80. Time of Angels - Never Put Me In a Trap
There are great moments in Series 5 where Matt Smith puts his mark on the character of the Doctor and this is one of them and was used in several trailers for the series. The man who on the outside looks ridiculous and a joke, reminds us he is not to be messed with and brings tremendous gravity to the scene. It was so effective that in the UK, the BBC was bombarded with complaints for putting a promo for the Graham Norton Show at the bottom of the screen, complete with animated dancing Graham Norton. They blasted the BBC for shattering this tense and dramatic scene leading into the cliffhanger. The Doctor is a force not to be messed with.
79. The Angels Take Manhattan The Deaths of Amy and Rory
I say Deaths plural because they had quite a few in the end. Although I dont think the story had the lasting impact and build up that would have done it more justice, the scenes of them choosing to jump off a building together to create a paradox is so charged with emotion and so beautifully shot, it is magnificent. Then just when they seem safe, something much crueller happens. They are separated as an Angel comes between them. Amy then has to make the terrible if reckless decision to let the angel take her too, by looking away to see her raggedy Doctor one last time.
78. The Web of Fear - Yeti Comes to Life
Its hard to come up with moments from the 60s, as many of the stories are absent from the archives. However from this first episode of 'The Web of Fear' we still have a marvellously eerie scene from the story, where Professor Travers is in hysterics about the Yeti sphere having gone missing, he pleads with a museum curator to have the robot Yeti he brought back from Tibet returned. The Professor leaves empty handed and as the curator locks up, there is a smash from the exhibition hall and a increasingly loud beeping and then the Yeti transforms into its updated design, complete with glowing eyes and accompanied by a swelling and deeply atmospheric orchestral score. The curator searches the hall and turns around only to be struck down as the Yeti roars. A masterpiece of not just Doctor Who, but of horror as a whole.
77. The Three Doctors - Omega Doesnt Exist
One thing that is going to be difficult to achieve for the 50th anniversary is achieving the balance between celebratory tone and telling a belting good story. 'The Three Doctors' achieved this with varying degrees of success admittedly but absolutely nails it when having delved fairly deeply into Time Lord lore, the Third and Second Doctors agree to stay in the black hole and let stellar engineer Omega leave. Throughout the story, Omega wears a magnificent mask to protect him from the corrosive forces from the black hole. As part of his preparations, he asks the Doctors to remove the mask and as they do, they react with horror and slam the mask back down again. There is nothing left of Omega. He looks in the mirror and removes the mask himself, he is indeed headless, existing only as a force of will and Patrick Troughton and Jon Pertwee stand behind him delivering their diagnosis. A simple but effective trick and it really is quite disturbing.
76. Invasion of Time The End of Episode Four
If this were a list of top cliffhangers, this would be up in the top ten for sure. It sums up why the new series needs more cliffhangers. 'The Invasion of Time' is a 6 part story about the invasion of Gallifrey, which might sound impressive but is actually heavily under-rated. Already the stakes are high. Whats more the Doctor has gone completely off his rocker and is helping them! After a lot of double crossing, the Doctor repels the invading Vardans and while delivering his victory speech he turns around and without warning there is a group of armed Sontarans on the stairs and the whole thing spirals in another direction. Its a great twist and a great surprise. Especially since up to this point we had never seen more than one Sontaran in the same room and also, theyre on Gallifrey! If the Sontarans had been a foot shorter and in baby blue romper suits like the current series, the scene would have much less impact.
75. The End of Time Part 1 Dinner Time
The Master in the Tenth Doctor Finale is a lot different compared to his previous appearance. Hes a lot madder but also weirdly more believable because he has a motive, whereas previously he seemed more mad for the sake of being mad. Here the Master is desperate, he has nothing, he has to hide, his body is ripped open and hes completely nuts. Its a more chilling performance and intense because he could snap at any minute. He polishes off a burger in a way that makes me extremely hungry while sneering at two tramps. When one of them notices he looks like the former Prime Minister, he begins to unravel. He flickers so you can see through his skull, freaking out the tramps then he does the strangest thing. He lets them run. As they scream, he falls from the sky and eats them. I remember watching this scene on Christmas Day and thinking how twisted and disturbing it was. This scene made the Master scary, which hasnt really been done before.