Anyone else agree, I understand that we have a new director, but I'd like some 'lighter' episodes. It just seems like Steve is trying to scare everyone at home, i've jumped a couple of times. But I liked Dr Who in the daylight and where everything wasn't all dark and gloomy.

Anyone else agree?

We're supposed to get a light one with episode 11.

No I don't Every episode has featured daylight segments, spaceship or otherwise. Nor do I have a problem with darker storylines as long as the humor is still there - which it is.

I don't agree that it has been darker, ceratinly the only time I have felt the most creeped out was the Angels turning their heads, or the beginning of TEH....but mostly, its no darker....Vampires was a romp and so was the Dalek one, although I only prefer the former. For me the most dark its got is the Dream Lord in Amy's Choice...and the fact he is the Doctor...


Overall they are going for a fairytale feeling, so if you feel it is dark then I guess they are achieving their purpose....

I agree, but it seems like Steve Moffat is just trying to scare us in every episode by using darkness. It's more of a horror now instead of an adventure.

I will still disagree that it is horror...yes he has taken on "horror" themes like Vampires and his angels, but again Moff has said that he feels Doctor Who should be about scaring you....so again I guess its doing its job that he has set up to do, and Doctor Who has dealt with gothic horror in the past, so its nothing new...

There was hardly any dark scenes in "TEH" or "VOTD". And
didn't RTD give us those brightly-lit, light-hearted, upbeat stories "Midnight", "Turn Left" and "Waters of Mars" ?

I'm generally enjoying Series 5, but a just for fun "The Unicorn and the Wasp" type of episode would IMHO complement the other stories well.

Yes, it does have more of a nightmare quality to it at times now, a touch of horror-and it's great! It's reminiscent of the real old days, the Hinchcliffe era, when Who really was influenced by horror movies. This is what it's supposed to be like, so no, I don't want light, fluffy stories again. Good riddance to them.

Questionable surely????? 47 years of Who history being dismissed for one era only?

Finally things we agree on!!!! Although there was hints of darkness in TEH....

oh okay okay....lets just enjoy agreeing with you...

While I agree with your assement of the show's current era, I do disagree with "this is what it's supposed to be like". After all, Hinchcliffe and Holmes' style was a radical departure-no other production team had put the emphasis on making "Doctor Who" so scary.
Lance Parkin pointed out that he got annoyed with some fans referring to the Letts and Hinchcliffe eras as "traditional" Doctor Who, when in fact they were both making the show radically different from its previous incarnations.

Besides, Moffat seems to be following a dark "fairy tale" style, which is seperate and has differnet motif from "Gothic Horror" with the early Tom Baker era used.

Yeah, the whole prophecy of death from 2009 wasn't exactly the most uplifting piece of television history.

Through the run of the classic series, the show changedtone a few times,there was a particular period in the Tom Baker era where stories where more horror themed and thats considered one of the programme's best periods.

Ahhh !!! Not for me it wouldnt.

Not to mention '42', those cheery little blighters the Toclafane, the Master being far more openly pyschopathic than previously and subjugating the entire world for fun a few times, death and destruction on a vast scale, the whole premise of the Doctor undergoing guilt and angst for wiping out not only his own kind but others as well and the near end of the world at the end of every series?




No thanks, that was a dire one (for me, anyway).

.
But it was all done with a smile and a song

That episode was bad enough the first time round. No more demented men buzzing and twitching, please!

To the OP, Doctor Who has always been scary. That's one of its defining attributes. The Daleks are a part of history, simply for making a whole generation of children (and some adults!) hide behind their sofas.

I loved Doctor Who as a kid, but it scared the crap outta me. That's how it's supposed to be.

I pretyy much agree with you, especailly the last sentence....its still quite different to the Tom Baker horror theme



Personaly I love it! So different, they managed to fit in the Christie style murder mysteries in such a fun way!!!



Oh but that is what makes it so dark.....killing with a killer smile!


Yes instead we have rainbow Daleks..and killer grannies that spit (by the way I love both, but just pointing out that the crazy behaviour of our alien friends are here to stay)


And sorry I have to disagree....Doctor Who isn't supposed to be certain way.....that is why it has survived for so long, because one story or an era is not the same as the next...even Moff admits that if he made the whole series dark and scary, it would get boring....Doctor Who thrives on versatile stories....yes scraring Kids is good, but so is making them laugh....it has to get the right balance, which on a whole I think Doctor Who does well....even this series, I don't feel it is as dark as people are making it out to be....for example the Vampires and the Dalek stories were nothing more than a romp....but I guess, scares and comedy are subjective so what one person finds scary won't be scary to another...

I disagree with other posters on here - I actually enjoyed this story..it was all tongue in cheek, and gave us a break for what was about to become....a much darker story.
Let's face it - most drama's (especially US series) tend to have a silly story somewhere along the line.
At least DW hasn't done a musical version yet (oops is that Steven Moffat having discussions with Lloyd Webber)

Umm, The Eleventh Hour would surely qualify? Great fun romp with a lot of comedy. The Beast Below was actually pretty light when you get right down to it (the whole tongue scene especially). Has it got darker since? Yeah, although Vampires of Venice was a pretty light romp with few horror moments, but to be frank a series should trend darker as it goes along if you're building up to something. One of the big big problems with the RTD years (not complaining or bashing those series in any way but this needs to be said) was the inconsistency of tone which makes it very hard to build up a series long arc.

Actually, I don't agree that this series has been darker at all when you actually sit down and look at the content of the stories and compare to RTD as Moffat & co have done a great job of putting in funny stuff alongside the dark. The difference is they're trying to get out of the big bright city and really using the settings to their advantage. But in terms of topics covered and outright horror in the first seven episodes:

Series 1: Plastic coming to life and imitating your boyfriend, end of the world and burning to death, flat-out ghost/zombie story, aliens skinning humans and wearing them as suits, trapped underground with an unstoppable alien killing machine and undead zombies (plus holes in your head to access the brain).

Series 2: Possession and zombies, Werewolf, Teachers that eat students, clockwork robots that hide under your bed and cut you up for parts, having your brain cut out and put in a metal shell while you're still alive and having your face stolen by the TV.

Series 3 - Vampire, witches, giant... crabs (hmm), people captured and turned into pigs plus human dalek, throwback creature that sucks lifeforce and possession plus burning.

Series 4 - Your body literally breaks apart, gradually turn to stone, turning into an Ood and the whole red-eye demonic bad mood thing, GPS units locking you in your car and drowning you, this episode missing, giant wasp hiding as a human.

Frankly I'd say Series 5 slots in somewhere around halfway. Series 1 and 2 have covered FAR darker subjects in their first 7 episodes, 3 started well then stalled with Gridlock on the horror front and series 4 was fairly light but with the most horrifying premise in all of modern whodom in the first episode.

Well, I think that that the new Daleks are naff, so I'm not defending everything Series 5 is doing over the previous years - just that the buzzing, twitching man was just too cringeworthy for words! It was one of those moments that made me physically wince when it happened, it was just too much.



I agree that Who has never stayed the same across the eras. But it has always been scary - particularly for kids, if not for us now-jaded adults

I do agree that this series isn't as bleak as some seem to suggest. It has it's lighter moments, though the scares still remain there, too. VoV was more of a romp, but it was also quite dark as well.

But I don't think the last 4 series lacked scary bits, either.

I'd add to series one the media is being controlled by higher powers, reality TV gone mad, and riligion (of the Daleks) gone mad too...as well as the right of the Doctor to make a decision on who should or shouldn't be punished.

Series 2, you have an obsession that then leads you to find out why you had that obsesssion and lose all the people you came to love.

Series 3....you left out the darkest of them all, the control of the Master...and his sadistic behaviour, and the toclafane being humans who are happy to kill their ancestors, and for Gridlock, people living in hope that there is light at the end of the tunnel, and therefore staying in their cars for their rest of their lives, not questioning, and scarecrows, and the fact that if the Doctor had never been there no one else would have died. And despite a whole year being erased, it will always remain with the memories of the people we know.

Series 4, you forgot Humans!!! in Planet of the Ood, and Midnight, and Turn Left, the idea your whole life has changed because the Doctor doesnt exist.....and what more horrific than losing your memories....

I liked the changes of tone from comedy to tragedy and back again, and thought it worked well.

(And I'm not bashing the current series).

Yeah it does have a nice mix, and like I said it subjective what we are scared of, I still remember showing Rose to my niece who was three at the time, thinking she won't really be scared of anything here, as Ii wasn't, little did I know that she would be paranoid of wheelie bins for at least a week!!!