Our theories on how Osgood is back in 'Doctor Who'

By the standards of Doctor Who last year’s season finale represented a veritable blood bath.

Following the passing of Danny Pink in ‘Dark Water’ (before we even got to the title sequence!), most shocking of all was the death of Osgood in ‘Death in Heaven’, vaporised by a wonderfully mad and sinister Missy.

Despite only making her debut in the 50^th anniversary spectacular ‘The Day of the Doctor’, Osgood had already made a mark as a very popular addition to the show and Peter Capaldi’s Doctor had suggested that we may have been about to see a lot more of her in the Tardis. Then Missy finished her off forever.

Except of course we know that Osgood is set to return in some form in Season 9, working alongside the Doctor in a two-part story written by Peter Harness (‘Kill the Moon’).

So how can that be? It’s time to do what we Doctor Who fans do best and start wildly speculating…

Return of the Zygons

When Osgood made her first appearance in Doctor Who she did battle with the Zygons, leading to her duplication and a rather touching moment of friendship revolving around an asthma inhaler.

We already know that the Zygons will also be returning in Harness’s two-parter – ‘Invasion of the Zygons’ and ‘Inversion of the Zygons’ – so the simplest solution to the mystery of Osgood’s return would be that we are once again to meet her duplicate (assuming that the new story takes place chronolically after ‘Death in Heaven’ and we’re not just seeing Osgood prior to her demise).

The flaw in the theory is that in both their previous appearances in the show it has been made very clear that in order to successfully take on somebody’s form they need the victim to be alive. This causes something of a problem, but hardly an insurmountable one for a Doctor Who writer.

When Steven Moffat announced Osgood’s return he did so while calling into question whether the Doctor would be able to trust her this time around. That would seem to add weight to the duplicate theory and a story where after initially opposing the Doctor, Zygon-Osgood (Zygosgood?) ultimately ends up helping to win the day could be where this is all heading.

Who knows what the effect of the Zygon’s human counterpart being blasted with Missy’s weapon will be on its duplicate? If somehow it managed to maintain its new shape then some form of identity crisis would seem entirely understandable in the circumstances.

Perhaps Zygosgood is completely unaware that she’s not the original Osgood? Just imagine the horror of undergoing a transformation if the poor UNIT scientist thinks she’s just a human!

After all, the last time we saw the Zygon duplicate in ‘The Day of the Doctor’, it was still under the influence of the Black Archive’s memory wiping technology.

There could even still be a Zygon duplicate of Kate Stewart knocking about under the Tower of London somewhere!

I was dead, but I’m getting better

Steven Moffat has made something of a habit of making death a lot less finite than is usually the case (hey Rory!). During his time in charge of the show a variety of characters have seemingly died only to reappear in the best of health.

He has of course previously confirmed that Osgood really did die, but then we know that the recently appointed OBE enjoys making mischief far too much for anything he says to be taken entirely at face value.

He is also a brilliant writer capable of coming up with a multitude of bonkers explanations as to how a once dead character can find very literal new lease of life. The return of Missy, also announced for Season 9, adds an extra dimension of mystery.

While the Doctor and Clara believe that the Cyber-Brigadier zapped her in the graveyard, her vaporisation did look very similar to the manner in which Osgood had been disposed of earlier in the episode.

Maybe the weapon wasn’t quite as terminal as it seemed, although the pile of dust left where Osgood had once been did suggest she would need more than a sticking plaster to make a full recovery.

It remains to be seen exactly how much more of Ingrid Oliver’s performance as Osgood we will have left to enjoy. Whether her return will be a one-off or Moffat has bigger plans for her, we will soon discover.