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ariadIt's clear how out of my Dreamwidth habit I've been that I don't have a single Doctor Who icon. Where we gettin icons these days, lads? Are we making them ourselves?
At Phoebe's encouragement, I've ranked my favorite Doctor Who television stories. I also made a Modern Doctor Who Television Story Sorter to ease the process, although of course that actually made it take five hours because I ranked 148 stories instead of just my favorites. (Note: I failed at this; around 85 there are a lot of ties, and I'm not committed to the order of anything past 20 (nor to the order of the top 20 for that matter).)
Here they are in reverse order like a proper listicle, with why I like each one. But first, honorable mentions:
Honorable Mentions
These aren't the direct runners-up; those are at the bottom. These are just ones I want to talk mention.
Top 20
20. A Christmas Carol (Xmas 2010)
In this adaptation of the Dickens story, Amy and Rory are on a ship that is on the verge of a disaster that would kill everybody on board. The only person who can save them is the wealthy Kazran Sardick, who controls the cloud layer of the planet nearby and would be able to allow them to safely land. When the Doctor entreats him to open the cloud layer to save the ship, he refuses. Thus, the Doctor travels to Kazran's boyhood and changes his life in an attempt to make him a better person.
This episode is such a complete and well-crafted time travel story that also unveils emotional stakes and complications as it goes on. It's a time travel story, but it's also about love, pain, abuse, loneliness, mortality, and grief.
19. The Power of Three (7x04)
In this, Amy and Rory's penultimate episode, the Earth is invaded by mysterious, seemingly harmless small cubes. Amy and Rory are no longer traveling as frequently with the Doctor. They have jobs and friends and a whole life that has nothing to do with the Doctor, and it's becoming harder for them to juggle both. They wonder if they have to choose. Since they began traveling with the Doctor, it has been ten years for Amy and Rory, hundreds for the Doctor. The Doctor uses the excuse of investigating the cubes to stay with the Ponds—because he misses them.
It's a really lovely tribute to the Doctor's relationship with both of them, and it underscores how important they are, and especially how important Amy is, to him. It's also funny and features Rory's dad Brian, a charming ancillary companion.
18. Silence in the Library / Forest of the Dead (4x08/4x09)
The Doctor and Donna visit a library the size of a planet and find it empty of people. Just as they discover that something is sinister about the shadows, an archaeological team shows up, led by River Song.
Another great horror episode, and a phenomenal introduction to River. It could make a Doctor/River stan out of someone.
17. The God Complex (6x11)
The Doctor, Amy, and Rory find themselves trapped with four other people in what looks like an 80's hotel. Every person the hotel snatches up has a room that contains their bad dreams, and the room calls to them, preparing them for the monster that stalks the hotel's halls.
I love a horror episode, and this one comes with one of my favorite one-off companions, Rita. She's intelligent and brave and charms the Doctor immediately, which is part of what makes the episode so gutting. The way the episode frames the Doctor's relationship with Amy is also the most interesting their relationship has ever been, with Amy having a child's hero worship for the Doctor and the Doctor wanting never to let Amy grow up and neither of them seeing them as the fallible adults that they are.
16. The Unicorn and the Wasp (4x07)
The Doctor and Donna attend a 1920's garden party, where they meet Agatha Christie! The party has barely gotten started, however, when guests and house staff begin dying one by one.
I've never seen anyone else place this as their favorite episode of Series 4. 😠This is very much a comfort episode placement, but there is nothing funnier than "How is 'Harvey Wallbanger' one word?!" Agatha Christie is also one of my favorite historical guests to date, matching the Doctor for investigative skill while carrying the weight of her troubled marriage.
15. Human Nature / The Family of Blood (3x08/3x09)
It's 1913, the eve of World War I, and the Doctor is a teacher at a boys' boarding school in England, and Martha a school maid. Except the Doctor doesn't know he's the Doctor; he is a human named John Smith, his Time Lord essence sealed inside a fob watch to hide from the Family of Blood, a group of aliens hunting him down. The Family of Blood have short lifespans; if the Doctor can remain in hiding for three months, the Family of Blood will die. Only Martha knows Mr. Smith's secret. But their plan is complicated when John Smith falls for the school nurse, and when the Family of Blood finds them anyway.
This two-parter gets so many points just for Harry Lloyd's freaky performance as Son of Mine and for his final speech.
14. The Impossible Planet / The Satan Pit (2x08/2x09)
In this two-parter, the Doctor and Rose land in a mining base with a skeleton crew on a planet somehow orbiting a black hole. While studying an ancient find, the crew's archaeologist becomes possessed by a malevolent force and begins killing the crew members one by one.
My favorite genre of Doctor Who episode is "a skeleton crew gets killed off one by one," and in the revival, this two-parter did it first! It's also a deeply romantic Doctor/Rose story, maybe the most romantic of the season.
13. Demons of the Punjab (11x06)
Leaping way ahead to Series 11. After Yasmin's grandmother Umbreen tells her she was the first woman married in Pakistan, Yaz asks the Doctor if they can go to the past to see her grandmother as a young woman. They arrive on the date of Umbreen's wedding, but there are two problems: 1) the man Umbreen is marrying is not Yaz's grandfather but a Hindu man named Prem, and 2) they've arrived the day before the partition of India.
"Demons of the Punjab" is the best historical the revival has done. It's almost purely a historical, with the sci-fi element—aliens that are found over the body of the wedding's sadhu—being very much secondary to the human conflict. It also shines a light on the human victims of recent history in a really devastating way, which Doctor Who does not do nearly enough!
12. Under the Lake / Before the Flood (9x03/9x04)
The Doctor and Clara land in an underwater archaeological base, whose crew has unearthed a vessel with strange writing inside. Since discovering the vessel, the crew has been attacked by ghosts, with each crew member who dies becoming another homicidal ghost.
This two-parter is just such a good horror story. I love the sense of mystery and strategy around puzzling out what the ghosts are doing. The other thing that elevates it above other similar stories is how it reinforces the series theme of mortality and how the Doctor and Clara react to the possibility of each other's deaths.
11. School Reunion (2x03)
The Doctor, Rose, and Mickey investigate a school whose student and staff are exhibiting suspicious behavior. There, they run into the Doctor's old friend Sarah Jane, and Rose gets a example of what her own future with the Doctor may hold.
The highlight of this episode is absolutely Sarah Jane. I'm so obsessed with Elisabeth Sladen's face journeys when she recognizes the Doctor, and with her whole deal as someone who was abandoned by him but hasn't, in thirty years, been able to move on. More classic companions have had guest appearances since, but none have been as meaningful or emotional as this one. Tony Head also gives an iconic performance as Brother Lassar/Mr. Finch. The actor ever.
10. Eve of the Daleks (2022 Specials)
On New Years Eve, eight minutes to midnight, the Doctor, Yaz, and Dan land in a self storage facility that is being attacked by Daleks. The owner has been killed. So has the lone customer. So are the Doctor, Yaz, and Dan. Only, they come back. That's right; it's a time loop episode!
This is another comfort episode. It's not particularly deep or emotional, but god is it fun. I've watched it three times in less than two months because it's just pure enjoyment. Also, Aisling Bea is here, being everything you want from Aisling Bea: sarcastic, cutting, Irish.
9. Heaven Sent (9x11)
After Clara's death, the Doctor is imprisoned in a castle where the rooms move and any change he makes to them resets. He is being pursued by one of his childhood nightmares, a rotting corpse in a white shroud. As he puzzles his way through the castle, he imagines he is in the TARDIS, explaining his thought process to Clara, trying to impress her, though he can never see her face. This episode is notable for being almost entirely just Peter Capaldi.
In a show that is so frequently about grief, this episode is the Most about grief. It's exquisitely constructed, surprising on the first rewatch and even better on the second, and it has the best score of any TV story since "The End of Time."
8. Father's Day (1x08)
Rose asks the Doctor to take her back to the day her father died, when she was a year old. She means to just hold his hand as he dies, but at the last minute, she saves his life, causing a paradox that damages the timeline and threatens the universe. As people begin to vanish, Rose gets to know her father.
This episode never fails to make me sob! It's an impactful story in its own right, but it also holds a special place for me in the whole of the show because it establishes two things early on 1) that time travel doesn't mean you can simply undo the worst things that have happened to you, and 2) every person, no matter how ordinary or unaccomplished, is important. The show has said many times since that every person is important, but never as well as "street corner, two in the morning, getting a taxi home."
7. The Snowmen (Xmas 2012)
In 1892 London, a governess-by-day, barmaid-by-night named Clara encounters the Doctor when they are attacked by sentient snowmen. In the wake of losing Amy and Rory, the Doctor has retired from investigating danger, but he finds Clara's pull hard to resist.
This episode is the first time we see the Doctor interact directly with a version of Clara, before he meets our Clara. Although it's tied to Clara's S7 storyline, it's mostly a really fun standalone. The Doctor and Clara Oswin Oswald have insane chemistry. They're such a joy to watch together—dare I say more than any other Doctor-companion duo?? He falls for her immediately and I believe it!! I also love that this episode is a fairytale. She climbs a magical staircase to find his magic box on a cloud! What!!
6. Wild Blue Yonder (2023 Specials)
It feels wrong to give a synopsis of this episode when it was so shrouded in mystery before it aired. But this is not a spoiler-free post lol. The TARDIS strands the Doctor and Donna on an abandoned spaceship at the edge of the universe. There, they are pursued by doppelgängers who have copied not only their appearances but their memories.
The story for this episode is simple, but it's so thrilling to watch because of David Tennant and Catherine Tate's performances as the not-things. Even before the not-things show up, the tension on the abandoned spaceship is such that there isn't a dull moment. I can and have joyfully rewatched the whole episode just for a sinister line delivery that got stuck in my head. The scene where the Doctor is confronted with the revelations of The Timeless Children and Flux is also gratifying as far as, like, continuity mattering and the Doctor being allowed to react to their trauma.
5. The Day of the Doctor (50th Anniversary)
The Doctor (John Hurt), on the final day of the Last Great Time War, takes a weapon of mass destruction into a remote barn, meaning to destroy Gallifrey. Before he does, a time fissure opens, and he meets the men he will become (Tennant and Smith). The three of them and Clara work to stop a Zygon attack on 21st century London, the two older Doctors not realizing that the War Doctor has yet to make the most devastating choice of their lives.
Boy. This is a story that could have easily felt weak-willed and false, if any of many things had been different. Instead, it's one of the most perfectly executed episodes of the show. I best expressed how I feel about this episode on Twitter right after I watched it, so I'm just going to quote myself:
"i know i just went on a rant the other day about how important it is to me that characters not be able to just undo the worst things that have happened to them, but maybe, once every twelve lifetimes, after centuries of grief and shame, if you have looked yourself in the eye and counted the toll of what you wrought, and you are very clever and a time traveler and there are thirteen of you, and it’s the 50th anniversary of your show, you can find a way to take back the worst thing you ever did."
4. The End of Time (Series 4 Specials)
As the Doctor heads toward his death, the Master returns from his. In London, Wilfred Mott has been having bad dreams and visions of a mysterious woman. Far away, the Ood summon the Doctor because something else is returning.
This is the Tenth Doctor's final story and by far my favorite regeneration story. It shows the Tenth Doctor at his best and worst and most complex: at once selfish and selfless, at once self-important and self-loathing and compassionate and heroic and loving and insane and gay and soooo depressed and wanting only to live, to live and live! Life, whatever it may be! Featuring David Tennant's most nuanced performance as the Doctor. The farewell tour makes me so crazy. I like when the Doctor cries in a cafe. Also, best score award.
3. The Empty Child / The Doctor Dances (1x09/1x10)
It's the London Blitz, and the Doctor encounters a young woman being pursued by a child with a fused-on gas mask. The child can make telephones ring and repeatedly asks, "Are you my mummy?". Meanwhile, Rose meets a dashing former Time Agent, Captain Jack Harkness, who mistakes her for a buyer of a mysterious alien object.
This two-parter is one of the finest horror stories in the revival. The gas mask transformation is the freakiest moment on the show, and Jack's introduction is perfect. I don't have deep thoughts about this one. It's just an absolutely pristine piece of television.
2. The Runaway Bride (Xmas 2006)
Immediately after the Doctor says goodbye to Rose (for some measure of saying goodbye), a woman appears on the TARDIS in a wedding dress. It's Donna's first appearance! Shenanigans ensue as the Doctor tries to determine how Donna was transported onto the TARDIS, Donna tries to get back to her wedding, and robot Santas try to kidnap Donna for nefarious purposes.
This episode is a romp. It's funny, it's camp, and the Doctor and Donna have amazing chemistry both as a comedic duo and in the more grave or tender moments. Though he tries to suppress it, we see the Doctor's grief for Rose as well as the ways in which he falters without her. It's also a perfect introduction to Donna and works both as a standalone as the first episode of a future companion.
1. The Waters of Mars (Series 4 Specials)
In his penultimate story, the Tenth Doctor visits the first human colony on Mars, led by Captain Adelaide Brooke. The Doctor soon realizes he has arrived on the date that the colony ends in nuclear disaster, killing all nine crew members. Nobody ever knows why. Recognizing a fixed point in history in which he cannot interfere, the Doctor makes to leave—which is when the crew discovers a malevolent alien parasite has killed two of their members, taking over their bodies, making them exude water from their mouths and the cracks of their skin, and going after the rest. The crew all die today, and the Doctor must do nothing.
This is an episode so good that when I watch it, I forget to breathe. The external conflict of the Mars crew versus the Flood is scary enough, especially as the deaths pile on more and more rapidly. The Doctor's internal conflict of whether to save the Mars crew, whether he is allowed to, whether he should, whether he can—and how that culminates less in heroism than in hubris—is even more intense and is one of the Tenth Doctor's most interesting moments. Adelaide is my single favorite one-off character, a middle-aged grandmother who gave up everything for the stars and who has the guts to stand up to the mysterious man who wields the godlike power to determine the fates of her and her crew. I am thinking about this episode constantly. It is my Roman Empire.
Every other story on this list could be swapped lol I'm not committed, but number one could only ever have been "The Waters of Mars."
#21-79
I'm not committed to the placement of any of these!!!
21 The Stolen Earth / Journey's End
22 The Husbands of River Song
23 Hell Bent
24 Utopia / The Sound of Drums / The Last of the Time Lords
25 Army of Ghosts / Doomsday
26 The Magician's Apprentice / The Witch's Familiar
27 The Caretaker
28 Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS
29 Smith and Jones
30 Face the Raven
31 Thin Ice
32 The Pilot
33 Flatline
34 Dark Water / Death in Heaven
35 The Fires of Pompeii
36 The Voyage of the Damned
37 Partners in Crime
38 The Giggle
39 The Star Beast
40 Tooth and Claw
41 Dalek
42 World Enough and Time / The Doctor Falls
43 Twice Upon a Time
44 The Lie of the Land
45 Spyfall
46 The Power of the Doctor
47 Flux
48 New Earth
49 Midnight
50 Turn Left
51 The Eleventh Hour
52 Amy's Choice
53 Vincent and the Doctor
54 Bad Wolf / The Parting of the Ways
55 The End of the World
56 The Church on Ruby Road
57 Fugitive of the Judoon
58 The Christmas Invasion
59 The Girl Who Died
60 Oxygen
61 Knock Knock
62 The Girl in the Fireplace
63 The Haunting of Villa Diodati
64 The Woman Who Lived
65 Time Heist
66 The Rings of Akhaten
67 Fear Her
68 42
69 The Zygon Invasion / The Zygon Inversion
70 Smile
71 The Doctor's Daughter
72 Deep Breath
73 Love & Monsters
74 Boom Town
75 Into the Dalek
76 Planet of the Dead
77 The Next Doctor
78 Blink - Finally, an answer to how much I like or dislike "Blink" and that answer is "78"
79 Gridlock
After this point it's a lot of ties because I couldn't separate in my head how much I did or did not like them. But those top 71 are all solid bangers (yeah I'm a "The Doctor's Daughter" apologist), after which they're more mid.
At Phoebe's encouragement, I've ranked my favorite Doctor Who television stories. I also made a Modern Doctor Who Television Story Sorter to ease the process, although of course that actually made it take five hours because I ranked 148 stories instead of just my favorites. (Note: I failed at this; around 85 there are a lot of ties, and I'm not committed to the order of anything past 20 (nor to the order of the top 20 for that matter).)
Here they are in reverse order like a proper listicle, with why I like each one. But first, honorable mentions:
Honorable Mentions
These aren't the direct runners-up; those are at the bottom. These are just ones I want to talk mention.
- Utopia (3x11): This is technically part of the same story as "The Sound of Drums" and "The Last of the Time Lords," but it's easily my favorite of the three. The tension—both emotional and anticipatory—throughout this episode is some of the best in the show.
- Midnight (4x10): This episode has an odd place in my rankings because I do have a lot of respect for it, but I personally can't fully enjoy it.
- The Husbands of River Song (Xmas 2015): One of my comfort episodes. Hilarious. Could easily have gone in the Top 20. Made me a Doctor/River, finally.
- The Pilot (10x01) & Thin Ice (10x03): No Bill episodes made it into my Top 20 RIP. Series 10 is actually one of my favorites but it just doesn't reach the same heights as even some of the weaker series. These are my favorite Bill episodes.
- Twice Upon a Time (Xmas 2017): The Doctor's regeneration is one of my most rewatched scenes.
Top 20
20. A Christmas Carol (Xmas 2010)
In this adaptation of the Dickens story, Amy and Rory are on a ship that is on the verge of a disaster that would kill everybody on board. The only person who can save them is the wealthy Kazran Sardick, who controls the cloud layer of the planet nearby and would be able to allow them to safely land. When the Doctor entreats him to open the cloud layer to save the ship, he refuses. Thus, the Doctor travels to Kazran's boyhood and changes his life in an attempt to make him a better person.
This episode is such a complete and well-crafted time travel story that also unveils emotional stakes and complications as it goes on. It's a time travel story, but it's also about love, pain, abuse, loneliness, mortality, and grief.
19. The Power of Three (7x04)
In this, Amy and Rory's penultimate episode, the Earth is invaded by mysterious, seemingly harmless small cubes. Amy and Rory are no longer traveling as frequently with the Doctor. They have jobs and friends and a whole life that has nothing to do with the Doctor, and it's becoming harder for them to juggle both. They wonder if they have to choose. Since they began traveling with the Doctor, it has been ten years for Amy and Rory, hundreds for the Doctor. The Doctor uses the excuse of investigating the cubes to stay with the Ponds—because he misses them.
It's a really lovely tribute to the Doctor's relationship with both of them, and it underscores how important they are, and especially how important Amy is, to him. It's also funny and features Rory's dad Brian, a charming ancillary companion.
18. Silence in the Library / Forest of the Dead (4x08/4x09)
The Doctor and Donna visit a library the size of a planet and find it empty of people. Just as they discover that something is sinister about the shadows, an archaeological team shows up, led by River Song.
Another great horror episode, and a phenomenal introduction to River. It could make a Doctor/River stan out of someone.
17. The God Complex (6x11)
The Doctor, Amy, and Rory find themselves trapped with four other people in what looks like an 80's hotel. Every person the hotel snatches up has a room that contains their bad dreams, and the room calls to them, preparing them for the monster that stalks the hotel's halls.
I love a horror episode, and this one comes with one of my favorite one-off companions, Rita. She's intelligent and brave and charms the Doctor immediately, which is part of what makes the episode so gutting. The way the episode frames the Doctor's relationship with Amy is also the most interesting their relationship has ever been, with Amy having a child's hero worship for the Doctor and the Doctor wanting never to let Amy grow up and neither of them seeing them as the fallible adults that they are.
16. The Unicorn and the Wasp (4x07)
The Doctor and Donna attend a 1920's garden party, where they meet Agatha Christie! The party has barely gotten started, however, when guests and house staff begin dying one by one.
I've never seen anyone else place this as their favorite episode of Series 4. 😠This is very much a comfort episode placement, but there is nothing funnier than "How is 'Harvey Wallbanger' one word?!" Agatha Christie is also one of my favorite historical guests to date, matching the Doctor for investigative skill while carrying the weight of her troubled marriage.
15. Human Nature / The Family of Blood (3x08/3x09)
It's 1913, the eve of World War I, and the Doctor is a teacher at a boys' boarding school in England, and Martha a school maid. Except the Doctor doesn't know he's the Doctor; he is a human named John Smith, his Time Lord essence sealed inside a fob watch to hide from the Family of Blood, a group of aliens hunting him down. The Family of Blood have short lifespans; if the Doctor can remain in hiding for three months, the Family of Blood will die. Only Martha knows Mr. Smith's secret. But their plan is complicated when John Smith falls for the school nurse, and when the Family of Blood finds them anyway.
This two-parter gets so many points just for Harry Lloyd's freaky performance as Son of Mine and for his final speech.
14. The Impossible Planet / The Satan Pit (2x08/2x09)
In this two-parter, the Doctor and Rose land in a mining base with a skeleton crew on a planet somehow orbiting a black hole. While studying an ancient find, the crew's archaeologist becomes possessed by a malevolent force and begins killing the crew members one by one.
My favorite genre of Doctor Who episode is "a skeleton crew gets killed off one by one," and in the revival, this two-parter did it first! It's also a deeply romantic Doctor/Rose story, maybe the most romantic of the season.
13. Demons of the Punjab (11x06)
Leaping way ahead to Series 11. After Yasmin's grandmother Umbreen tells her she was the first woman married in Pakistan, Yaz asks the Doctor if they can go to the past to see her grandmother as a young woman. They arrive on the date of Umbreen's wedding, but there are two problems: 1) the man Umbreen is marrying is not Yaz's grandfather but a Hindu man named Prem, and 2) they've arrived the day before the partition of India.
"Demons of the Punjab" is the best historical the revival has done. It's almost purely a historical, with the sci-fi element—aliens that are found over the body of the wedding's sadhu—being very much secondary to the human conflict. It also shines a light on the human victims of recent history in a really devastating way, which Doctor Who does not do nearly enough!
12. Under the Lake / Before the Flood (9x03/9x04)
The Doctor and Clara land in an underwater archaeological base, whose crew has unearthed a vessel with strange writing inside. Since discovering the vessel, the crew has been attacked by ghosts, with each crew member who dies becoming another homicidal ghost.
This two-parter is just such a good horror story. I love the sense of mystery and strategy around puzzling out what the ghosts are doing. The other thing that elevates it above other similar stories is how it reinforces the series theme of mortality and how the Doctor and Clara react to the possibility of each other's deaths.
11. School Reunion (2x03)
The Doctor, Rose, and Mickey investigate a school whose student and staff are exhibiting suspicious behavior. There, they run into the Doctor's old friend Sarah Jane, and Rose gets a example of what her own future with the Doctor may hold.
The highlight of this episode is absolutely Sarah Jane. I'm so obsessed with Elisabeth Sladen's face journeys when she recognizes the Doctor, and with her whole deal as someone who was abandoned by him but hasn't, in thirty years, been able to move on. More classic companions have had guest appearances since, but none have been as meaningful or emotional as this one. Tony Head also gives an iconic performance as Brother Lassar/Mr. Finch. The actor ever.
10. Eve of the Daleks (2022 Specials)
On New Years Eve, eight minutes to midnight, the Doctor, Yaz, and Dan land in a self storage facility that is being attacked by Daleks. The owner has been killed. So has the lone customer. So are the Doctor, Yaz, and Dan. Only, they come back. That's right; it's a time loop episode!
This is another comfort episode. It's not particularly deep or emotional, but god is it fun. I've watched it three times in less than two months because it's just pure enjoyment. Also, Aisling Bea is here, being everything you want from Aisling Bea: sarcastic, cutting, Irish.
9. Heaven Sent (9x11)
After Clara's death, the Doctor is imprisoned in a castle where the rooms move and any change he makes to them resets. He is being pursued by one of his childhood nightmares, a rotting corpse in a white shroud. As he puzzles his way through the castle, he imagines he is in the TARDIS, explaining his thought process to Clara, trying to impress her, though he can never see her face. This episode is notable for being almost entirely just Peter Capaldi.
In a show that is so frequently about grief, this episode is the Most about grief. It's exquisitely constructed, surprising on the first rewatch and even better on the second, and it has the best score of any TV story since "The End of Time."
8. Father's Day (1x08)
Rose asks the Doctor to take her back to the day her father died, when she was a year old. She means to just hold his hand as he dies, but at the last minute, she saves his life, causing a paradox that damages the timeline and threatens the universe. As people begin to vanish, Rose gets to know her father.
This episode never fails to make me sob! It's an impactful story in its own right, but it also holds a special place for me in the whole of the show because it establishes two things early on 1) that time travel doesn't mean you can simply undo the worst things that have happened to you, and 2) every person, no matter how ordinary or unaccomplished, is important. The show has said many times since that every person is important, but never as well as "street corner, two in the morning, getting a taxi home."
7. The Snowmen (Xmas 2012)
In 1892 London, a governess-by-day, barmaid-by-night named Clara encounters the Doctor when they are attacked by sentient snowmen. In the wake of losing Amy and Rory, the Doctor has retired from investigating danger, but he finds Clara's pull hard to resist.
This episode is the first time we see the Doctor interact directly with a version of Clara, before he meets our Clara. Although it's tied to Clara's S7 storyline, it's mostly a really fun standalone. The Doctor and Clara Oswin Oswald have insane chemistry. They're such a joy to watch together—dare I say more than any other Doctor-companion duo?? He falls for her immediately and I believe it!! I also love that this episode is a fairytale. She climbs a magical staircase to find his magic box on a cloud! What!!
6. Wild Blue Yonder (2023 Specials)
It feels wrong to give a synopsis of this episode when it was so shrouded in mystery before it aired. But this is not a spoiler-free post lol. The TARDIS strands the Doctor and Donna on an abandoned spaceship at the edge of the universe. There, they are pursued by doppelgängers who have copied not only their appearances but their memories.
The story for this episode is simple, but it's so thrilling to watch because of David Tennant and Catherine Tate's performances as the not-things. Even before the not-things show up, the tension on the abandoned spaceship is such that there isn't a dull moment. I can and have joyfully rewatched the whole episode just for a sinister line delivery that got stuck in my head. The scene where the Doctor is confronted with the revelations of The Timeless Children and Flux is also gratifying as far as, like, continuity mattering and the Doctor being allowed to react to their trauma.
5. The Day of the Doctor (50th Anniversary)
The Doctor (John Hurt), on the final day of the Last Great Time War, takes a weapon of mass destruction into a remote barn, meaning to destroy Gallifrey. Before he does, a time fissure opens, and he meets the men he will become (Tennant and Smith). The three of them and Clara work to stop a Zygon attack on 21st century London, the two older Doctors not realizing that the War Doctor has yet to make the most devastating choice of their lives.
Boy. This is a story that could have easily felt weak-willed and false, if any of many things had been different. Instead, it's one of the most perfectly executed episodes of the show. I best expressed how I feel about this episode on Twitter right after I watched it, so I'm just going to quote myself:
"i know i just went on a rant the other day about how important it is to me that characters not be able to just undo the worst things that have happened to them, but maybe, once every twelve lifetimes, after centuries of grief and shame, if you have looked yourself in the eye and counted the toll of what you wrought, and you are very clever and a time traveler and there are thirteen of you, and it’s the 50th anniversary of your show, you can find a way to take back the worst thing you ever did."
4. The End of Time (Series 4 Specials)
As the Doctor heads toward his death, the Master returns from his. In London, Wilfred Mott has been having bad dreams and visions of a mysterious woman. Far away, the Ood summon the Doctor because something else is returning.
This is the Tenth Doctor's final story and by far my favorite regeneration story. It shows the Tenth Doctor at his best and worst and most complex: at once selfish and selfless, at once self-important and self-loathing and compassionate and heroic and loving and insane and gay and soooo depressed and wanting only to live, to live and live! Life, whatever it may be! Featuring David Tennant's most nuanced performance as the Doctor. The farewell tour makes me so crazy. I like when the Doctor cries in a cafe. Also, best score award.
3. The Empty Child / The Doctor Dances (1x09/1x10)
It's the London Blitz, and the Doctor encounters a young woman being pursued by a child with a fused-on gas mask. The child can make telephones ring and repeatedly asks, "Are you my mummy?". Meanwhile, Rose meets a dashing former Time Agent, Captain Jack Harkness, who mistakes her for a buyer of a mysterious alien object.
This two-parter is one of the finest horror stories in the revival. The gas mask transformation is the freakiest moment on the show, and Jack's introduction is perfect. I don't have deep thoughts about this one. It's just an absolutely pristine piece of television.
2. The Runaway Bride (Xmas 2006)
Immediately after the Doctor says goodbye to Rose (for some measure of saying goodbye), a woman appears on the TARDIS in a wedding dress. It's Donna's first appearance! Shenanigans ensue as the Doctor tries to determine how Donna was transported onto the TARDIS, Donna tries to get back to her wedding, and robot Santas try to kidnap Donna for nefarious purposes.
This episode is a romp. It's funny, it's camp, and the Doctor and Donna have amazing chemistry both as a comedic duo and in the more grave or tender moments. Though he tries to suppress it, we see the Doctor's grief for Rose as well as the ways in which he falters without her. It's also a perfect introduction to Donna and works both as a standalone as the first episode of a future companion.
1. The Waters of Mars (Series 4 Specials)
In his penultimate story, the Tenth Doctor visits the first human colony on Mars, led by Captain Adelaide Brooke. The Doctor soon realizes he has arrived on the date that the colony ends in nuclear disaster, killing all nine crew members. Nobody ever knows why. Recognizing a fixed point in history in which he cannot interfere, the Doctor makes to leave—which is when the crew discovers a malevolent alien parasite has killed two of their members, taking over their bodies, making them exude water from their mouths and the cracks of their skin, and going after the rest. The crew all die today, and the Doctor must do nothing.
This is an episode so good that when I watch it, I forget to breathe. The external conflict of the Mars crew versus the Flood is scary enough, especially as the deaths pile on more and more rapidly. The Doctor's internal conflict of whether to save the Mars crew, whether he is allowed to, whether he should, whether he can—and how that culminates less in heroism than in hubris—is even more intense and is one of the Tenth Doctor's most interesting moments. Adelaide is my single favorite one-off character, a middle-aged grandmother who gave up everything for the stars and who has the guts to stand up to the mysterious man who wields the godlike power to determine the fates of her and her crew. I am thinking about this episode constantly. It is my Roman Empire.
Every other story on this list could be swapped lol I'm not committed, but number one could only ever have been "The Waters of Mars."
#21-79
I'm not committed to the placement of any of these!!!
21 The Stolen Earth / Journey's End
22 The Husbands of River Song
23 Hell Bent
24 Utopia / The Sound of Drums / The Last of the Time Lords
25 Army of Ghosts / Doomsday
26 The Magician's Apprentice / The Witch's Familiar
27 The Caretaker
28 Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS
29 Smith and Jones
30 Face the Raven
31 Thin Ice
32 The Pilot
33 Flatline
34 Dark Water / Death in Heaven
35 The Fires of Pompeii
36 The Voyage of the Damned
37 Partners in Crime
38 The Giggle
39 The Star Beast
40 Tooth and Claw
41 Dalek
42 World Enough and Time / The Doctor Falls
43 Twice Upon a Time
44 The Lie of the Land
45 Spyfall
46 The Power of the Doctor
47 Flux
48 New Earth
49 Midnight
50 Turn Left
51 The Eleventh Hour
52 Amy's Choice
53 Vincent and the Doctor
54 Bad Wolf / The Parting of the Ways
55 The End of the World
56 The Church on Ruby Road
57 Fugitive of the Judoon
58 The Christmas Invasion
59 The Girl Who Died
60 Oxygen
61 Knock Knock
62 The Girl in the Fireplace
63 The Haunting of Villa Diodati
64 The Woman Who Lived
65 Time Heist
66 The Rings of Akhaten
67 Fear Her
68 42
69 The Zygon Invasion / The Zygon Inversion
70 Smile
71 The Doctor's Daughter
72 Deep Breath
73 Love & Monsters
74 Boom Town
75 Into the Dalek
76 Planet of the Dead
77 The Next Doctor
78 Blink - Finally, an answer to how much I like or dislike "Blink" and that answer is "78"
79 Gridlock
After this point it's a lot of ties because I couldn't separate in my head how much I did or did not like them. But those top 71 are all solid bangers (yeah I'm a "The Doctor's Daughter" apologist), after which they're more mid.
