The Doctor is destined to die on the shores of Lake Silencio, Utah, at 5.02pm on April 22nd, 2011. However, River Song refuses to let events play out as they were intended, and she inadvertently fractures time in the process. The Doctor now finds himself on an Earth where all history is happening simultaneously: Charles Dickens sits for a television interview, while Winston Churchill is the Holy Roman Emperor. Only a special few -- including Amy and River -- remember time as it was meant to be. Even as the Silence spring their final trap, the Doctor knows that he must meet his fate at Lake Silencio, or all of time will disintegrate.

Nicholas Courtney passed away on February 22nd, 2011. He had been a stalwart member of the Doctor Who family since 1965, when he appeared as ill-fated Space Security Service agent Bret Vyon in the first four episodes of The Daleks' Master Plan. However, Courtney's most famous role came in 1968's The Web Of Fear, in which he made his debut as Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart. He was back as the same character at the end of the year for The Invasion, now promoted to Brigadier and in charge of the United Nations Intelligence Taskforce (UNIT). With Jon Pertwee's debut as the Third Doctor at the start of 1970, Courtney became a regular member of the cast; when the Time Lord assumed the role of UNIT's scientific advisor, Lethbridge-Stewart was effectively his boss. Courtney could be seen regularly in Doctor Who until UNIT was phased out in 1975. He made sporadic appearances thereafter -- both on television and in various spin-off media -- and was last seen as Lethbridge-Stewart in 2008's Enemy Of The Bane for the spin-off series The Sarah Jane Adventures.

In late February, Doctor Who executive producer Steven Moffat started work on his script for the Season Thirty-Two finale. Eventually known as The Wedding Of River Song, it would wrap up the year-long story arc about the Doctor's apparent demise at Lake Silencio, Utah. Upon learning that Courtney had passed away, Moffat quickly concluded that an actor -- and a character -- who had meant so much to Doctor Who for so long deserved more than just a dedication running in front of an episode. Instead, he incorporated two pivotal elements into his script as a tribute to Courtney. Not only would the Doctor be galvanised to face his own fate after learning that the Brigadier had died, but special eyepatches would also factor prominently into the story. The latter was an homage to Courtney's role as the alternate-universe Brigade Leader in 1970's Inferno, which had inspired one of the actor's favourite convention tales. The stopping of time at 5.02pm, meanwhile, was prompted by what was intended to be a red herring in a list of predictions found in Panini Publishing's Doctor Who: The Brilliant Book 2011, edited by Clayton Hickman.

Filming for the finale had begun in the United States months before Steven Moffat tackled the script

Unusually, filming for The Wedding Of River Song had begun months before Moffat tackled the script. As his plans for the season coalesced, Moffat knew of certain developments which would have to take place in the finale, and so he wrote a few pages of script back in the autumn of 2010. They became part of director Toby Haynes' shooting schedule while recording material for the season premiere, The Impossible Astronaut / Day Of The Moon, in the United States. On November 19th, 2010, Haynes recorded the revelation of the mysterious astronaut's true identity at Lake Powell in Page, Arizona -- although not all of this material would ultimately suit the script in its final form.

The director for the balance of the episode would be Jeremy Webb, who had recently completed work on The Curse Of The Black Spot. The finale was made as “Block Seven-B”, which was actually Season Thirty-Two's ninth and final production block. Webb's first task was to shoot the material on the bridge of the Teselecta at Doctor Who's usual studio home in Upper Boat. This took place on April 4th, during the recording of Let's Kill Hitler, the other story to feature the Justice Department Vehicle. Also completed in advance of the main shoot, on April 7th, was the sequence at the late Brigadier's nursing home -- actually Hensol Castle in Hensol.

The cast of The Wedding Of River Song included a number of familiar faces. Frances Barber had appeared throughout Season Thirty-Two as Madame Kovarian, and she would now be drawing her storyline to a close. This would also be the fourth and final Doctor Who episode for Ian McNeice as Winston Churchill, and the third and final story for Simon Fisher-Becker as Dorium Maldovar. Simon Callow, meanwhile, was reprising the role of Charles Dickens which he had originated for 2005's The Unquiet Dead. Richard Hope's cameo saw him back in prosthetics to play Dr Malohkeh, as in the previous year's Cold Blood. A familiar name wearing an unfamiliar face was Mark Gatiss, who would be hidden beneath heavy make-up in the role of Gantok. In addition to writing several episodes -- most recently Night Terrors, earlier in Season Thirty-Two -- Gatiss had also played the titular villain of 2007's The Lazarus Experiment. For his appearance in the finale, he would be credited as “Rondo Haxton” -- a tribute to actor Rondo Hatton, whom Gatiss felt he resembled in his Gantok make-up. Hatton had suffered from acromegaly, leading to a series of villainous roles during the Forties in movies such as The Pearl Of Death and The Brute Man.

The Wedding Of River Song would mark the last use of an original Paradigm Dalek casing

The inclusion of a Dalek in The Wedding Of River Song was the culmination of a deliberate wind-up on Moffat's part. Although he believed that the Daleks were an essential part of Doctor Who and should appear on a regular basis, he had been teasing the British press that they were being “rested” for Season Thirty-Two. All the same, Moffat's decision to include a Dalek in the finale came on the spur of the moment, and was not by design. To represent the malfunctioning Dalek, the white Paradigm casing introduced in Season Thirty-One's Victory Of The Daleks was heavily distressed. With the blue and orange Paradigm Daleks having been effectively destroyed when they were repurposed as the stone Daleks of the 2010 finale, The Big Bang, this meant that only the red and yellow versions remained intact. As it would transpire, however, neither would ever be used again on-screen; The Wedding Of River Song would mark the last use of an original Paradigm casing in a featured role.

Following the completion of “Block Seven-A” -- Let's Kill Hitler -- production on Doctor Who stood down for a week, to accommodate a number of promotional events in the United States. As such, principal photography on The Wedding Of River Song did not begin until April 14th and 15th, at the premises of Mir Steel in Newport. It represented the bar on Calisto B on the first day, while Webb also shot Dickens' interview. On the second day, the team moved on to the action in Chess Pit 47. Work on scenes in the wrecked Dalek spaceship spanned both days at Mir Steel. It was back to Upper Boat on April 16th for scenes in the TARDIS and on the Teselecta gantry. New shots of the Doctor and River at Lake Silencio were also captured using a green screen.

Sunday the 17th was a day off, and was followed by more work in the studio. April 18th and 19th concentrated on the chamber of skulls and the effects shots of the decapitated Dorium. April 20th and 21st saw the cast and crew move to the Area 52 control room. Also recorded on the 20th was a shot of River wearing an eyepatch for the episode's prequel. Additional work on the 21st included the effect of the Silents on the Senate ceiling. On April 22nd, Cardiff City Hall offered a space appropriate for the Senate chamber.

After the weekend, a busy April 25th saw Dyffryn Gardens in St Nicholas pose as Churchill's offices, a Roman centurion hold up traffic on St Mary Street in Cardiff, and the Glamorgan Building in Cardiff serve as the exterior of Buckingham Senate. Meanwhile, at Upper Boat Studios, a pick-up shot of Dorium's box was recorded against a green screen. Furthermore, Meredith Vieira of the American Today show agreed to record a cameo appearance as the newsreader; she was in the United Kingdom to cover the April 29th wedding of Prince William to Kate Middleton. Work on the 26th began at Cardiff's Bute Park for footage of the children being pursued by a pterodactyl through Hyde Park. That evening, the scenes in Amy and Rory's home and back garden were filmed at a residence on Archer Road in Penarth.

Webb's team then returned to Upper Boat for the remainder of the shoot. April 27th focussed on scenes on the roof of Area 52, alongside additional filming in the chamber of skulls. On the 28th, material in the pyramid corridors was taped alongside some inserts on the control room set. More hallway sequences were recorded on April 29th -- including some for the prequel, under the direction of producer Marcus Wilson -- as were those aboard the train. Finally, a variety of pick-up shots were completed on the 30th. During post-production, Sian Williams and Bill Turnbull, the hosts of Breakfast on BBC One, provided dialogue for the interview with Dickens. Dubbing was also required to introduce the term “eye drive” for the devices originally called “data cores”, when it became clear that viewers might not understand that this was referring to the eyepatches.

On October 1st, Season 32 drew to a close

The seventy-four-second prequel for The Wedding Of River Song was released online on September 24th, immediately after the transmission of the preceding episode, Closing Time. It depicted two guards checking on the imprisoned Silents in Area 52. A week later, on October 1st, Season Thirty-Two drew to a close. The Wedding Of River Song aired at the slightly earlier time of 7.05pm; Strictly Come Dancing returned as its lead-in, while the premiere of Merlin's fourth season was scheduled immediately afterwards. As of the following week, expanded editions of Strictly Come Dancing would take over the Doctor Who timeslot.

But while Doctor Who would continue at Christmas with The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe, this was the end of the line for the behind-the-scenes companion series Doctor Who Confidential, which had been running on BBC Three since 2005. On September 27th, it was announced that the programme was being cancelled as a consequence of budget cuts -- despite the fact that some material had already been recorded to chronicle the making of the upcoming Christmas special. As a result, the Doctor Who Confidential episode which accompanied The Wedding Of River Song, entitled When Time Froze, became the series finale. Nonetheless, the team responsible for the show would continue to produce featurettes for DVD/Blu-ray releases and the official Doctor Who website.

• Doctor Who Magazine Special Edition #31, 8th August 2012, “The Wedding Of River Song” by Andrew Pixley, Panini UK Ltd.
• Doctor Who: The Complete History #70, 2018, “Story 224: The Wedding Of River Song”, edited by John Ainsworth, Hachette Partworks Ltd.