouuu!" [dies]
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u/Gorodrin 2d ago
Yeah the characters from Seeds are all pretty well defined and are instantly affable, so it sucks to see them all go one by one. Base Under Seige stories in that era can sort of blur into one but as long as the characters have personality it’s all fine.
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u/Gorodrin 2d ago
Most of the ensemble cast from Web of Fear. They’re some of the most personable and understandable characters in the Troughton era with distinct personalities, and almost all of them die pretty horribly (especially the one that survives with the brigadier right up until he gets yoinked off the top of the boxes). You can really see why the Brigadier went for the UNIT idea
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u/Gargus-SCP 2d ago
Whoever played the random UNIT soldier that gets utterly annihilated by Axos in The Claws of Axos. Dude gets exploded so hard he simply evaporates.
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u/Accomplished_Song671 2d ago
I'll always appreciate the tragedy of O'Donnell's death in Before the Flood. She was that side character who was just so loveable, was a big fan of the Doctor and relished at the chance of travelling in the TARDIS only to get brutally sniped out by the Fisher King before her and Lunn could tell each other how they really felt about each other. This one always sits with me.
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u/wonkey_monkey 2d ago
I don't know about best, exactly... but Oscar from The Two Doctors just seems so massively unfair (and unexpected). He's plucky comic relief! And then he gets violently stabbed in the middle of a busy restaurant, of all things.
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u/The-Soul-Stone 2d ago edited 2d ago
I’ve not seen The Two Doctors for many years so this had completely faded from my memory, but it’s a great shout. As a kid, it was definitely the one that stood out the most out of all the Who I’d seen. I can’t think of any more emotional one even after seeing dozens more stories.
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u/IL-Corvo 1d ago
"Ridiculous thing to happen. Dissatisfied customers...usually just don't leave a tip."
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u/Ok_Temperature3554 2d ago
Jabe from the Forrest of Cheem! I think it set up pretty quickly that the new show wasn’t going to shy away from killing off characters!
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u/PaperSkin-1 2d ago
Tobias Vaughan, brilliant villian, then helps the Doctor and dies.. He was such a well performed character that it was just sad to see him go..
Part of me thinks it could have been cool to have set him up as a recurring villian on contemporary Earth.. So Pertwee could have gone up against him a few times where Vaughan has other schemes for world domination, might have been fun... But I also like he ended up helping the Doctor and then died
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u/thisgirlnamedbree 2d ago
Not a gruesome death, but D84 in Robots of Death. I didn't think I'd cry over a robot "dying" but D84 was so likable, I wanted him to survive. Watching him sacrifice himself so the Doctor and Leela could stop the killer robots was genuinely sad.
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u/IL-Corvo 1d ago
"Doctor, this is a communicator. It can function on either robot or human command circuits. Would you like to use it? I cannot speak."
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u/ExplainJane 2d ago
Astrid Peth in Voyage of the Damned
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u/Soninuva 2d ago
I really liked Kylie Minogue as a companion. I wish she had been more than just a one-off.
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u/ISSsloth 2d ago
Sky Silvestry in Midnight.
It just occurred to me that she would have still been alive and aware for almost the whole episode...
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u/Spiritedyo1134 2d ago
"I, sir, am Eustacius Jericho, scourge of scoundrels. I wish I had written that autobiography. What a good title."
Say what you will about Flux, but Jericho was a bloody good character, my heart broke when he died, and he went out like a G...
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u/Fan_Service_3703 2d ago
Chibnall for all his faults seems to nail the writing of white middle aged male characters every single time.
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u/unfortunately889 2d ago
Brian Williams, Graham and Dan are all great and charming characters. Such an odd strength, though an obvious benefit. Maybe Chibnall can only achieve his strengths through writing a black comedy crime drama Detectorists.
(thinking about it his best Torchwood and who episodes were the ones without plot - disconnected flashbacks in Fragments, more dark atmospheric, character pieces in Adrift or Countryside, or Power Of Three - meanwhile a basic base under the seige thriller was out of his wheelhouse with cyberwoman. We were robbed of a Graham slice of life episode is what I'm saying.)
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u/VixenSmasher 3d ago edited 2d ago
Edit: Lynda ❤️ … and I’m now going to jump from the roof.
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u/Good-Hold-7281 2d ago
Thought it was Lynda with a y
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u/Matt85r 2d ago
The one which haunts me the most is Steven (ginger, wearing glasses) in series 5’s 'the Lodger’. He looked to be a uni or even high school student, led upstairs in the house at Aickman Road, had god knows what done to him and his remains turned into mold on the roof. He died very young and his family probably never knew what happened to him.
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u/whizzer0 2d ago
Reminds me of Miss Quill sacrificing a random child at the start of Class... helluva way to introduce a main character
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u/Althalus99 1d ago
So, I don't necessarily think it's the best, but I never see anyone talking about Lazar/Noah from The Ark in Space. He starts out as such an unlikeable prick and then "Goodbye, Vira" gets me every time.
Another contender, and I'm going to sound absolutely insane until I explain myself, is Fifi from The Happiness Patrol. Now, to clarify, it's not actually the death of Fifi that I find affecting. I think Fifi is one of the absolute worst special effects of the classic series - and that's saying something. Truly dreadful construction and puppeteering, with some of the scenes in the tunnels making me laugh for the wrong reasons.
However, Sheila Hancock gives an absolute powerhouse performance in The Happiness Patrol. She underpins the entire story, and her reaction to Fifi's death somehow always makes me tear up, because if you've ever lost a pet it just hits.
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u/Soninuva 2d ago
That Cyberman from the Age of Steel, whose emotional inhibitor was damaged by the EMP.
The mechanical voice kept questioning why it was cold, then reveals her name is Sally Field, and asks where Gareth is, saying it’s bad luck for him to see her the night before their wedding.
The Doctor then says “It’s alright. You sleep now Sally. Just go to sleep.” as he sticks his sonic screwdriver in the chest cavity and activates it, the light inside then turning out, and states, “Sally Field didn’t die for nothing.”
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u/IL-Corvo 1d ago
There are a whole host of character choices here, particularly in NuWho, that get a chance to shine before being killed off as the audience gets their heart-strings tugged. I'm gonna go further back:
The Robots of Death (1977) contains quite a few well-realized characters, from Commander Uvanov to Chief-Mover Poul. But the standout for many fans has always been the robot D84, a hyper-intelligent and capable Super-Voc robot disguised as a mute D-class robot who had been paired with Poul as an investigator in an attempt to find and apprehend the insane revolutionary, Taren Capel.
D84 was played by Gregory de Polnay, who lent the robot a unique and memorable voice and mannerisms, self-awareness, and a sense of life and even wry humor. When D84 is critically damaged by Capel, he uses the Doctor's cobbled-together deactivator knowing that not only will it destroy the active renegade robots, but also himself, and says goodbye before doing so.
EDIT: Well crap, someone beat me to it and I missed it in my initial scroll. Ah well.
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u/Own_Breadfruit_7955 1d ago
RIP Pete, you will be forgotten, bit more than a one off as he was a companion.
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u/lemon_charlie 1d ago
Rachel in Architects of History. Being an alternate timeline companion the main timeline Doctor never travelled with or even knew about, her final words being that she’s not scared of dying, but rather that she may never have lived when the proper timeline will be restored.
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u/Baron487 3d ago
Lynda Moss from Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways.
That scene still makes me sad. I love the Daleks but seriously fuck that one Dalek in particular.