It’s been almost five years since Doctor Who celebrated its 50th with a “Day of the Doctor,” though the event could have been more momentous. Departing showrunner Steven Moffat shares an early draft that would have featured fan-favorite Christopher Eccleston’s return.

Eccleston made headlines for recent comments about his one-season exit from the series, though it’s widely known that he declined a chance to return for the 50th anniversary. John Hurt’s “War Doctor” stood in for Eccleston alongside tenth and eleventh Doctors David Tennant and Matt Smith, and storyboards also showed that Billie Piper’s Rose Tyler replaced a young “Raggedy Girl” as Eccleston’s companion. Now, Steven Moffat has revealed portions of the early script (via RadioTimes), which will be published in a book to benefit author Tommy Donvaband. We’ve shared one excerpt below that features dialogue clearly written for Eccleston:

THE NINTH DOCTOR

Listen. A very bad thing is gonna happen here and I’m not sure how it’s gonna work. But I don’t think you want to be here when it does, okay?

RAGGEDY GIRL

…you’ve got a funny face.

THE NINTH DOCTOR

You should see the other fellas.

RAGGEDY GIRL

I like it though.

THE NINTH DOCTOR

Thanks, it’s new. Not sure about the ears yet, they just sort of kept going. Now, you need to get away from here. You need to pick a direction and just run –

Other snippets are relatively unchanged from the final version between the War Doctor and Rose’s “The Moment,” though Moffat specified that the barn had a different origin in the first draft. All the same, Eccleston did end up making an appearance in the 50th anniversary episode, albeit in stock footage of all the various Doctors assembling over Gallifrey.

The franchise has since moved on with Peter Capaldi and Jodie Whittaker, but would “Day of the Doctor” have been more effective with Nine, Ten and Eleven together?

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