Big Bang Theory stars open a wedding gift from Stephen Hawking

Leave it to TV show The Big Bang Theory to make audiences cry over a wedding gift.

When  Sheldon (Jim Parsons) and Amy (Mayim Bialik) finally got hitched on the season 11 finale of the show Thursday, there were plenty of celebrities present for the wedding. (Disclosure: The Big Bang Theory airs on CBS, parent company of CNET.)

Both Star Trek: The Next Generation actor Wil Wheaton and Star Wars actor Mark Hamill were on hand to make the wedding extra geeky.

But the one member of nerd royalty who showed up in an unexpected way was the late-great science icon Stephen Hawking. 

The famous scientist had a cameo on the episode called "The Hawking Excitation," where he reviewed Sheldon's scientific paper on the Higgs boson. 

Hawking's voice made another cameo in "The Extract Obliteration" episode, where he accepted a request by Sheldon to play the online game Words With Friends.

In this deleted scene that was initially cut from The Big Bang Theory season finale due to time constraints, we see Sheldon and Amy unwrapping a special wedding present sent to the happy couple before Hawking died in March. 

The funny-yet-emotional clip even has a few science jokes and one heck of a tear-jerker courtesy of Big Bang Theory writers who wanted to pay tribute to the iconic scientist one more time. 

"We had wanted to do something to honor his passing and his involvement in the show," Executive Producer Steve Holland told Entertainment Weekly on Friday. "When we were writing the wedding episode, it was actually Executive Producer Steve Molaro that had the idea that maybe Professor Hawking had sent them a gift before he passed."

Bravo Big Bang Theory. Bravo.

The Big Bang Theory will return to CBS this fall.