9. The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances
"Are you my mummy?" Doctor Who introduced viewers to one of its most terrifying extra terrestrial excursions to date in this critically and fan lauded Series 1 two-parter when our heroes encountered an unearthly child (no, not that unearthly child!) on the shadowed streets of a Blitz torn London. The acclaimed episodes - current showrunner Steven Moffat's first NuWho offering - also introduced John Barrowman as the ever charismatic Captain Jack Harkness into the show's mythology and, while it's often cited as one of the scariest stories in Doctor Who history (seriously, you'll never quite look at gas masks, or children, in the same way again...), it's also an anomaly within the franchise as it's one of only a handful of adventures in which "everybody lives". Yep, there are no deaths here - the Ninth Doctor, Rose and Jack only had an ever growing army of ridiculously creepy gas mask zombies to contend with. The story managed to traumatise an entire nation - 7 million viewers, to be precise - upon its original premiere in May 2005 and it's been sending grown ups and children alike screaming behind their sofas ever since. And that's what Doctor Who is all about, right?
Dan Butler
Doctor Who Editor
Dan Butler is the Doctor Who Editor at WhatCulture.com. When he isn't writing his own articles or editing other people's, he can be found trawling the internet for gifs of Steven Moffat laughing. Contact him via dan.butler@whatculture.co.uk.
See more from
Dan