"What's this? A tear Sarah-Jane? Now, don't cry. While there's life theres..."

What a wonderful thing regeneration is.

There you are, wounded by your cowardly enemies, ground down despite the best of fights, until you are finally pulled out of the arena, your precious present life spent.

And then you come back, re-energised, reborn anew, young again and all set to take up the good fight with all the freshness of the morning.

I love it.

As the Brigadier said: "Here we go again..."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWdA1TfcMR4

Not to mention regeneration scenes are just so pretty aren't they, well new style ones anyway

Someone on YouTube did a revamp of the Pertwee to Baker regeneration with updated effects and music from the "Dalek" episode of the Eccleston era. It was absolutely beautiful and did great, belated justice to the fantastic acting that was in that scene.

But my favourite has to be David Tennant to Matt Smith. "I don't want to go"

I've watched the updated Pertwee/Baker regeneration on YouTube and though it looks nice, I think it works perfectly as it was. It is as bigger a contrast to the Tennant/Smith Regeneration as you can get and it still works just as beautifully. The almost silence as the Third Doctor lies dying works wonders.

But if we can't all agree that the regen in Time and the Rani is pants, then there's nothing Who fans can ever agree on.

Epic.

i like the old regenerations most cause theyre more about character and not just cgi. you feel sad the old one is going but cant wait to see the new one. and theres something warm and cosy about the old ones. the new ones have all the noise and fx but i think that distracts you from it being all about character. time and rani you have to forget cause colin baker didnt want to do it. i think my fave regeneration of them all is pertwee to tom baker. thats a lovely warm moment thats just about right

That was me - and then bloody BBC Worldwide had it taken down

I think everyone has their "own" Doctor when growing up, and the regeneration scene is our first taste of death and loss, as well as a sense of the way life moves on and changes.

Anytime I watch the Christmas cafe scene between David Tennant and Wilf, when he talks about it like it's being dying and being dead, with a new guy "toddling off", brings a tear to my eye.

Just science fiction? With all this love, this real sense of loss and regret? I don't know of a warmer, more human programme than Doctor Who... the only TV show that made me actually cry for a dying Dalek.