Doctor Who: 9 Most Underrated Episodes Of The Revived Series
3. The Wedding Of River Song (Series 6)
This was recently voted the worst finale of the revival according to an online poll. Admittedly, this poll was taken before the Peter Capaldi series so it didnt take any of its stories into account, but its still a pretty damning verdict nonetheless. However, Doctor Who has given fans a lot of good finales over the last 9 years, which suggests that, even if this really is the worst finale of them all, it doesn't mean it really is all that bad. Its a first draft. Lets get that out of the way to start with. As much as a lot of fans hate criticising writers, most of the problems come down to its script. The story behind this one is that Steven Moffat was unable to keep up with the superhuman schedule Russell T Davies stuck to and ultimately didnt leave himself enough time to give the script he amount of redrafts that most episodes go through. As a result, they ended up filming the first thing that hit the page. Hence its likely to be messy. In fact, that isnt hugely to its disadvantage, either. Time gets all messed up in the episode, after all, so a slightly messy script actually helps the overall execution. The Silents are at their most threatening here, too, even more so than in the opener The Impossible Astronaut/Day of the Moon. While in that story they have a weakness (specifically in the form of bullets), here that hindrance to their threat value is taken away. They appear to be captured in an army base, then break out and use the eye patches that everyone is wearing to remember them as a means to massacre the opposition. Talk about scary. Here the Silents feel like unstoppable juggernauts that have more in common with the Weeping Angels than the Church theyre aligned with in later stories. Thats not even mentioning this episodes key strength - it is utterly watchable. Its something that you can sit down with when it comes on TV, switch your brain off and just relax. All the actors are at the top of their game and clearly enjoying themselves, and that makes it greatly entertaining, despite the problems in the script department. Thats surely a plus for any show.
