Inspired by the other thread about how it would have looked like with Eccleston.

Over time, I've come to feel that Eight is a much better 'fit' for being the Doctor who ends the Time War than Nine, if War didn't exist. So here's the way I imagine the 50th anniversary celebrations going down if there was no War Doctor.

'Name of the Doctor' would unfortunately lose that epic cliffhanger. It'd probably just end with the Doctor and Clara leaving the Doctor's timeline...maybe some kind of foreshadowing of 'Day of the Doctor'. Hell, maybe the Moment shows up in the Doctor's timeline (in Rose's form? or as Eight? as Eleven? or maybe as another Clara splinter?) and warns him that he will soon have to make the biggest decision of his lives. Something like that.

'Night of the Doctor' would be the big reintroduction of McGann's Eighth Doctor. Instead of this being his ending though, it would be about the moment where Eight makes the decision to destroy Gallifrey, and acquires the Moment. It'd really drive home just how much of a toll the war has taken on the Doctor and how he's mentally and emotionally almost a husk of his old self.

And then we have 'Day of the Doctor' where things play out very similarly plot-wise. The only difference is that Ten and Eleven don't feel an overt hostility towards Eight per se, but seeing Eight at this point in his life terrifies them and it does lead to some low-key hostility, which is discussed. But the big change in their attitude isn't that he's also the Doctor (as it was with War), but rather that Ten and Eleven secretly pity and also honour Eight for being the one who had to make the tough decision, and they hail him as possibly the bravest among them all (in a meta way, this would be a kind of nod to how McGann never got the same exposure that other Doctors did on TV, and kind of compensating for that).

Anyway, the ending plays out similarly, with Gallifrey being saved. And we see Eight regenerating into Nine...but this time the regeneration is not triggered by 'old age' per se, but rather that Eight feels exhausted and that he's done all he could - and subconsciously he triggers his regeneration in the desire for a new beginning.

Of course, 'Time of the Doctor' would have to be pretty different without the regeneration limit issue being brought up...

Anyway, thoughts?