The Who You Love, The Who You Hate

[Andrew Curnow]

Simple thread to get the ball rolling - what (today!) is your favourite original series Who story, and which is your least favourite. Please feel free to give reasons!!

[Dirk Gently]

My favourite would be Talons of Weng-Chiang. Why? Well I just love the combination of Doctor Who & Sherlock Holmes, I wish they would do a detective story in the new series. I also like Robots of Death for similar reasons.


My least favourite would have to be The Twin Dilemma. Those bloody twins get on my nerves!

[Phillip Culley]

My favourite is The Underwater Menace for reasons I really can't explain - it's just fun, and I've found one of the stories I can watch/listen to again and again!

There's no story I actively dislike, however I'd much rather watch a clunker like The Twin Dilemma or Paradise Towers than cures for insomnia like Underworld and The Monster of Peladon

[Ralph]

My favourite is The Sea Devils - Pertwee & Delgado on top form, love the story from start to finish, don't mind the unusual experimental synthesiser background music and the monsters are some of my favourites with that fabulous rising from the water scene. Least favourite has got to be The Gunfighters - it grates on me from start to finish!

[SiHart]

City of Death is my favourite for being a Doctor Who story that makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. It's silly, clever, funny and adorable... like me!

Planet of the Daleks is quite possibly my least favourite story, because coming to it after reading the Target book when i was young, I found it slow, tedious and badly made, which was such a great shame.

Si xx

[Dirk Gently]

because coming to it after reading the Target book when i was young, I found it slow, tedious and badly made, which was such a great shame.

I felt similar about The Space Museum, it was such a nice book.

[Logo Polish]

My favourite story is possibly Androids of Tara, because it's not pretending to be anything other than an enjoyable bit of fun.

Least favourite would probably be Timelash. Clunky and inept imo.

[Rob McCow]

Androids of Tara is an interesting one to choose. It's a perfectly good four-parter but I wouldn't list it as a classic myself.

Me, I prefer Day of The Daleks which has become a bit of a nostalgia favourite since I bought the video about fifteen years ago! It's a beautiful, sunshine story with wine and cheese. Yes, quite after my own taste in fact. It's either that or The Five Doctors.

I'm not too fond of The Tenth Planet. But out of all of Doctor Who it's about the only story that I don't really enjoy. It's not excruciatingly bad, but it is dull. Even Hartnell falls asleep by episode three and I can't get worked up about General Cutler's son trying to pull a lever in his little shuttle.

[Antony Cox]

Day of The Daleks - a beautiful sunshine story??

Loads of people get murdered and at the end someone commits suicide! Not the most up-beat story I can think of!

My fave is Ark In Space. It's the story I'm most able to suspend my disbelief over, and thus I can really enjoy and appreciate the magnitude of the situation. Plus it's very cosy - especially the first episode!

My least fave is probably The Twin Dilemma, too. It's not the twins which annoy me, it's everything else (bar Maurice Denham, natch).

[Anthony Williams]

My favourite has got to be Frontios - it's so fantastically dark and gloomy. They never managed another story like it! The other end-of-the-world stories that Who has come up with seem to have a somewhat cheerful attitude about them (The Ark/End of the World/New Earth). Frontios portrays the last of the human race as desperate and struggling for survival - brilliant!

My least favourite would have to be Colony in Space. dull, dull, dull!

Ant x

[Rob McCow]

Loads of people get murdered and at the end someone commits suicide!

Ah, but they do so against a gorgeous sunny backdrop and in a lovely field by a canal! The canal bridge is very similar to one in Croxley and for years I wondered if they actually filmed it there. Sadly not

Ooo - Frontios is lovely. It's certainly Davison's best outing as Doctor Who and he was pretty good normally!

[Raston]

Favorite has to be Curse of Fenric, its dark complex and full of subplots-its also wonderfully made and everyone is sublime.

Least Favorite has to be- The Silurians, it tries to be complex and clever but it fails and is just stupidly boring, a half hour story made to make us suffer for seven weeks.

[Pip Madeley]

My favourite Doctor Who story would have to be Fury From The Deep - lots of drama from riveting arguments, great cliffhangers, real scares (Oak & Quill frighten even me), memorable music, fantastic performances & believable characters, the chilling heartbeat... if only they didn't junk it.

The worst? Terminus. Bores the arse off me.

[Wayne]

Fave longtime story: A tie between Pyramids of Mars & Genesis of the Daleks. Obviously nostalgia is a big factor, but i can watch these stories over & over again.
Fave story that i didn't see when i was a kid. Remembrance of the Daleks. Most exciting story of the 80's IMO. The Daleks are back, Good performance from Sylv, nice anti-fascist sub-plot. Shame about the incidental music, but you can't have everything.
Fave New Series story: Bad Wolf/Parting of the Ways. It's yet to be bettered, IMO. Fantastic performances from Chris & Billie. Loved the new Emporer Dalek. Most exciting thing i've seen in years. I was a wide eyed kid again, on the edge of my seat!

Worst longtime story: Masque of Mandragora. It bored me when i was 13, & it bores me to this day.
Worst story i didn't see when i was a kid: Many contenders, but probably a tie between CBBC, Panto-Farce: Paradise Towers, & The Gunfighters.
Worst New Series story: Fear Her. Deadly Dull. The Doc & Rose are way too smug by half, & Tennant is $hite.

[Ian Lethbridge-Stewart]

My favourite story from the original series its a tough call this:

I really like The War Games, Day of and Death to the Daleks, Ark in Space, Robots of Death, Pyramids of Mars, Five Doctors, Caves of Androzani, and Ghost Light. But my all time favourite has to be Logopolis, extremely nostalgic and just an all round cracking story (if you overlook some of the visuals that is) plus its got Ainley in it what more could you want?

The worst would have to be: The Chase, because its pants (far worse than the Gunfighters IMO), failing that Id have to go for Timelash or Time Flight. Hang on, what am I talking about???
The worst story of all time isBattlefield I Heeaaarrrggghhh Yoououuouoouuooooooo!!!!!!

[Jason Thompson]

I guess I'd have to say The Ark In Space is my favourite, possibly because it's the story that got me hooked way back in 1991. (For those who don't know the story, my school library had a copy of Ian Marter's superb novelisation of the story, and barely a week after reading it I happened to stumble across a small group of people watching Dr Who in a lunchtime club at school, and I just happened to walk in exactly as part 1 of The Ark In Space came along. I stayed, and I've been a fan ever since.)

Least favourite is Timelash, by a country mile. It has absolutely nothing to recommend it. Endless TARDIS scenes, obvious padding and an ending that is follwed by another when the writer realised he still had ten minutes of screen time to fill. None of the performances are up to scratch. It's just crap. Ironically, it occurs to me that there is about enough plot for one episode of the new series. Trimmed down and with beter performances and production values (and without the extended buildup to the Doctor's ultimate sacrifice which is then deflated by his strolling inc ausally without a word of explanation) it could make a good story....

Every other clunker has some redeeming features. Not so Timelash. Awful from start to finish. It may be a long time before I watch such tales as The Space Museum, The Creature From The Pit or The Invisible Enemy again, but I'm only keeping Timelash because I don't want gaps in my collection after 11 years of collecting to get the entire series!

[Antony Cox]

I guess I'd have to say The Ark In Space is my favourite, possibly because it's the story that got me hooked way back in 1991. (For those who don't know the story, my school library had a copy of Ian Marter's superb novelisation of the story, and barely a week after reading it I happened to stumble across a small group of people watching Dr Who in a lunchtime club at school, and I just happened to walk in exactly as part 1 of The Ark In Space came along. I stayed, and I've been a fan ever since.)

Funnily enough I remember you saying that when you first joined the old PS - and I rejoiced it then, too!

[Stephen Morgan]

My favourite has to be Talons, I love a Victorian period piece and have always been a lover of series like Upstairs Downstairs, Duchess of Duke Street, and Talons came soon after these.
The idea of a brooding, Holmesian Doctor was played to perfection by Tom in this one and was a perect end to the excellent 1976/77 series.
My least favourite, and there are one or two I just can't stand to watch, is City of Death. Tom, under Graham Williams, and Douglas Adams' script, was let loose to unleash depths of comedy which I felt didn't suit the character, he made the Doctor seem an idiot in this one, and I'm afraid I don't like it. And don't even mention the pantomime that is Nimon, but I know there are fans of both.

[MacNimon]

I'd say The Pyramids Of Mars must be my favourite. Everything just clicked in this story, imo. The scene of the 1980 Earth is one of my favourite scenes, ever. Time And The Rani (sorry, Andrew!) gets my vote as worst ever, although there are several stories which run it close...

[MacNimon]

My least favourite, and there are one or two I just can't stand to watch, is City of Death. Tom, under Graham Williams, and Douglas Adams' script, was let loose to unleash depths of comedy which I felt didn't suit the character, he made the Doctor seem an idiot in this one, and I'm afraid I don't like it. And don't even mention the pantomime that is Nimon, but I know there are fans of both.

I agree with all these points, Stephen, but these points make it one of my favourites! I've got a soft point for Nimon, as well...simply because it's such a panto!

[Larry]

least favourite and there are a few has to be The Web Planet, granted the first episode is ok but the other 5 are dull and painfully slow to watch so much so you feel like you need therapy. I've even tried watching this story in two sittings and even that was a struggle to get through in fact if you know any body who suffers from insomnia The Web Planet is the perfect cure.

Favourite is Pyramids of Mars. for me season 13 is the golden season of the old series and every thing about this story from the production right through to the cast and wonderfull atmospheric feel to the story is perfect.

[Andrew Curnow]

My fave rave has to be "Castrovalva", just because it was on at the perfect time - 10 years old, a brand new Doctor, and such gorgeous dialogue, it's just scrummy.

My least favourite is "The Monster of Peladon" - not even the Ice Warriors and a talking phallus can make it watchable!

[Pip Madeley]

My least favourite is "The Monster of Peladon" - not even the Ice Warriors and a talking phallus can make it watchable!

People who are mean about The Monster of Peladon can be banned.

[Andrew Curnow]

Hey, at least I didn't say "The Caves of Androzani"!

[Jon Masters]

Favourite is Talons; Tom and Louise and Bob and Philip and Dudley and Roger ML and so many others all at the top of their game.

Least favourite - difficult choice between Timelash (only watched once, never again) and Monster of Peladon (never watched in more than 15 minute bursts before my brain switches off).