Doctor Who: EVERY Modern Series Ranked Worst To Best

Many consider Series 9 to be Peter Capaldi’s best. But if you remove Heaven Sent, is it still your favourite?

That episode is a flawless example of what this show can do when it’s firing on all cylinders – a beautiful story about the stages of grief with a haunting soundtrack and a one-hander script that understands how to make Capaldi shine. Face The Raven is a fantastic, heart-breaking prelude, and Hell Bent is the subversive sequel Heaven Sent deserved. This three-part finale is one of the crowning jewels of the modern era.

The problem is, the rest of the series is nowhere near as good. The opening Dalek two-parter has some great moments (Capaldi playing an electric guitar atop a tank will never not be iconic), but is weirdly lacking in stakes, considering it’s set on Skaro of all places. The Zygon two-parter falls flat aside from Capaldi’s belter of a speech, and let us not forget, Moffat let Mark Gatiss write a whole episode about sentient eye bogies.

The only exception is Under The Lake/Before The Flood, which has a great timey-wimey twist on the base-under-siege formula, a fantastic supporting cast, and a splendidly-crafted script. One of the most underrated stories of Capaldi's tenure.

It's a series where you have to accept the rough with the smooth, though the fantastic characterisation for both Twelve and Clara, along with the finale, elevates it above some of the others.