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BBC America Announces Surprise Return of Ingrid Oliver’s Osgood to Doctor Who!

::takes hit off inhaler::

Osgood Doctor WhoSteven Moffat doesn’t hate fandom after all!*

BBC America just sent over a press release that has us screaming in joy. Ingrid Oliver, who played fan-favortie/fan-stand-in character Osgood in “The Day of the Doctor” and “Death in Heaven,” is reprising her role for a two-parter!

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UNIT scientist Osgood, played by Ingrid Oliver, returns to Doctor Who for season nine. Having been killed by Missy (Michelle Gomez) in the show’s season eight finale ‘Death in Heaven’, Steven Moffat decides to bring back the Doctor’s biggest fan.

The last time we saw Osgood as Kate Lethbridge-Stewart’s assistant was with the Twelfth Doctor during an invasion of Earth by an army of Cybermen led by a new, female incarnation of the Master. This time she’s back in action and comes face-to-face with the shape-shifting extra-terrestrial Zygons, as they also return for the new season. They last appeared in ‘The Day of the Doctor’ for the show’s 50th anniversary episode.

The two-part episode is currently being filmed in Cardiff, Wales, and is written by Peter Harness (Doctor Who – ‘Kill the Moon’, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, Wallander), produced by Peter Bennett and directed by Daniel Nettheim (Line of Duty, Glue).

Also joining Peter Capaldi (The Doctor) and Jenna Coleman (Clara Oswald) and confirmed for guest roles in the double episode is Jemma Redgrave, Jaye Griffiths, Cleopatra Dickens, Sasha Dickens, Abhishek Singh, Todd Kramer, Jill Winternitz, Nicholas Asbury, Jack Parker and Aidan Cook.

Is this surprise more surprising than them letting us know Michelle Gomez’s Missy would also be returning? I’d say so. After all, Missy is a Time Lord and Moffat had previously said of Osgood’s demise, “Missy would have to kill someone we liked in the most cruel, heartless, and terrible way… Osgood was the one we flung on the fire to make the Master burn brighter.”

But what does he say now?

“Osgood is back, fresh from her recent murder at the end of last series. We recently confirmed that Osgood was definitely dead and not returning – but in a show about time travel, anything can happen,” he said. “The brilliant Ingrid Oliver is back in action. This time though, can the Doctor trust his number one fan?”

Oliver, who said she remembers feeling sick when she read Osgood was being killed off, had this to say about her return, “As every actor who’s worked on Doctor Who will tell you, there’s always the secret hope you’ll get the call asking you to come back. To actually receive that call is both unexpected and brilliant. The word ‘honour’ gets banded about a lot, but it really is, it’s an honour. Especially because I was so sure Osgood was a gonner after the last series!”

Are you excited for Osgood’s return? I was set not to watch Season 9, or at the very least wait until the season was over to watch all at once, but between this and Maisie Williams’ guest role I may just have to.

*pure conjecture

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Author
Jill Pantozzi
Jill Pantozzi is a pop-culture journalist and host who writes about all things nerdy and beyond! She’s Editor in Chief of the geek girl culture site The Mary Sue (Abrams Media Network), and hosts her own blog “Has Boobs, Reads Comics” (TheNerdyBird.com). She co-hosts the Crazy Sexy Geeks podcast along with superhero historian Alan Kistler, contributed to a book of essays titled “Chicks Read Comics,” (Mad Norwegian Press) and had her first comic book story in the IDW anthology, “Womanthology.” In 2012, she was featured on National Geographic’s "Comic Store Heroes," a documentary on the lives of comic book fans and the following year she was one of many Batman fans profiled in the documentary, "Legends of the Knight."

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