Jerusalem posted:

I'd personally recommend:

Father's Day - Rose's attempts to find closure/acceptance of her father's death.
School Reunion - An old companion being unexpectedly reunited with the Doctor and how they both deal with the gulf of time hanging between them and their last encounter.
The Girl in the Fireplace - The Doctor's impact over the course of a brilliant woman's entire life, and how she in turn impacts him.
Human Nature/Family of Blood - The Doctor finding out what it is like to be human and have to sacrifice everything.
The Fires of Pompeii - Donna coming to terms with the fact that the victims of long-ago disasters she only ever read about in history books were real people who lived real lives, and the pain of not being able to do anything with her future knowledge.
Vincent and the Doctor - One man's agonising journey through life, and the reminder that you can't just "fix" somebody with one (beautiful) gesture.
The Doctor's Wife - The Doctor finally getting to speak with the one true constant in his life.
The Girl Who Waited - What happens when your daughter grows up and no longer sees you as some inspirational, unfaltering paragon?
Last Christmas - Though it loses its impact without the back story of the Doctor and Clara's relationship
Heaven Sent - How one lonely old man deals with grief
The Husbands of River Song - Confronting the knowledge that you love somebody more than they can or will ever love you back.

They're not necessarily the BEST episodes (though some are) but I feel like each has a lot of emotional impact either running through the whole episode or in particular key scenes. The Husbands of River Song in particular I didn't think was all that great but River's giant speech about the Doctor not loving her (followed by "Hello, Sweetie") and their final conversation together really hit hard.

Stairs posted:

guess what?

spog posted:

If you really want to blow your mind, take a look at the career of Noel Clarke, aka Mickey Smith

He's a very different person from Thickey Mickey. Apparently, he'd never watched DW before the job and part of the reason he looked so baffled most of the time was because he was baffled most of the time.

Bicyclops posted:

Clara, after leaping into the Doctor's timestream, has the opportunity to save Adric from the Great Intelligence interference that leads him to die from the Cybermen, but just kind of shrugs.

CityMidnightJunky posted:

I couldn't figure out why this season wasn't clicking with me until someone mentioned that the script is like an audio play. Just constant exposition and talking about everything that is happening in front of them. It slows everything down. The Doctor talks like a Saturday morning special, it's all tell and no show. It's just boring. I really want to like this. But I don't.

Hemingway To Go! posted:

Well anyway. I don't get why people didn't think this felt like a Who episode. I was thinking that last week, but this felt almost stereotypically somewhat weakly written Who episode, with all the talk about pacifism and sticking together and guns being bad, and not living up to the concept. It was fine.
I think I welcomed the flying dishrags because it shows that from time to time they're still going to do whimsical fantasy stuff, even if they're pretty stupid for being an ultimate killing machine.
And I'm welcoming the little bits of continuity. They're not overwhelming the episode and it's far more interesting to slowly learn about a through line than to just repeat a catch phrase harder and harder or to cut away to a garden or something.

Plavski posted:

I just rewatched series 10 and drat it's still exemplary. Even the poor Extremis bits can be saved by Mackie, Capaldi and Lucas. Fantastic Who.

Fil5000 posted:

There were so many bits of that that made me happy, although I think "...and for my next trick!" was pretty great. I do wish Eccleston had done at least a cameo.

Barry Foster posted:

Eccleston did an amazing job, in that his doctor was a totally new interpretation of the character while remaining instantly recognisable, which I don't think the other nuwho docs have managed. Tennant was definitely his own panto thing, but he never felt very Doctor-y to me, and while I absolutely love Matt Smith's performance, it's very very Troughton inflected. Ditto Capaldi with pretty much every classic doctor.

Too early to tell with Whittaker, although as I've said before, she's a little too Ten so far.

Yvonmukluk posted:

Not...really? She's been fairly consistent this regeneration.

docbeard posted:

I'm completely happy with the "they found a humane way to euthanize the trapped spiders offscreen" explanation given that they were literally talking about finding a humane way to euthanize the trapped spiders when they were gathering them in the first place.

And the entire point of why just shooting the suffering giant spider wasn't okay was because it wasn't a monster, it wasn't an evil supervillain spider boss, it wasn't an object to be hated and dreaded and feared (even if you hate and dread and fear spiders) it was a suffering animal and the Doctor didn't even have a chance to find a way to give it a dignified and painless death (which she and the spider researcher had explicitly talked about being a priority for them before) before Bigly decided to shoot it in the face.

Also, as cathartic as ruining the Trump-analogue's presidential chances with a few choice observations about how tired he is to the press would have been, it feels more honest in some ways for him to do unpleasant Bad Man stuff and walk off into the sunset, whether he's going to be back or not.

Wolfechu posted:

Honestly, I've half expected them doing something with the now filled-in "hole in the road" in sheffield. I'm old enough to remember this being under a major roundabout in the city, and Chibnall is missing a trick if it isn't the secret entrance to UNIT HQ or Torchwood: Sheffield or something.

SiKboy posted:

Its not just me right? That tree definitely has cocks growing out of it?

Timby posted:

Jerusalem posted:

I think it's going to be a long time before anything tops,"LOCATION EARTH! LIFEFORMS DETECTED! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OwN6vNBttws

Mickey's "That's not Cybermen....." line gets to me everytime.

BioEnchanted posted:

I liked the Daleks and the Cybermen being catty at each other:

"You would declare war on the Cybermen?"
"THIS IS NOT WAR! THIS IS PEST CONTROL!"

and

"YOU ARE SUPERIOR IN ONLY ONE RESPECT!"
"What is that?"
"YOU ARE BETTER AT DYING!"

HardKase posted:

I like that this series is exploring more uncomfortable or lesser known historical periods.

Avalerion posted:

Punjabi was a cool setting but like nothing happened - neither doctor and crew or the aliens even needed to be there at all. Though worst episode has to be the 2nd (monument) - I actually forgot that one was a thing until looking over the episode list now.

Highlight for me was def Rosa.

Barry Foster posted:

There was tons I disliked about both RTD and Moffat's eras, but what I do miss in this one is the slightly melancholy existentialism that was often apparent in their writing. I get that 13 is generally about unabashed optimism and positivity, though, and I suppose it was time for a change.

BioEnchanted posted:

It's kind of amusing that the most vicious one was the freshest faced, then Capaldi was curmudgeonly but never quite as vengeful despite appearances.

Wheat Loaf posted:

It would have been funny if that company had been called "Van Statten UK" or something. But it was a bit strange how the one archaeologist guy knows that this company is dealing in black market extra-terrestrial tech like it's no big thing. You know, like that's just a thing people know exists. I know he's meant to be a guy who's a bit too invested in esoteric conspiracy theories but nonetheless, it seems like a wee bit of a jump to go from, "Believes in this obscure text that relates to his field of work," to, "By the way, the rumour is that this company hoards alien weaponry."