Doctor Who: All 40 Steven Moffat Episodes Ranked From Worst To Best

Moffat wrote in his episode guide that "a new Doctor is in town, with mayhem in his wake. The madman in the box has never looked madder, and Clara Oswald has never been so scared. The time of Capaldi is upon us!" And the newly-regenerated Twelfth Doctor certainly makes a roaring start to his era by being regurgitated, within the TARDIS, from the throat of a Tyrannosaurus Rex. What a showman! He then proceeds to talk dinosaur - linguistic show off!

Like the Half-Face Man, Deep Breath reassembles elements from previous stories and assimilates them to create 76 minutes (an hour would've sufficed) of marvellous make-believe macabre, mischievous mirth, and a madcap, malcontent Doctor.

The first adversaries that the Twelfth Doctor confronts hark back to the sinister Clockwork Droids from The Girl in the Fireplace. Here, they're engineered to present even more of an eviscerating threat; the scene where Half-Face Man threatens to torture a terrified Clara wouldn't look out of place in Luther. As for whether the Doctor murdered the Half-Face Man, that's a philosophical debate for down the Maldovarium.

Opinion was divided on Matt Smith's surprise goodbye cameo, with some feeling that it detracted slightly from Capaldi's full episode debut. However the tender phone call between the Eleventh Doctor and Clara sidles perfectly alongside the main plot because he's reassuring Clara - and those sceptical Whovians - that although the Doctor is a changed man replete with attack eyebrows, that's still our favourite time travelling alien standing right in front of us.