I hope so too!!
I wonder if sometime in the future they’ll address the lack of confirmation on how many regenerations the Doctor was given. Sure it could be left open that its infinitely, which was most likely Moffat’s intention.
Alternatively, and I think it could be cool, the Doctor could suffer a fatal injury but not start regenerating? Prompting maybe another episode search to see if he can find a way to regenerate?
Genuinely, taking away the Doctor’s ability to regenerate would be a really easy way to up the stakes and set up an interesting arc (kinda like they do in the EDAs for a bit). Maybe the only way to restore their regenerations will induce one as part of the process, so they’re hesitant about just doing it right away
I thought of the exact same thing when I watched it today!
Yeah, Moffat did leave that rather uncertain, how Rassilon didn’t even know how many regenerations they gave him. Though I don’t take it so much as being infinite, rather just not knowing. Could be anywhere from 4 to 12 to 100 or more, to whenever they decide to make it a relevant point again. You’re right that there’s plenty of story opportunities in there.
Started The Gunfighters, rip the Doctor’s tooth
Isn’t the whole “limited regenerations” gone now?
The Timeless Child had unlimited regenerations. There’s no reason to believe that The Doctor was ever limited.
Pretty much what I was thinking, and if they did have a limited number of regenerations, it was imposed on them after the fact, so it’d be more a matter of fixing what was done to the Doctor then anything.
I believe the Doctor was chameleon arched into a regular Time Lord so they had the limit imposed on them from the first Doctor onwards.
I agree with this. I know we could now assume Smith would’ve regenerated on Trenzalore regardless because he had unlimited timeless regenerations, but I like the idea that he had been limited at some stage – the Time Lords not only stole regeneration from him, but then made it so he only got as many as anyone else. (I like the limit being in place because I think Time works better with it.)
ETA: I also think having a limit in place, even if they don’t explicitly state a number, leaves the door open for more story potential down the line. If he can just regenerate endlessly, meh. If there’s a chance he’s reached the end of a limit, how does he go about getting another new cycle, or does he accept his fate? etc. I know the show will go on regardless but you can inject some stakes if you retain some form of a limit.
Actually yes, Name of the Doctor works better with the limitation - it wouldn’t be his grave if he regenerated.
So he either got 12 more regenerations, which kicks it into the long grass for now, or unlimited. Any other number would just be weird.
It’s a shame the Time Lords aren’t around for him to go and ask them.
Rassilon’s comment leaves it nicely open-ended, I think. “How many did we grant you?” He could know it’s 12, but equally he might not have a clue. It’d get pretty tedious if they did it all the time, but it could be interesting to have a Doctor remember this ‘granting of another cycle’ at some stage and realise, ‘holy crap, any regeneration now could be my last.’
The regeneration limit is such a fascinating thing but it’s clearly lore from an era where nobody expected to ever need 13 different Doctors. I do agree that it works really well for Time of the Doctor because the Doctor understands that his life as a whole is over after this, but from a meta narrative perspective there is no limit because no one at the BBC will cancel Doctor Who just because the Doctor reached the limit, so I think having a limit, but leaving it unspecified so that a future writer can have their “out of regenerations” story, without having it be somewhat forced like with TotD, works best.
2 parts down with The Gunfighters, not enjoying it as much as The Leisure Hive but that might be the lack of Foamasi
Of course, for all we know, the regenerations he got already ended, and that’s why his last two have been so wonky…
Actually, there’s a thought. Maybe they gave the Doctor one regeneration.
Maybe 12 → 13 was the regeneration cycle breaking and when the Doctor regenerates, they are back to being female, like they were right before the imposed regeneration cycles.
Then the Master goes and screws with the Doctor’s regenerations even further, causing the Doctor to revisit Tennant as 14.
Then the regeneration hiccups the next time, and we get the bi-regeneration…
Probably coincidence, but the Doctor’s regenerating abilities easily could be a total mess at this point.
Love that theory. And it works a treat so far! 
Reminds me of when I watched The Brain of Morbius, The Deadly Assassin and The Caves of Androzani for the first time, and they got me scratching my head…
In The Brain of Morbius, the Doctor is shown to have eight previously unseen faces during the mind-bending sequence. Then add Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee and Tom. That takes the Doctor upto 12 incarnations. Note that The Brain of Morbius was heavily rewritten by Robert Holmes.
Next up, The Deadly Assassin where it’s revealed for the first time ever that Time Lords only have 13 lives. So, twelve regenerations, thirteen lives. This story is written by Robert Holmes, and so that 13 limit is his deliberately his choice…
Finally, The Caves of Androzani comes along. At this point, following the previous train of thought, we’re on Peter Davison and therefore the Doctor’s 13th life. His final incarnation. The Doctor is poisoned and, inside the TARDIS, says to himself: “Is this death? […] I might regenerate. I don’t know. Feels different this time.” And guess who the writer is… Robert Holmes again.
And then as the Davison Doctor does regenerate, it’s the most forceful one yet and the Colin Baker Doctor is the most unstable he’s seemingly ever been. Maybe because he’s just somehow bypassed the old regeneration limit.
Just a fun theory. It doesn’t hold up beyond that, but I just find it amusing that Holmes gives the Doctor pre-Hartnell faces, then he chooses a limit, and then makes Davison mention death and that he ‘might’ regenerate but he doesn’t quite know.
Going through some webcasts today. Some of them are great, and some of them are Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre. (Their draw-a-dalek song is funny, though)
And boy oh boy do I need that ignore reviews feature — there’s someone whose reviews are one sentence nothingness. Imagine seeing a single review on some random webcast only to find it says two words. I mean, why?
Maybe controversial but maybe reviews should have a minimum character count/word limit, so every review is at least a paragraph rather than 3 or 4 words. A couple of words can be summed up way more succinctly in a star rating.
We had this discussion somewhere before, can’t remember which thread.
A word limkt can be hard to set, and sometimes a very short review can be good. So instead we are going to have an ingnore feature to allow you to hide reviews of certain people. And sort-by-word-count feature should be enough for people who don’t want to read too short reviews.
I think being able to ignore review below a certain word count is better than setting a minimum for all. Can’t remember if I brought it up before. 
I think Shauny mentioned earlier that the reviews section is getting a face lift, with more filtering options to sort out the very short reviews, for instance.