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The botched regeneration on Lake Silencio was a fake anyway, it was the duplicate robot, the Doctor never did get shot, before or after the time travel (beginning or end of the season). The Doctor wouldn't have regenerated at all, it's just that no one knew it so everyone expected a regeneration and the Silence prepared for River to shoot him again mid-regeneration. In "Let's kill Hitler", saying "regeneration wouldn't work anyway" is a trick that ended up useful to avoid saying he can't regenerate anymore. It doesn't actually mean he could have regenerated.
Beside, the number of regenerations left was a subject of inquiry for a long time, at least since 10th cheated his own, so as long as they decided to go the route of "unnumbered Doctor", they must have known this was the last one.
That being said, I'm not sure when they took a decision on the War Doctor, 9th made references to watching Gallifrey burn along with the Daleks, and 10th contradicted that by talking about the Time Lords being trapped back in the episode with Timothy Dalton (which is the truth, but is also something he shouldn't remember according to the movie). But at the very least, they definitely were careful about not risking contradicting themselves - all the references to 11th next regeneration were faked or discarded ("poison is too strong"), they definitely did that on purpose.
If I struggled to the end of my determination, to the end of my way of life with my followers, if the result is ruin, then this ruin is inevitable. Grieve. Shed tears. But you cannot regret.
Last Edit:
May 08, 2014, 12:49:00 am by DKDC
