What's the SADDEST episode ever?

[shada pavlova]

I was just thinking...what's the SADDEST episode ever?

Vote from the above, or discuss other tear-jerking episodes below.

[Wayne]

Torchwood: Exit Wounds - In the true sense of the word.

Last of the Time Lords - In the 'modern' sense of the word.

[Zbigniev Hamson]

I think the saddest moment is when Sandy the sandbeast gets killed by Barbara in The Rescue.

[Larry]

think you really need to expand on that list because for me the saddest episode is Fathers Day..

[Pip Madeley]

You missed out The Girl In The Fireplace too - the closing scenes of that are heartbreaking!

[shada pavlova]

not to me. Those are the six saddest episodes I could think of.

[Pip Madeley]

Earthshock's not in the same league as Father's Day and The Girl In The Fireplace when it comes to sadness, but that's my opinion.

[shada pavlova]

discuss other tear-jerking episodes below.

let us do that.

I hear what you're saying about Father's Day, but I think the sadness is cancelled out by the events of Rise of the Cybermen/The Age of Steel and Army of Ghosts/Doomsday, because it turns out Pete, well a Pete is still alive in some form.

[SiHart]

I don't think that negates it at all. I think the episode stands on it own terms with Rose coming to terms with her Dad's death and the bit where she says "My daddy." makes me cry each time.
However the episode I get most choked up about is School Reunion. Poor K9. Gets me every time.

Si xx

[shada pavlova]

Once again, the sadness-causing situation is resolved a few minutes later.

[SiHart]

Yes, but just because it's resolved, it doesn't actually make any less sad at the actual moment. It's still a sad moment for me, even though it's resolved a little later in the story.
You could, by that token argue that 30 years later the sadness of the end of The Hand of Fear is resolved.

Si xx

[Dirk Gently]

Well the non-fan sitting to my right said that to her, off the top of her head, the saddest Doctor Who stories would be Fathers Day & Fires of Pompeii.

[Si Hunt]

The saddest episode for me is "A Race Against Death". The Second Elder has, up to that point, been portrayed as a timid and sensitive individual. Mention of his "family unit" gives him the image of a father figure and a protector. But as viewers, we know that the future is not rosy for this wholesome individual - the City Administrator is on the loose, a bent and corrupt individual, and he's just realised that by stealing the Second Elders sash, he can impersonate him because the Sensorites can't tell each other apart except from these appendages (it must be very easy for devious lothario Sensorites to trick their way into lady Sensorites - Sensorita's - beds by similar unscrupulous sash-swapping, thus heightening the tragedy of the Second Elder). The Second Elder is literally dragged aside, and his sash removed by the evil, rotten City Administrator. This act - identity rape, if you will - leaves the poor Second Elder without a purpose or means of asserting who he is to anyone. The consequences of this run deep - what if the sash was burnt? Or hurled from the top of a viaduct and lost within a river? The Second Elder would have literally no means of proving who he was. His wife would never again make love to him, fearing him to be her dustman or bank manager or any other sash-less no hoper. His bank manager would refuse him custom, without means of proving who he was, and laugh at him because he was secretely knocking off his wife. And even his own family unit would cast him out, unable to trust him when he wept that he was indeed their own Second Elder, and leaving him abandoned and lonely in the gutters of the Sense-Sphere.

It's surely the most tragic and sad scene in the whole of Doctor Who.

Si.

[Lissa]

What absolute nonsense. I've never read such drivel on a Doctor Who message board.

It's "family group" not "family unit". You've undermined an extremely good point with your bibbling lapse.

[Pip Madeley]

it must be very easy for devious lothario Sensorites to trick their way into lady Sensorites - Sensorita's - beds

Sensorites probably have sex the same way as most parents - with the lights always on and making as little noise as possible.

[shada pavlova]

Maybe in Doctor Who: Uncut & Uncensored.

[Ralph]

None of the above.

[Rob McCow]

Out of the ones chosen, Hand of Fear is the saddest.

Out of all of the show, I'd say the end of Family of Blood where they visit Tim at the War Memorial. I found that scene quite moving.

[Antony Cox]

Maybe in Doctor Who: Uncut & Uncensored.

Un-Sensorite-d, surely?

[Wayne]

[Stuart Wallis]

Earthshock, of the ones listed. Overall, I'd go for Susan leaving, and the Doctor subsequently realising that he's on his own at the end of The Massacre.

[Dirk Gently]

From the ones listed I've gone for Logopolis. For purely personal reasons, I saw 'my' Doctor die & get replaced by some bloke who used to be a vet it some other show.

[Kaybee Bailey]

Out of all of the show, I'd say the end of Family of Blood where they visit Tim at the War Memorial. I found that scene quite moving.

I agree, that scene was very emotional. Much like the memorial scene at the beginning of Saving Private Ryan, it's very quietly powerful.

Of this selection I think Exit Wounds is probably the most tear-jerking, though it doesn't quite have the same gravitas as some other sad moments mentioned here.

[Pip Madeley]

I agree, that scene was very emotional. Much like the memorial scene at the beginning of Saving Private Ryan, it's very quietly powerful.

Of this selection I think Exit Wounds is probably the most tear-jerking, though it doesn't quite have the same gravitas as some other sad moments mentioned here.

Did you cry when Adric died?

[Kaybee Bailey]

Actually Earthshock was the first story with Adric in that I saw, so I think I kind of assumed he was like Guy in Galaxy Quest. Which in many ways, he is.