Doctor Who: Every 11th Doctor Episode Ranked Worse To Best

10. The Lodger

Doctor Who Matt Smith
BBC Studios

Simple ideas executed brilliantly can often lead to some of the best episodes of Doctor Who. Dalek, Blink and Midnight, as well as having simple titles feature brilliant premises that have gone down as classics. The Lodger follows this pattern of self-explanatory titles with an interesting concept as the Doctor attempts to lead a human life in a flat for a week.

While it sounds initially quite dry, it is the brilliant chemistry between lovable everyman Craig, played brilliantly by James Corden, and Smith’s eccentric Doctor that stands out. This episode comes the closest in the 11th Doctor’s debut season to a comedy but remembers to ramp up the drama too with an eerie monster lurking at the top of the stairs…

The episode also features a touching will they/won’t they love story between Craig and Sophie which is tied up neatly in the conclusion. While it was nice to see Corden again in Closing Time, it may have been more satisfying to just have Craig exist in this special one-off episode.

In this post: 
Doctor Who
 
Posted On: 
Contributor

An avid cinephile, love Trainspotting (the film, not the hobby), like watching bad films ironically (The Room, Cats) and hate my over-reliance on brackets (they’re handy for a quick aside though).