Top Five Tennant Stories

[Cherry Pepsi Maxil]

The thing that annoys me about The Impossible Planet is that Scooti, the really cute one, buys it first. Typical. Why couldn't that annoying guy with the long hair have been killed off first instead?

[burrunjor]

Mar 12, 2024 10:52:47 GMT Cherry Pepsi Maxil said:

I did see it as a child, but I don't recall being all that scared. I do remember at the time people calling it the scariest Doctor Who story. If they had been killer rat people I'd probably have shit myself. As it is I rarely got that scared by NuWho as a kid except, funnily enough, by my favourite foes the Cybermen. I always had nightmares of hiding behind a sofa in the dead of night trying to avoid them only for one of them to find and delete me. I will watch Waters of Mars again since I have it on Blu ray now.

No New Who episodes scared me either, not because they weren't scary, but I was too old by then. You can obviously still be creeped out, and recognise how effective something is, but in terms of it giving you nightmares and really freaking you out, yeah that only happens I think when you're young. 

Meanwhile for me the DW episodes that scared me the most where Inferno and Ghostlight and the Mind Robber. 

Inferno because of the primords who tapped into the terror of becoming a monster, as well as the Doctor failing to save an entire world. 

Ghostlight because of the backstory about Ace. That idea that she stumbled into that old, abandoned haunted house alone when she was just a teenager was unsettling enough, but when you realise the history what she must have stumbled on inside, it becomes ever worse. To start with Light's presence was still in the house. A mere echo of what it was, but still again the idea that it would be following her around, possibly even remembering who she was and she had no idea was scary. Worst of all however where Mrs Pritchard and her daughter. Both turned to stone, and both still alive, but unable to move or scream for over 100 years! Again imagine being Ace and you're alone in that house and you stumble upon those two statues that are already a bit creepy, not knowing that they are in fact.... alive! That helped give me a phobia about stautes for a while LOL as I was always scared they were alive like Mrs Pritchard and her daughter and there was nothing I could do to help them. (I had the same fear about paintings thanks to that horrifying scene in The Witches of the girl trapped in the painting.) My dad and my sister were always such bastards with it haha. They'd always every time we went by statues or paintings in museum do voices saying "Help, help I'm trapped, let me out, I can't take it!" 

The Mind Robber meanwhile creeped me out when I was very young because of both the visuals of the Medusa coming to life (again what is it with f*cking statues?) And the first episode. That idea of the white void, where we never find out for sure what was out there and why it wanted to lure the Doctor and his friends out, and the fact that if the TARDIS had taken off he'd never have been able to rescue them. Those gave me lots of nightmares. 

This line. 

"Someone or something wanted you to leave the TARDIS." Still creeps me out. 

Other than that there were a few moments that gave me nightmares like Lytton being captured and converted, and the guys face melting off in Dragonfire too. I was never even remotely scared of the Daleks, because I loved them so much. I'd always want to see as many of them as I could on the screen and had shit tons of toys of them so yeah they were victims of their own charisma for me LOL.

I think DW is at its scariest when it comes up with ideas that get stuck in your head, and creep you out thinking about them for a long while afterwards like what was in the white void, or what must it have been like for Ace stumbling into that mansion. That's a way of overcoming it's low budget.   

Incidentally I think this is why Angels Take Manhattan is unfairly bashed by fandom. What the Angels do to Rory in that story, trapping him in that one tiny room for the rest of his life with no company, nothing is horrifying, and the idea that he can never escape them, even if he flees to the other end of the universe, they'll still catch up to him eventually is truly nightmarish. It's exactly the type of thing that would have scared me if I'd been a child when I'd first seen it. I can just imagine young me not being able to stop thinking about it LOL and putting myself in Rory's position and imagining that even if it had been years, I'd still be looking over my shoulder every day, only to gasp in horror, when one time I'd finally see the face of an Weeping Angel, smiling at me before I realized I was in that horrible little black room and nobody, not even the Doctor could save me now! I'd also imagine what it must have been like for him in there, doing everything he could to try and get out, going mad with grief, and hearing the moans and cries of others the Angels had captured. 

Far more terrifying than anything in Blink to be honest. I mean I understand why Blink became more famous as it was the first one, and it admittedly doesn't have anything as stupid as the Statue of Liberty moment which really is one of the silliest scenes, but still Angels Take Manhattan does I think add to the Angels menace a lot and is their scariest story by far.