How would you rank the NuWho seasons?

[iank]

5
10
6
9
3
1
7
8
4
2
Pisstaker

[rushy]

1. Series 5 - Genuinely fantastic.
2. Series 1 - A strong start, with a terrific performance by Eccleston.
3. Series 4 - The most confident New Who ever got, the Tennant/Tate dynamic is fabulous. And it has Wilf.
4. Series 3 - I mainly remember this one for John Simm, who is my favourite Master. So I'm slightly biased. I wasn't a big fan of Martha though.
5. Series 10 - Capaldi got to shine in this one. Pearl Mackie and Matt Lucas bring a fun eccentric quality that I liked. The arc is a mess, though.
6. Series 7 - Vapid, but the idea of DW 'movie standalones' makes it feel closer to Classic Who than some other New Who seasons. The only season where I liked Clara.
7. Series 2 - The Rose love story drags this one down.
8. Series 6 - Convoluted af, no standout episodes whatsoever.
9. Series 9 - So bad it's good.
10. Series 8 - Miserable slog.

I haven't finished the Whittaker seasons.

[Brian MK.II]

Solid
1: Series 5- The only NuWho season I'd say is on par with the classic series. Matt and Karen light the screen up, good mix of classic style episodes and an clear arc.

2: Series 3- Tennant's more grounded here, Martha is a more natural companion and there are a fair few entertaining episodes despite being bogged by the shit finale

3: Series 7- First half's quite bland but I find the second half to this underrated and there are some decent episodes in spite of it's many flaws. 

Middling 
4: Series 1- 90% of it has aged like milk, tonally and visually but the good episodes are relatively watchable. Eccleston's 50/50.

5: Series 6- It's a complete mess and bloated for it's own good but I will say in it's favour it's not trying to rip off the RTD formula and attempting an new direction.

Barrowman

6: Series 4- When it's decent, it's the closest the Davies era got to feeling like TruWho but when it's bad, it's f*cking dire. Tennant is in full spunk haired cartoon mode and too busy trying to out-ham Tate.

7: The 2008-10 Specials- Apart from Waters Of Mars and Next Doctor's first two thirds, everything else is just an mess of catchphrases, explosions and cartoonish characters.

8: Series 2- Smug, shallow and RTD at his most maudlin and Eastenders level tedium. Tennant's bland here and the Doctor/Rose angle was when I first realised NuWho's worst elements were here to stay.

8: Series 8- Didn't even last fully through. Capaldi's a great fit but is reduced to second fiddle in his own pissing show, Clara is absolutely unbearable and the 7 stories I did see didn't exactly pique my hopes.

9: Everything from 2015-22, I guess... (I haven't even seen most of Capaldi's last two series and only a few Whittaker ones isolated from the rest)

[Deleted]

Am I ill? Why am I getting so nostalgic for the RTD era? This has come out of nowhere.

[burrunjor]

1/ Series 5. An all around brilliant series of television, not just DW. It is the closest we have ever got to a proper 21st century version of DW however, thanks to Matt's performance.

2/ Series 3. Whilst the last episode is a travesty, there is a lot to enjoy here and Martha is one of the best companions. I'd have married Freema Agyeman if I'd been the Doctor. 

3/ Series 7. I don't get the hate for this series? It does feel more classic who with the stand alone movie concept and whilst there are bits that are awful like Matt using his sonic screwdriver for a dick joke, and the bit with Jenny which is a lot worse than I remember it, (actually fair do to Claudia on that one) and other things, it's still a good run of episodes.

4/ Series 4. Again the finale is a hot mess, but overall there are lots of great episodes this season like the Sontaran and the Library two parters, and Midnight. Really some of the absolute best the show ever did. 

5/ The specials. I think this only gets hate because of the self indulgent finale. In actual fact the first three specials are brilliant fun. Next Doctor, Planet of the Dead and Waters of Mars, all very different and enjoyable stories, with Tennant at his best. 

6/ Series 10. Capaldi's only good series. It is of course let down by Missy, and some of the woke stuff is really cringe like the references to Donald Trump which have already dated it. Still when not bogged down in that shit it's actually a decent run and I do like Bill a lot as a companion. Nardole was also quite lovable too. 

7/ Series 2. I might be in the minority but I prefer this to series 1. It has better episodes like the Satan two parter, the finale is also so much better. I like the multiverse idea, even if the Cybermen get shafted, and there are fewer tedious pop culture references too. Tennant and Rose are smug and annoying, but to be fair that is the point of the series. They are punished for their arrogance 

8/ Series 1. I don't have much positive to say about this. The Dalek introduction, though flawed was decent I suppose and there are a few other passable episodes like the Unquiet Dead. I like Billie and Barrowman, but Eccelston is just hopelessly miscast for me. It's an okay season, not bad by any means, but very average. 

9/ Series 9. Dreadful series overall. The member berry Dalek two parter is probably their weakest story, the finale is shockingly bad, and other episodes like the Gatis and Maisie Williams two parters are a slog to get through. The only high points are the Ghost two parter and Heaven Sent, with the Zygon one being quite good in parts but a bit too preachy. 

10/ Series 8. It actually does have a few decent episodes, like Into the Dalek, Robin Hood, the Mummy on the train series, the monsters coming in from the other universe one, all of which could have heralded a new golden age for Capaldi. Sadly however the finale and other turkeys weigh it down too much. THIS is the series that killed Doctor Who. It has never truly recovered from this series in any way, with the viewers, fans, and the precedents it set to destroy canon, gender bending, etc. 
11/ Flux. A very boring series. I wasn't sure whether to rate it below series 8, as technically it didn't do as much damage to the brand, only in that the brand was dead at this point. To quote Scotty "he's dead already." Still it didn't have any good episodes unlike 8, was boring and had atrocious leads in Jodie and John Bishop unlike Capaldi and Coleman. 

12/ Series 11. An absolute travesty. At times it didn't even feel like DW, just a preachy after school special. Jodie was atrocious from the beginning and the monsters and villains from the Pting to the rags to the butch tooth fairy were the lamest we ever had. 

13/ Series 12, I remember gits like Mr Tardis gloating about how this was going to be the series to win back the crowd. LMAO. This is without doubt the single worst series in any shows history. I'm not being hyperbolic. I honestly can't think of any season of any show that has damaged the series to this extent where there truly is no way back. It's quite a feat honestly. 

[Deleted]

Series 12 is more damaging to Series 11 I agree, but Series 11 has literally the blandest, most egregiously bad episodes ever. There's absolutely nothing in there and I wouldn't be surprised if every episode ends up in the bottom 30 when it comes time to do the next stories poll. Alienating shite.

[rushy]

Nov 3, 2022 12:24:51 GMT @kengrubshaw said:

Am I ill? Why am I getting so nostalgic for the RTD era? This has come out of nowhere.

Everything is proceeding as I have foreseen... 

[Deleted]

I must say I probably ranked Series 2 too high. I can't really think of a stand out story from that series. There are some OK ones like Rise of the Cybermen (despite the flat direction) and Fireplace is well produced, but I think the Impossible Planet two parter is overrated and I find Doomsday a dramatic but ultimately shallow affair with Tennant giving one of his worst performances. Mickey has no character development either. So he's cool and badass now that he's been away? It's not very effective if we don't see the character's progression. I also find Harper's work for NuWho very underwhelming and Doomsday is no exception. How anyone could put it above POTW is beyond me.

[burrunjor]

Nov 3, 2022 20:14:12 GMT @kengrubshaw said:

. How anyone could put it above POTW is beyond me.

Well you did ask?

1/ Parting of the Ways has an unbelievably lazy and stupid resolution. The idea that an old obsolete type 40 TARDIS has enough power to make someone turn into a god that can wipe out an entire fleet of Daleks leaves you wondering how the Time Lords actually lost to the pepper pots in the first place? Why not get someone to open up a more advanced one and use that to destroy the Dalek empire? The explanation they give to cover this plot hole 2 years later that if a Time Lord did that he'd become a god, is even more ridiculous. Why wouldn't any of the countless renegade Time Lords like the Master, the War Chief, the Rani, or Rassilon himself just open up a TARDIS like that? They all wanted to become gods and have power over the cosmos, but for some reason they ignored that option that would have given it to them instantly? In Doomsday meanwhile, the solution to stopping the Daleks and Cybermen is at least linked up to how they came here and is something that would only work in those circumstances and it isn't wrapped up in such a neat way either, with Rose being lost and the after effects staying with the show for years to come. 

2/ The Doctor is fecking useless in Parting of the Ways. He does literally NOTHING, whilst his companion becomes a god and wipes them out in a second. At least in Doomsday he is the one who saves the day. In fact that's the ONLY finale in the RTD era where he saves the day. 

3/ Parting of Ways is..... boring for huge parts of it. We are stuck with Rose, her mother and Mickey sitting eating chips, talking about their fee fee's etc. That soap opera dirge gets just as much focus as the Daleks. In the season 2 finale, whilst there is a bit of that, at least it is always linked to the story at hand. IE Rose's father and mother come from different universes so we don't just literally side track onto that. 

4/ The season 2 finale is more original. The Genesis ark is a cool concept that had never been done before, as are the Cult of Skaro, who whilst being something different also tie into a long running theme from the original series of the Daleks lacking imagination and having to overcompensate for it somehow. In Evil they try and get the human factor, in Destiny they try and use Davros, and in Remembrance they use the little girl. The Cult of Skaro with this in mind make perfect sense. Also the alternate universe angle is fascinating and I like the way RTD focuses on the nothingness between, which is a concept that has always intrigued and in some ways terrified me. The Parting of the Ways meanwhile is just the usual Dalek stuff, with nothing new brought to it. Let's see the Daleks invade the earth? The Daleks are made from humans? The Emperor, or Emprah as Rose would say LOL. It's all been done before, with nothing new added. 

5/ The season 2 finale has so many twists and turns and is genuinely shocking the first time you see it. The idea of the Daleks being there too is one of the best and most shocking twists. Honestly that cliff hanger was on a par with Earthshock the first time I saw it, Torchwood not being the villains when they had been built up to be, the twist of how Rose died etc. The Bad Wolf twist meanwhile doesn't really make much sense and it was clearly just thrown in at the last minute. They also crap out of the decision to kill Captain Jack. 

6/ The pop culture references. Having the Daleks use 21st century game shows hundreds of thousands of years in the future was so lame and so cringe inducing it was unbelievable. To be honest prior to Capaldi, that was the lowest DW ever sunk to me. It seemed like a parody of itself at that point, and also so insecure it had to tap into the most shallow dumbed down forms of entertainment to survive. The season 2 finale whilst having some pop culture references at least keeps them to the bare minimum and hey they are actually quite witty and funny in that. 

7/ The supporting cast in Doomsday are much better. Lynda with a Y is just a bland, cutesy, wutesy character, Paterson Joseph, though a good actor, plays a bland, stock cowardly character whose death scene is more comical than frightening "it's not faaaaaiiiiiiiiirrrrrr." Meanwhile Tracy Ann Cybermen, whilst a total bitch in real life LOL, does put in a better performance and her character is a bit more nuanced the way she thinks she is helping her country but ends up dooming it. Her death is also more horrific, though I admit her retaining her personality as a cyberman is naff. Still when you think about it that's even more horrifying. She'll get sucked into the void and be trapped with the Cybermen in there for all eternity. Aware, but unable to feel, or escape from the nightmarish state she is trapped in! Even the Torchwood operative they kill has more personality than Joseph's character and his death is more genuinely moving and horrible. 

8/ The monsters are used a lot better here. Okay the Cybermen are legendarily made into pussies against the Daleks, which is a real mark against the story and one that could have easily been fixed. Still at least the story does use the Cybermen in a way that only they can be used, IE body horror, like the bit being ripped out of lovely Freema's ear (one of the most disgusting bits in the show.) The horror of conversion as we hear people screaming when they are in the chambers, and little touches like the Cyberman's brain leaking out of its head when its blown up, reminds you that they are still part human. The Daleks similarly despite being given more personalities, it's not as overt as the Emperor (who talks about human concepts like heaven.) They also are shown as formidable, xenophobic and intelligent and resourceful, with even the Doctor not knowing what their plan is. In Parting of the Ways meanwhile the Daleks get blasted by Ann Robinson and are portrayed in a far more overtly human way talking about heaven, and gods etc. 

9/ Rose gets a better send off than Eccelston. A/he doesn't do anything heroic and B/ his death makes no sense! If he absorbed it from Rose, why wouldn't it have killed her as well? Considering she had it in her longer? Why does it only kill the Doctor who has it for two seconds? It's so lazily thought out. Clearly due to the bad blood between Russel and Eccelston they just wanted him gone as soon as possible.

10/ All of the things that are shit about Doomsday are just as applicable to Parting of the Ways. IE Doctor/companion love story, millions of daleks being defeated at once, overblown music, melodrama. 

To me the Eccelston era is actually like Trial of a Time Lord and season 24. IE all three seasons suffer from having a Doctor who is compromised. In Colin's case he is made too toothless, in McCoy's he has to be silly because Michael Grade insisted and in Eccelston's he has to be an Angel/Xena clone because of RTD's lack of faith in the character. 

All three seasons are also so silly at points they veer into parodies, like Kate O'Mara's impression of Bonnie Langford, the Slitheen, and Brian Blessed's eh, "performance". At the same time however all three try and overcompensate by being too nasty and horrible at certain points too, like Peri's death and Lynda with a Y's death. To me they are the three weakest proper seasons of DW. 

(I don't count Capaldi and Jodie as proper seasons as by that stage the entire show has been compromised.) 

I think the only reason Eccelston gets away with it more than Trial and season 24 is A/ he was a lot of people's first exposure to the show, and B/ he had the BBC hype machine behind him, whilst poor old Colin and Sylvester had the reverse. C/ fans also went easier on Eccelston because they didn't want the show being cancelled again so soon after it had come back. 

[Deleted]

Nov 4, 2022 9:57:47 GMT burrunjor said:

Nov 3, 2022 20:14:12 GMT @kengrubshaw said:

. How anyone could put it above POTW is beyond me.

Well you did ask?

1/ Parting of the Ways has an unbelievably lazy and stupid resolution. The idea that an old obsolete type 40 TARDIS has enough power to make someone turn into a god that can wipe out an entire fleet of Daleks leaves you wondering how the Time Lords actually lost to the pepper pots in the first place? Why not get someone to open up a more advanced one and use that to destroy the Dalek empire? The explanation they give to cover this plot hole 2 years later that if a Time Lord did that he'd become a god, is even more ridiculous. Why wouldn't any of the countless renegade Time Lords like the Master, the War Chief, the Rani, or Rassilon himself just open up a TARDIS like that? They all wanted to become gods and have power over the cosmos, but for some reason they ignored that option that would have given it to them instantly? In Doomsday meanwhile, the solution to stopping the Daleks and Cybermen is at least linked up to how they came here and is something that would only work in those circumstances and it isn't wrapped up in such a neat way either, with Rose being lost and the after effects staying with the show for years to come. 

2/ The Doctor is fecking useless in Parting of the Ways. He does literally NOTHING, whilst his companion becomes a god and wipes them out in a second. At least in Doomsday he is the one who saves the day. In fact that's the ONLY finale in the RTD era where he saves the day. 

3/ Parting of Ways is..... boring for huge parts of it. We are stuck with Rose, her mother and Mickey sitting eating chips, talking about their fee fee's etc. That soap opera dirge gets just as much focus as the Daleks. In the season 2 finale, whilst there is a bit of that, at least it is always linked to the story at hand. IE Rose's father and mother come from different universes so we don't just literally side track onto that. 

4/ The season 2 finale is more original. The Genesis ark is a cool concept that had never been done before, as are the Cult of Skaro, who whilst being something different also tie into a long running theme from the original series of the Daleks lacking imagination and having to overcompensate for it somehow. In Evil they try and get the human factor, in Destiny they try and use Davros, and in Remembrance they use the little girl. The Cult of Skaro with this in mind make perfect sense. Also the alternate universe angle is fascinating and I like the way RTD focuses on the nothingness between, which is a concept that has always intrigued and in some ways terrified me. The Parting of the Ways meanwhile is just the usual Dalek stuff, with nothing new brought to it. Let's see the Daleks invade the earth? The Daleks are made from humans? The Emperor, or Emprah as Rose would say LOL. It's all been done before, with nothing new added. 

5/ The season 2 finale has so many twists and turns and is genuinely shocking the first time you see it. The idea of the Daleks being there too is one of the best and most shocking twists. Honestly that cliff hanger was on a par with Earthshock the first time I saw it, Torchwood not being the villains when they had been built up to be, the twist of how Rose died etc. The Bad Wolf twist meanwhile doesn't really make much sense and it was clearly just thrown in at the last minute. They also crap out of the decision to kill Captain Jack. 

6/ The pop culture references. Having the Daleks use 21st century game shows hundreds of thousands of years in the future was so lame and so cringe inducing it was unbelievable. To be honest prior to Capaldi, that was the lowest DW ever sunk to me. It seemed like a parody of itself at that point, and also so insecure it had to tap into the most shallow dumbed down forms of entertainment to survive. The season 2 finale whilst having some pop culture references at least keeps them to the bare minimum and hey they are actually quite witty and funny in that. 

7/ The supporting cast in Doomsday are much better. Lynda with a Y is just a bland, cutesy, wutesy character, Paterson Joseph, though a good actor, plays a bland, stock cowardly character whose death scene is more comical than frightening "it's not faaaaaiiiiiiiiirrrrrr." Meanwhile Tracy Ann Cybermen, whilst a total bitch in real life LOL, does put in a better performance and her character is a bit more nuanced the way she thinks she is helping her country but ends up dooming it. Her death is also more horrific, though I admit her retaining her personality as a cyberman is naff. Still when you think about it that's even more horrifying. She'll get sucked into the void and be trapped with the Cybermen in there for all eternity. Aware, but unable to feel, or escape from the nightmarish state she is trapped in! Even the Torchwood operative they kill has more personality than Joseph's character and his death is more genuinely moving and horrible. 

8/ The monsters are used a lot better here. Okay the Cybermen are legendarily made into pussies against the Daleks, which is a real mark against the story and one that could have easily been fixed. Still at least the story does use the Cybermen in a way that only they can be used, IE body horror, like the bit being ripped out of lovely Freema's ear (one of the most disgusting bits in the show.) The horror of conversion as we hear people screaming when they are in the chambers, and little touches like the Cyberman's brain leaking out of its head when its blown up, reminds you that they are still part human. The Daleks similarly despite being given more personalities, it's not as overt as the Emperor (who talks about human concepts like heaven.) They also are shown as formidable, xenophobic and intelligent and resourceful, with even the Doctor not knowing what their plan is. In Parting of the Ways meanwhile the Daleks get blasted by Ann Robinson and are portrayed in a far more overtly human way talking about heaven, and gods etc. 

9/ Rose gets a better send off than Eccelston. A/he doesn't do anything heroic and B/ his death makes no sense! If he absorbed it from Rose, why wouldn't it have killed her as well? Considering she had it in her longer? Why does it only kill the Doctor who has it for two seconds? It's so lazily thought out. Clearly due to the bad blood between Russel and Eccelston they just wanted him gone as soon as possible.

10/ All of the things that are shit about Doomsday are just as applicable to Parting of the Ways. IE Doctor/companion love story, millions of daleks being defeated at once, overblown music, melodrama. 

To me the Eccelston era is actually like Trial of a Time Lord and season 24. IE all three seasons suffer from having a Doctor who is compromised. In Colin's case he is made too toothless, in McCoy's he has to be silly because Michael Grade insisted and in Eccelston's he has to be an Angel/Xena clone because of RTD's lack of faith in the character. 

All three seasons are also so silly at points they veer into parodies, like Kate O'Mara's impression of Bonnie Langford, the Slitheen, and Brian Blessed's eh, "performance". At the same time however all three try and overcompensate by being too nasty and horrible at certain points too, like Peri's death and Lynda with a Y's death. To me they are the three weakest proper seasons of DW. 

(I don't count Capaldi and Jodie as proper seasons as by that stage the entire show has been compromised.) 

I think the only reason Eccelston gets away with it more than Trial and season 24 is A/ he was a lot of people's first exposure to the show, and B/ he had the BBC hype machine behind him, whilst poor old Colin and Sylvester had the reverse. C/ fans also went easier on Eccelston because they didn't want the show being cancelled again so soon after it had come back. 

Good and valid points, Burrunjor. I can't fault Doomsday's drama. I think the RTD era is quite good at that. I just think Parting of the Ways is better in terms of story and also the rising tension throughout. I get the game show stuff is dated since most of those shows aren't even on anymore, but audiences of 2005 weren't going to appreciate a robot Michael Barrymore doing a Strike it Lucky show compared to the Weakest Link. Also, Lynda IS cutesy wutesy but she's 100% companion material. Jo Joyner is absolutely superb and the character is so damn likeable you totally get why the Doctor takes to her so much. Even Jack is actually tolerable here though bringing him back from the dead is a bit of a cop out like Peri's.


Doomsday I think has a good score and a terrific moment where the Cybermen and Daleks meet, but the former being mere cannon fodder for the Daleks annoys me. To be fair, this isn't the first time either. Five Doctors and Nemesis are guilty of this too. I feel Doomsday is also a bit smug and I don't think Rose works as well with Tennant. The episode is obviously better than Journey's Bellend though.

[Deleted]

Why is Yvonne's actress a bitch in real life? I'm not familiar with her outside Who.

[Bernard Marx]

Nov 4, 2022 12:00:31 GMT @kengrubshaw said:

I'm not familiar with her outside Who.

She vehemently despises anyone on the left who advocates for Palestinian rights, going as far as to fervently harass Rivkah Brown's relatives on Twitter (Brown is a left-leaning Jewish activist sympathetic to Corbyn). Suffice to say that her relatives can't stand her either. 

[Bernard Marx]

Nov 3, 2022 12:34:32 GMT @kengrubshaw said:

Series 12 is more damaging to Series 11 I agree, but Series 11 has literally the blandest, most egregiously bad episodes ever. There's absolutely nothing in there and I wouldn't be surprised if every episode ends up in the bottom 30 when it comes time to do the next stories poll. Alienating shite.

Each Chibnall season feels interchangeable to me in how dreadful they are, but yeah- I remember finding series 11 an especially abrasive watch. 

Kerblam saw me off in the end. I don't think I watched any of the successive three episodes. 

[Cherry Pepsi Maxil]

I hate to say it, but Series 3 is the only one I genuinely like as a whole. I like Boom Town & Bad Wolf/Parting of the Ways from Series 1, but three episodes isn't really enough. Series 2 has more terrible episodes than good ones and Series 4 is so hard to watch for me now. I don't even like Series 5 all that much these days. I rewatched some of it last week and apart from The Pandorica Opens it didn't quite work its magic for me like it did back in 2010.

[Cherry Pepsi Maxil]

Mar 13, 2024 13:09:42 GMT Cherry Pepsi Maxil said:

Series 4 is so hard to watch for me now. 

I tell a lie, I do enjoy the Sontaran two parter and Midnight.