2. The God Complex
The soundtrack, the characters, the nightmarish imagery - The God Complex is a brain-child of Toby Whitehouse and he brings the same levels of comedy and horror to the episode as he does to his own BBC fantasy series, the unmissable Being Human. The episode is based on the idea of a hotel that contains within it one room that stores your greatest fear in the universe. It 's a fun concept with tantalizing overtones of Kubrick's The Shining but the best thing about it isn't the premise we know all too well that a bad writer can take the best idea in the world and crush it into the ground it's how the story is told. It's so easy to sit before an episode of Doctor Who and watch it passing by feeling nothing but the slight sense of disappointment when your prediction for how it would end comes to pass. This one plays it right despite being set in a mysterious, surreal location, the episode is relatable because it's about human emotions. Our guest cast feel real because the nature of the complex is one that exposes their personalities, what makes them tick, what they fear, why they are who they are. Rita in particular is one of those characters who come into a story and prove that they have enough guile and spirit to become a proper companion. This is also a notable episode for being the one to round off Amy and Rory's time in the TARDIS, and I think it manages to pull this off is far more interesting and mature than the departures of previous companions. They don't leave because they're trapped in another world, tragically separated forever! No, through the device of the monster that feeds on faith we see how Amy has been clinging on to her faith in the Doctor. She met him at a young impressionable age when she saw him as the greatest man in the universe and she continues to hold this view of him, which has stopped her from growing up. This is a poignant episode yet it's fun and kind of scary too. A well considered end.