I made a thread about best exits but which companions, doctors and other characters had bad exits. IMO I really didn't enjoy Matt Smith's I just thought it was a bit pathetic the whole episode all together i mean we were waiting a few series to find out what's this silence, silence will fall and pretty much it was a church wow. The AMy but was ok but all the emotional scenes were crammed into a few seconds. So what exits do you dislike?

Well Leela's must rank right up there, marrying a guy she hardly knew. I mean, it took Jo six episodes of building up the romance for her to leave for similar reasons. This was just wham, bam, I'm in love, I'm outta of here, must be the fastest recorded romance in the history of TV!

Then there was Dodo's, just pathetic the way she was written out. Not a fan of the character but it was just plain stupid how she never said goodbye and it was told to The Doctor by Ben and Polly, who also didn't have a proper goodbye story. The way they were written out in The Faceless Ones by having them in two episodes and then recording their exit for the end, just crazy.

As for The Doctor's, a real shame Colin Baker never got to record a proper goodbye scene. I always wonder if Baker had left of his own accord what sort of leaving story/scene would he have had? I'm sure his last words wouldn't have been Carrot Juice!

But that's not really about his exit, though, is it? That's the story leading up to it. When you're talking about the Fourth Doctor's exit, are you talking about his sacrifice, fall from the telescope, and reveal of the Watcher's identity, or are you talking about the story Logopolis?

(And it's not the place for this debate, but we already knew the Silence were a religious order, dedicated to the death of the Doctor. The only bit we were missing was the 'why'.)

He was offered "Time and the Rani" as his swansong, but according to Pip and Jane Baker was just too heartbroken to go back and film it. I imagine the end would have been different, with the 6th Doctor fatally injured in the giant explosion at the finale, perhaps sacrificing himself in place of Beyus. It does make me wonder which of the remaining season 24 stories could have been McCoy's first story instead, as none of them really have any gravitas.

That was his exit story and that includes in the exit. I don't follow doctor who as much as I used to so I didn't really know about the whole religous order thing. It was also his regenaration it happened all to quickly, the daleks were wiped out in a second. Everything in that episode was rushed, so for me emotions couldn't be felt.

Yep, he didn't want to go back and film it because they only offered him one story to do it, to film a regeneration.

What I was talking about in my previous post was supposing Colin Baker had left at an end of a Season with a Regeneration of his own after playing the role for say four or five years. In other words, if he hadn't been sacked or McCoy hadn't been cast in his place.

I would imagine if he'd played the role for a few more years he would have mellowed further and become quite a lot more popular than he is now. Therefore I could see him having some seriously dramatic exit which maybe would cause him a lot of sadness, like in the way he grieved after Peri's supposed death.

Yeah, we were robbed of (potentially) a truly great Doctor. He did say (at the time) that he wanted to play the role for longer than any other actor so if he'd stuck by that he would have been the Doctor into the 1990s (assuming things had gone well, over all, and the show hadn't been reduced and then axed).

I guess his regeneration depends on how sophisticated the writing would have become by then - would there have been a great build up to his 'death' or would it have been shoe-horned onto the end of a standard story?

Leela - weak, wet, makes me cringe every time I see it. Think she should have had an exit a bit more like Romana, where she has a sense of independence and can utilize the best of her skills. Leela was a misfit on her own planet but then ends up a housewife on one of the most ordered and civilized planets in the universe. Bit like sending a teenage rebel to boarding school, how on earth is Leela going to fit in there if the Doctor ran a mile from it?

Polly and Ben - clearly just pieced together due to a lack of interest from the producers. It feels so messy and weak, especially since they were such lively companions who deserved better.

Absolutely. I think considering the way his Doctor was going in 23, I'm convinced that more humorous performance would been the template for the remainder of his era had he stayed. Ten years down the line, who knows what would have happened but I'm sure JNT would have been gone by that time and maybe the writing may have improved.

1986-87 was a vintage era for cocked-up departures:

Peri's dramatic on-screen death is retconned with a couple of lines about her surviving and marrying King Shoutybeard.

The Sixth Doctor is inexplicably forced to regenerate after a crash landing which little Mel walked away from unscathed. (Although it's hinted that he may have fallen off the exercise bike.)

Mel just decides to live with Beardy Conman for no particular reason.

Entrances were pretty poor too with the Valeyard and Ace's backstories consisting of garbled dialogue about "an amalgamation" and "a time storm".

Agree 100% . . its like the writers had given up caring!

For the new series, End of Time part 2.

Absolutely agree with the explanation of Ace's introduction, but at least they tried to fit it into something more substantial later on! (Whether successful or not is another debate.)

It seems like things at the time were changing too fast and frequently for anything to be worked through properly - was this due to the pressures at the top?

On the plus side, leaving her on Gallifrey meant that she got to participate in the Big Finish Gallifrey audios alongside Romana and K9 which I thoroughly enjoyed. A lot of character development for her, there!

While we're talking about inappropriate romances, I think Peri's departure was a bit of a let down! First we think she dies and then it turns out she married some alien barbarian type but we never actually saw what led to this romance because it turned out what we had seen of her last adventure didn't actually happen the way we saw it and it was all portrayed as a flashback after the fact! Very unsatisfying

The 11th Doctor had the worst exit it was too short and the shortest Regeneration Story to date apart from The Night of the Doctor.

I think the 11th Doctor's Regeneration should have been like 10's Sad and Slow giving you time to say good by to a good Doctor.

But This is just in My Opinion

Dodo.

End of.

Off-screen exits are always unsatisfying.

Liz Shaw - Just sods off without a goodbye because she's sick of being the Test Tube Monitor.

Romana 1 - No on-screen explanation for why she regenerates. We're supposed to be too distracted by the hilarious comedy of her trying on inappropriate bodies.

Ace - Must have left at some point before the TV Movie. (Which reminds me to give honourable mention to the 8th Doctor, who had an unsatisfying off-screen exit until very recently.)

That's a bit contradictory though. You say you were waiting several series to find out what the silence were and what that all meant but didn't follow the show close enough to follow the plot developments that already told us. So that doesn't really have much to do with Smith's exit rather than some holes you had in the story from missing episodes, perhaps?

I second that. The whole regeneration effect of head thrown back and wham new doctor was a huge disappointment after the whole build up of us knowing Matt was leaving. Not good. Colin's exit was not good as far as the way he was treated.

Rose's. Why couldnt she just die in series 2.

All this crap they did at the start of the episode about this is how I die. No it isnt! Its just you going to a parallel world. Major disapointment.

I must say I was somewhat disappointed by Matt Smith's departure. I thought the scene leading up to the regeneration itself was very good, but the 'change' was throwaway. It reminded me of the Pertwee/Baker regeneration - blink and you'll miss it.

Its important to remember that although the episode (technically) got more than 10m viewers, 2m of those only tuned in for the final couple of minutes to watch the regeneration.

I can only think what a let-down it must have been for everyone who skipped the whole episode just to watch the regeneration and it was over in a second.

Though my main point is that everything was rushed and there were things we were waiting to find out and they were a huge let down or rushed in the space of a few seconds including Matt Smith's exit.

I completely agree - the shoddiest dumping of a companion by a long chalk.

Anyone know why that happened?

I know, I was addressing your point about the Silence and agreeing with the other poster about who the Silence are not really being his exit.