Into The Vortex...Revisited

[Darren]

The Eleventh Hour 9/10
The Beast Below 6/10
Victory Of The Daleks 1/10
Time Of The Angels/Flesh And Stone 7/10
Vampires Of Venice 6/10
Amy's Choice 6/10
The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood 2/10
Vincent And The Doctor 1/10
The Lodger 8/10
The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang 7/10

and

A Christmas Carol 1/10

[duncan]

The Eleventh Hour - 4/10
The Beast Below - 5/10
Victory Of The Daleks - 6/10
Time Of The Angels/Flesh And Stone - 5/10
Vampires Of Venice - 4/10
Amy's Choice - 7/10
The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood - 6/10
Vincent And The Doctor - 8/10
The Lodger - 4/10
The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang 5/10
A Christmas Carol - 8/10

[Darren]

I'm surprised lots of people don't like The Eleventh Hour. I thought it was a solid opener.

[SiHart]

The Eleventh Hour - 9
The Beast Below - 6
Victory Of The Daleks - 5
Time Of The Angels/Flesh And Stone -8
Vampires Of Venice - 7
Amy's Choice - 8
The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood - 6
Vincent And The Doctor - 9
The Lodger - 7
The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang 8
A Christmas Carol - 8

[Perry Vale]

The Eleventh Hour 9.5/10 (Smith nails the whole thing instantly)
The Beast Below 8.5/10 (Interesting premise, and a fun runaround)
Victory Of The Daleks 9/10 (My tv apparently showed a different version to everyone else's)
Time Of The Angels/Flesh And Stone 8.5/10 (The dream team, Smith, River and Amy, begin)
Vampires Of Venice 7/10 (felt a bit like an RTD cast off)
Amy's Choice 10/10 (Best incidental music since Davison era)
The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood 6.5/10 (Awkward and clumsy, the only real mis-fire of the season)
Vincent And The Doctor 10/10 (A story I could never have imagined seeing on Who)
The Lodger 8.5/10 (Corden actually being watchable, a genuine miracle)
The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang 10/10 (BIG and EPIC in every conceivable way)

and

A Christmas Carol 8.5/10 (A fun play with time travel + wonderful performance from Gambon)

Probably my favourite season of DW ever.

[Andrew Curnow]

I must admit, some of these I've only seen the once, and in general they tend to be (from memory) my less-loved stories. But thinking about it now, do I like them less because I haven't seen them much, or have I not seen them much because I don't like them? Chicken or egg, chicken or egg. Ah well, here goes...


The Eleventh Hour - 7 a really good solid opener, but I must admit (at risk of having to hand back my anorak) I find it a bit dull the more I watch it.
The Beast Below - 4 just the once
Victory Of The Daleks - 3 Yes Perry, I think it must. This is awfully unbalanced - too rushed at the start, too chatty in the middle, too stupid at the end. And rubbish new Daleks!!
Time Of The Angels/Flesh And Stone - 8 This scores well, which is really saying something considering how much I dislike River Song.
Vampires Of Venice - 7 Fun!
Amy's Choice - 7 Different!
The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood - 5
Vincent And The Doctor - 3 This is one I just disliked so much at the time, I've never managed to watch it again. And yet so many people rave about it so much, I have to assume I'm an idiot. But for now, it's stuck with a 3, and is lucky to get that!
The Lodger - 8 Again, fun! I like that.
The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang 10 Extraordinary. Such a twisty plot, full of surprises, and a glorious feel-good ending. And a fez.
A Christmas Carol - 10 Just gorgeous, instantly one of my favourite ever Whos, and I felt just as uplifted watching it again a few months back.

To be fair, the last two stories would probably have scored lower if they'd come later in the Matt Smith era - but, as it is, they played tricks & games with time when doing so was still a novelty. Now we're all a bit fed up with that I think, but back then... Heady days!

Incidentally, and even on the episodes I've scored very low, I'd happily add the phrase "and/but Matt Smith was superb in it" because really he took on what could have been the impossible task of replacing David Tennant, and not only did he manage to do it, he did it so well we almost instantly forgot David Tennant. No small feat!

[MacNimon]

The Eleventh Hour 7/10 Matt made an instant impression here, making you forget about the previous incarnation almost as well as Tom did back in 1974
The Beast Below 4/10
Victory Of The Daleks 4/10
Time Of The Angels/Flesh And Stone 6/10
Vampires Of Venice 7/10
Amy's Choice 9/10
The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood 7/10
Vincent And The Doctor 9/10
The Lodger 7/10
The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang 8/10 An enjoyable finale for the most part, just ruined by trying to be bigger and better than those which had come before. Smaller is better, much of the time.

and

A Christmas Carol 8/10 The most enjoyable Christmas special to date

Despite a few dull, but not unwatchable, stories this was a pretty solid season which boded well for the future. Or so I thought at the time...

[Dirk Gently]

The Eleventh Hour A good solid opener that does what it needs to. 8/10.
The Beast Below Interesting, shame Amy's 'Nightdress' was so thick. 7/10.
Victory Of The Daleks Not what I was expecting, not a classic. 6/10.
Time Of The Angels/Flesh And Stone I liked this. 8/10.
Vampires Of Venice Not bad at all. 7/10.
Amy's Choice Good stuff, loved the interplay between Rory & the Amy's. 9/10.
The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood Weakest story of the season for me. 5/10.
Vincent And The Doctor I liked it but it's not brilliant. 7/10
The Lodger Good fun, saved from being marked lower by Corden. 8/10.
The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang I liked this, a really good season ending. 9/10.

A Christmas Carol I'm not sure why but this disappointed me at the time & has never really captured my attention since. Must watch it again when I have a spare hour or so. 6/10.

[MacNimon]

Last call for Series 5! Anyone else wishing to rate these stories has another 24 hours or so to do so...for the rest of us though, it's time to move on to...

SERIES 6

As usual, marks out of ten please for...

The Impossible Astronaut/Day Of The Moon
The Curse Of The Black Spot
The Doctor's Wife
The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People
A Good Man Goes To War
Let's Kill Hitler
Night Terrors
The Girl Who Waited
The God Complex
Closing Time
The Wedding Of River Song

and

The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe.

[Mike Saville]

The Eleventh Hour -9/10
All my fears for Matt in the role were unfounded. He nailed the Doctor faster than any previous, and a joy to watch.

The Beast Below - 7/10
Excellent premise, not particularly well realised, but was ok, but promised so much more.

Victory Of The Daleks - 8/10 - 3/10
First 20 minutes and it was shaping up to be the best Dalek story ever...
second half, oh dear oh dear oh dear... Typical Gatiss.

Time Of The Angels/Flesh And Stone - 6/10
Lacklustre. Nice twist with Amy not able to look at the angels saves it, just. Would probably have been a better story without River Song shoehorned in.

Vampires Of Venice - 3/10
Uninspiring.

Amy's Choice - 7/10
Again, interesting premise.

The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood - 5/10
New series trying to do an old series style story doesn't often work, and this one misses the mark for me, sadly.

Vincent And The Doctor - 5/10
Beautifully shot, but overly sentimental and too heavy handed in its appreciation of Van Gogh.

The Lodger - 5/10
Was alreet I spose.

The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang - 8/10
Very edge of seat, and some great Matt dialogue, but the comic relief backwards and forwards time jumpy stuff marred it slightly.

A Christmas Carol - 4/10
Meh. Christmas specials are generally weak to me, and as such it was no worse and better than many of its predecessors, so a 4 it is.

[duncan]

The Impossible Astronaut/Day Of The Moon - 6/10
The Curse Of The Black Spot 7/10
The Doctor's Wife 6/10
The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People 6/10
A Good Man Goes To War 6/10
Let's Kill Hitler 5/10
Night Terrors 6/10
The Girl Who Waited 8/10
The God Complex 7/10
Closing Time 4/10
The Wedding Of River Song 7/10
The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe - 4/10

[Wayne]

The Impossible Astronaut/Day Of The Moon 2
The Curse Of The Black Spot 4
The Doctor's Wife 1
The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People 6
A Good Man Goes To War 2
Let's Kill Hitler 1
Night Terrors 5
The Girl Who Waited 8
The God Complex 3
Closing Time 2
The Wedding Of River Song 1

The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe 2

I'm not being harsh for the sake of it. I really lost faith during this season. The Girl Who Waited was a very fine episode, but otherwise I'd just had had enough of Moffat's smoke and mirrors, faux-complexity, and the degenerating characterisation of Smith's (excellent when the writers allow him to be) Doctor, who rapidly declined into Tennant-lite.
All this coupled with even more of the nauseating River Song, and the increasing undertone of smugness and stupidity, squandering the talents of Matt Smith with such banalities as The Doctor's Wife and other equally awful episodes.... Sorry, but that's just genuinely the way I feel about it.
Even RTD didn't actually make me stop watching altogther....

[Perry Vale]

The Impossible Astronaut/Day Of The Moon 9.5/10
The Curse Of The Black Spot 7.5/10
The Doctor's Wife 10/10
The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People 6/10
A Good Man Goes To War 9/10
Let's Kill Hitler 9/10
Night Terrors 7/10
The Girl Who Waited 8/10
The God Complex 7.5/10
Closing Time 6/10
The Wedding Of River Song 9/10

and

The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe. 8/10

A step backwards from S5 in my view, due to the guest writers not being up to it, and only the Moffat-penned ones hitting the spot.

[Dirk Gently]

The Impossible Astronaut/Day Of The Moon 8/10 Not a bad 2 parter at all.
The Curse Of The Black Spot 7/10. It has its critics but I'm not one of them. Lots to like for me.
The Doctor's Wife 10/10 I couldn't fault it!
The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People 6/10 Dragged a bit for a 2 parter.
A Good Man Goes To War 9/10 Great ending to the first half of the season. Great to see Matt doing anger well.
Let's Kill Hitler 8/10 A fun start to the 2nd half of the season. Quite enjoyable.
Night Terrors 6/10 Oh dear, excellent episode if you're 8...I'm not.
The Girl Who Waited 8/10 Good time/parallel universe story.
The God Complex 7/10 Nice episode into the working of the human psyche.
Closing Time 8/10 Corden does it again. Nice story & fun.
The Wedding Of River Song 9/10 Nice to see the series coming to a good ending.

and

The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe. 6/10 I like it but it'll never be a favourite. Need to watch it again soon.

[Darren]

The Impossible Astronaut/Day Of The Moon 9/10
The Curse Of The Black Spot 1/10
The Doctor's Wife 9/10
The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People 7/10
A Good Man Goes To War 5/10
Let's Kill Hitler 1/10
Night Terrors 1/10
The Girl Who Waited 1/10
The God Complex 8/10
Closing Time 7/10
The Wedding Of River Song 2/10

and

The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe 1/10

[Paul Clement]

The Impossible Astronaut/Day Of The Moon 5/10
The Curse Of The Black Spot 4/10
The Doctor's Wife 5/10
The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People 3/10
A Good Man Goes To War 7/10
Let's Kill Hitler 7/10
Night Terrors 7/10
The Girl Who Waited 6/10
The God Complex 8/10
Closing Time 3/10
The Wedding Of River Song 6/10
The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe. 4/10

[SiHart]

The Impossible Astronaut/Day Of The Moon 8
The Curse Of The Black Spot 3
The Doctor's Wife 9
The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People 8
A Good Man Goes To War 4
Let's Kill Hitler 7
Night Terrors 7
The Girl Who Waited 8
The God Complex 8
Closing Time 8
The Wedding Of River Song 5
The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe. 2

[Andrew Curnow]

Even more than season 5, there are many of these I've only seen just the once - maybe a rewatching would bring the high scores down and the low scores up, but then again maybe not. A bit like Wayne, I sort of lost faith a bit with it this year - I think the irony of Doctor Who is that it works best when it's not about the Doctor, and that combined with the fact that I just do not like the River Song character means that this series is a tough one for me to love.

The Impossible Astronaut/Day Of The Moon 6
To be honest, that's a generous 6, it's the perfect example of too many set pieces with no real plot or sense to link them. But it looks good.

The Curse Of The Black Spot 3
In the RTD era, I'm sure the script would have been sent back with the instruction to "up the pirate content" - what it needed was much more fun, gags about parrots, eye-patches & wooden legs & some "aaarrr" rather than an attempt to make 'real' pirates. There's a sense of "it'll do" to this one which is very unusual for Who.

The Doctor's Wife 8
It's a good story, but scores high partly because of being surrounded by some much weaker stories. In season 3 or 5 I think I'd have scored it lower.

The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People 6
It's another generous 6, Matt is very good in it though.

A Good Man Goes To War 4
Looks good, and has a sort of epic feel to it... but it's a nonsensical 'plot' ending with a disappointing reveal.

Let's Kill Hitler 1
The story that robbed Monster of Peladon of my "Worst Who Ever" position. It's a self-indulgent nonsensical story that is about nothing really other than 4 time travellers farting about in Berlin. Even Matt, when he's poisoned, is either over-acting or under-acting, or whatever. It's just awful, and I'd gladly slip Pamela Nash a fiver to do her best work on this one. And don't even get me started on the 'emotion-driven' new Who ignoring the fact that Amy & Rory have had their baby kidnapped but don't seem to be that bothered about it.

Night Terrors 8
Just a 'story of the week' with no larger agenda - the Doctor turns up, explores, saves the day, and leaves again. It's Doctor Who in a nutshell, possibly Gatiss' best and certainly his most-overlooked story to date.

The Girl Who Waited 7
Likewise, and for a change the Timey-Wimey stuff isn't to allow the regulars a chance to be smug. Karen Gillan is extraordinary in this one.

The God Complex 8
Another self-contained little gem, this is an oddly disturbing little tale, very well put together.

Closing Time 7
For the most part, very enjoyable - loses marks for the over-simplified schmaltz of the ending, but a fun romp for all that.

The Wedding Of River Song 8
I have to be honest, though I hated the arc in this series I bizarrely and unpredictably enjoyed the finale a great deal. Maybe I just really like to know what's going on!!

The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe 6
To be fair, Moffat was never going to top A Christmas Carol, this one is OK and Matt is superb, but it just all feels a bit.... inconsequential.

[MacNimon]

FINAL final call for Series 5, just to give everyone who has already participated the chance to vote before I post the results...

....Mr McCow, I'm looking at you....

[Rob McCow]

Series 5 of Doctor Who and The New Series:

The Eleventh Hour - 10
I'm the Doctor. Basically, run.

The Beast Below - 7
Humm... I think this was good. I'd like to re-watch it at some point maybe.

Victory Of The Daleks - 6
Not nearly as good as it thought it was and a big disappointment - though I'm totally fine with the New Paradigm and think they look great! It's just that the plot stops when the Doctor meets them...

Time Of The Angels/Flesh And Stone - 9
Brilliant, piddles all over Blink.

Vampires Of Venice - 5
Loses a lot of points for being !!EXACTLY!!! the same as School Reunion but without Sarah or K-9.

Amy's Choice - 9
This could be a Twicky one.

The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood - 5
Actually, this might be better on re-watching now that we're used to the new Silurians. But the moral predicament at the core of the story is presented in the dullest way possible. Even Star Trek TNG wouldn't have made it this boring.

Vincent And The Doctor - 10
Well I cried.

The Lodger - 8
I love Craig. I wish he'd come back again.

The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang - 7
Watchable, great fun, but once you know what the Pandorica is there's a heck of a lot of faffing about.

A Christmas Carol - 0
Shit, shit, shit. I hate Michael Gambon. He's flipping awful in everything he's ever been in. He drains the screen of charisma like the Keller Machine sucking the evil out of people's brains. Oh-let's-do-a-Christmas-Carol because I am so brain-dead at Christmas I can't think of anything else. Not meh - MUrrrrhhhhhggggghhhh. Merry Christmas.

And Now For Doctor Who The Sixth Series of New Doctor Who Seasons:

The Impossible Astronaut/Day Of The Moon - 7
Some great stuff but really, utterly illogical and makes no sense whatsoever.

The Curse Of The Black Spot - 0
Shit, shit, shit, shit. Just the worst episode of Doctor Who ever made, it would shame Sea Quest DSV.

The Doctor's Wife - 9
Probably not as good as I remember it. Oh hang on, there's the creepy TARDIS shenanigans. Woop!

The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People - 8
I really like this one, despite it's flaws. Nice bit of sci-fi.

A Good Man Goes To War - 7
Builds up the excitement, some nice bits with the Doctor turning the tables, but it's so very portentous for no good reason. River Song's mouth is writing cheques that the Doctor's trousers won't cash.

Let's Kill Hitler - 7
Would have got a higher score if it wasn't a big-season-resolving episode. Loads of great ideas sort-of thrown together and not explored properly.

Night Terrors - 8
Uh... I think this one might have been good.

The Girl Who Waited - 9
In the best possible way, the second half of this season invokes the spirit of the Doctor Who annuals.

The God Complex - 8
Great, but loses some marks for the laughing being a bit irritating.

Closing Time - 8
Great, but the Cybermen are defeated by Craig doing a poo.

With!

The Wedding Of River Song - 5
I have no idea what to make of this episode.

and

The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe - 0
Christmas is cancelled forever. What a f***ing let down, they had Bill Bailey and they wasted him. And who gives a living crap about the toffee faced posho kids? I was cheering for them to get killed!

[MacNimon]

Thanks Steve...I just didn't like to proceed without you!

That's the scores finalised...I'll try to update the list in the morning!

[Andrew Curnow]

River Song's mouth is writing cheques that the Doctor's trousers won't cash.

[MacNimon]

The results for Series 5 are now available here

As I commented on that thread, has anyone got a preference as how to proceed with Enemy Of The World and The Web Of Fear (which will be the final round of this thread for the time being - probably until Capaldi moves on, then we'll do another update)...we can either scrub the original voting and do it from scratch, or combine the original scores of those NOT participating at present with the NEW scores of those currently taking part (the new scores obviously overriding your original score), or simply leave the original score intact and count the rediscovered versions as a seperate entity, ie new (old) stories and thus keeping both sets of scores - it could be interesting to see how our views on them have changed since the stories recovery.

[Paul Clement]

or combine the original scores of those NOT participating at present with the NEW scores of those currently taking part (the new scores obviously overriding your original score),

This is my preferred choice.

[MacNimon]

The Impossible Astronaut/Day Of The Moon - 6/10 Looking back, despite my dislike for this season as a whole, this was quite an impressive opener. Maybe a bit on the smug side though..

The Curse Of The Black Spot - 5/10 Enjoyable first half, falls to bits though when the action moves to the spaceship.

The Doctor's Wife - 1/10 for the concept...too bad about the realization. A good idea, in an awful episode.

The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People - 6/10 More traditional now, and I like it. Not the most exciting story ever and I don't like the arc elements, but one of this season's high points for me.

A Good Man Goes To War - 1/10 This just leaves me cold

Let's Kill Hitler - 1/10 As does this...

Night Terrors - 3/10 A bit better, but that's not saying much

The Girl Who Waited - 7/10 Probably the best story of the season, but I was losing the will to live by this point...

The God Complex - 4/10 Just getting fed up with it all now

Closing Time - 5/10 Slightly better is about all I can say

The Wedding Of River Song - 4/10 The most forgettable season finale to date


The Doctor, The Widow And The Wardrobe - Throwaway Christmas fun, light relief after the boredom of the previous season. No classic, though. 6/10