10 Darkest Doctor Who Moments

6. Creation Of The Peg Dolls (Night Terrors)

Doctor Who The Impossible Planet Toby Zed
BBC Studios

The eerie, eyeless, singsong wooden Peg Dolls were brought to life as part of eight-year-old George's pantophobia – a crippling fear of absolutely everything.

Anything he found scary was sealed in his bedroom cupboard: a dolls house, the sound of the lift, and even his kindly old neighbour Mrs. Rossiter.

Not merely content with chasing Amy and Rory around the dolls house while emitting the sound of creepy childish laughter, the Peg Dolls also possessed the ability to transform people into more of their kind, a fate suffered by Amy and the landlord Purcell.

These transformations are the stuff of nightmares, and were horrifyingly realised onscreen. The sounds are a mixture of wood creaking and bone cracking, and the CGI of the hair emerging from the top of the heads is still impressive today.

Maybe you're better off getting the Barbie Dreamhouse instead.

Arguably no other episode in the modern era has conveyed a sense of childlike horror better than Night Terrors did, and these Peg Doll scenes will no doubt freak out the adults as well.

 
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Contributor

The name's Colbourn, James - yeah, doesn't quite have the same ring to it.