The latest season of Doctor Who is in my view the weakest of the relaunched series. The basic problem is that the scripts were generally quite weak, and failed to follow through on the promise of their premises, or contribute to the ongoing developments in the series.
As usual, my ranking of episodes this season from best to worst:
- Asylum of the Daleks (written by Steven Moffat)
- The Name of the Doctor (Moffat)
- Cold War (Mark Gatiss)
- Hide (Neil Cross)
- The Bells of Saint John (Moffat)
- The Rings of Akhaten (Cross)
- The Snowmen (Moffat)
- The Crimson Horror (Gatiss)
- Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS (Stephen Thompson)
- Dinosaurs on a Spaceship (Chris Chibnall)
- The Angels Take Manhattan (Moffat)
- Nightmare in Silver (Neil Gaiman)
- The Power of Three (Chibnall)
- A Town Called Mercy (Toby Whithouse)
(I’m excluding last year’s Christmas special, “The Doctor, The Widow and the Wardrobe” from the list because I don’t think it’s really part of the season. But if you’re curious I rate it a “shrug”.)
Also as usual, there are spoilers ahead!