Even their most ardent haters have to concede that disappointing Doctor Who episodes contain at least one moment – be it shocking, funny or touching – that is quintessential Doctor Who.
Here are just a few of those best bits from Doctor Who’s ‘worst’ episodes…
“This is my world too” in ‘In the Forest of the Night’
Previously, getting a special guest writer to pen a Doctor Who ep had worked – think the brilliant ‘Vincent and the Doctor’ from Love Actually’s Richard Curtis or Neil Gaiman’s ‘The Doctor’s Wife’.
Sadly, acclaimed novelist Frank Cottrell Boyce couldn’t see the forest for the trees, so to speak, when writing ‘In the Forest of the Night’ and delivered a rather lacking episode.
The scene where the Doctor and Clara truly believe the Earth is doomed, though, is a standout moment and an important turning point in the characterisation of the Twelfth Doctor.
Calling back to his evasiveness in ‘Kill the Moon’ a couple of episodes earlier, the Doctor here admits that “this is my world too. I walk your earth. I breathe your air.” This moment showed that, slowly but surely, this Doctor was defrosting…
The Doctor’s speech in ‘The Rings of Akhaten’
Instead of focussing on the touching backstory of Clara’s parents and the realisation of a multi-cultural alien society, most fans berate ‘The Rings of Akhaten’ for minor things like forgetting what the words plot and pace mean. Whovians are such nitpickers.
The episode is saved, however, by one of Matt Smith’s great speeches in the role (his incarnation really loved a bit of orating).
The Doctor is strangely melancholic throughout the episode (or maybe it is just Smith’s opinion of the script coming through?) and it all spills out here as he tells the tale of his long, long life to the story-sucking sun god.
“I saw the birth of the universe and I watched as time ran out, moment by moment, until nothing remained. No time. No space. Just me.” Brr. Spine-tingling.
Which other best bits in the worst episodes do you enjoy? Let us know below…
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