Doctor Who: Every Tenth Doctor Episode Ranked From Worst To Best

22. The Shakespeare Code

Doctor Who The End of Time
BBC Studios

Shakespeare. Witches. The Globe Theatre. This episode hits all the marks you'd expect for the inevitable 'the Doctor meets the Bard' episode, but that doesn't make it any less satisfying.

Key to the episode's success is the casting of Dean Lennox Kelly as Shakespeare, who plays him more like a rock'n'roll star than a lover or a poet, as had been the previous depictions onscreen. And it's entertaining as hell.

The witches are as hideous as the hags from Macbeth and there are some genuine scares throughout, including a horrifying cold open where the witches tear a young man to pieces.

The grand finale inside the Globe Theatre is a little anticlimactic, with the witches being defeated by the almighty power of... Expelliarmus? Still, The Shakespeare Code works really well overall, and is easily one of the more underrated episodes from Tennant's run.

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).