6. The Time Lords
BBCTime and repeated visits have not done the Time Lords any favors. By the time we got to Arc of Infinity most of the viewers at home would have cheerfully blown up Gallifrey themselves, never mind the Daleks. When they began however they were rather more impressive. The thing is- the Time Lords only really make sense after you've seen The War Games. It's an interesting story, The War Games. Aside from its importance as the last story of the second Doctor and the first appearance of the Time Lords, it has an interesting and notable structure. In a strange mirror of the opening sequence of Rose that we discussed a moment ago, it starts very small and then zooms out. And never stops zooming. Beginning with a small battle in World War One it suddenly pans out to show aliens involved in the war. Then it pans out to show aliens in all the wars. Then it pans out again, and again, until it reaches a scale that the program has rarely achieved elsewhere. And at the end of it, when the problem had multiplied exponentially until it was completely beyond The Doctor's ability to deal with he had no choice but to call on the only people that were bigger. After 6 years we finally got our first mention of The Doctor's own people. They were enormous. And going by his reaction they were terrifying. They have never again been as impressive or as awe-inspiring as they were in those first few moments when all we could see of them was The Doctor's fear.