Doctor Who: Every Series 3 Episode Ranked From Worst To Best
6. 42
Joining Russell T Davies' writing team for this season, alongside Stephen Moffat, is another future showrunner Chris Chibnall. His first writing credit for the show is a strong one indeed.
42 sees The Doctor and Martha responding to a distress call from a cargo ship that has found itself in the gravitational pull of a star and cannot escape. They only have a certain amount of time before impact - about the length of a serialised episode of TV, coincidentally.
The negatives for this episode are perhaps its aesthetic, looking strikingly similar to parts of last year's The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit, so much so that they could be reusing sets. This isn't really an issue but it does suffer in carving out its own identity and is sometimes forgotten by viewers because of it.
The positives, however, far outweigh this. The timed nature of the issue, and two groups both working their way to a solution puts the pedal to the floor... especially when possessed crew mates start hunting the others and Martha is jettisoned into space. With a classically touching ending, the Doctor discovers that the crew is being punished for scooping fuel out of a sentient star - and Tennant gets to write in agony and scream just before it.
A thrill-ride of an episode that deserves more attention.