Doctor Who Actually Shot The Season 2 Finale Fans Wanted
Season 2 of 'Doctor Who' initially looked a lot different, and could have solved a big mystery.
Doctor Who was supposed to be entering a new era. The long-running British sci-fi series finally found a global partner in Disney, and the series started fresh with a new (but returning) showrunner, a new star, and a new Season 1. However, what was supposed to be an entirely new volume instead turned out to be a short chapter.
After Season 2, Disney decided not to renew the partnership, and that has thrown the entire franchise into limbo. But what was in the works before this devastating move? According to a new report, the series would have finally made good on a mystery that was more than half a century old.
Susan Foreman, the Doctor’s granddaughter, was the first-ever Doctor Who companion as we know it.
According to TVZone, pre-production had already begun on Season 3 of Doctor Who when the Disney announcement prompted star Ncuti Gatwa to leave, meaning the ending would need to be reshot in order to show the Doctor regenerated. But apparently, the original ending would have been exactly what fans have been clamoring for. “Months after filming wrapped, the cast and crew were back on set to film Gatwa's regeneration,” the report says. “The original ending to Season 2, which featured Carole Ann Ford returning as The Doctor's granddaughter and first companion Susan, remains unseen.”
While this is still an unofficial source, it meshes with everything we saw in Doctor Who so far. The penultimate episode of Season 1 featured the introduction of Susan Triad (Susan Twist), whom the Doctor is convinced is actually his granddaughter, Susan Foreman. That doesn’t turn out to be true, but the mystery of Susan remained.
A now-older Carole Ann Ford returned as Susan Foreman in Season 2 of Doctor Who.
Most fans had given up on the Susan question. The character only stayed on the series until 1964’s adventure “The Dalek Invasion of Earth,” when the character fell in love with a freedom fighter and said her goodbyes. But Season 2 was full of references to her, including a brief appearance in “The Interstellar Song Contest” and “Wish World.”
If it weren’t for this last-minute change, we could have actually addressed this plot and answered a mystery that has plagued the Doctor Who fandom for generations and regenerations: what actually happened to the first companion? It’s another casualty of a decision from the powers that be, but there is still hope that it could be addressed in whatever form Doctor Who takes next.
Hopefully, it won’t take another 60 years to get back to Doctor Who and back to the mystery of Susan.
