The Detour Room

before the finished thought

Ranking Every Episode of New Who

Not much to say here - I made a tierlist of every episode of Doctor Who since the show's revival. If you'd like to make your own, the link is here.

Please note that this is based less on 'how good is it?' and more on 'how much do I like it?'. For instance: 'The Doctor's Daughter', objectively not very good but I like it; 'The Doctor Dances/The Empty Child', objectively very good but it's eh to me. Also I was apparently feeling very uncharitable towards the early Moffat era when I did this - whoops?

If you want to hear more about why I ranked any of these episodes where I did, leave a comment! 😊

And the list in text form, for accessibility:

GOD TIER

  • The Witch's Familiar
  • Dalek
  • The Impossible Planet
  • Utopia
  • Face the Raven
  • The Girl Who Waited
  • Heaven Sent
  • Hell Bent
  • The Parting of the Ways (it is important to me that anyone using screen readers knows that the tierlist misspelt this one as 'The Partying of the Ways')
  • The Doctor Falls
  • Midnight

Amazing

  • Smith & Jones
  • Thin Ice
  • The Magician's Apprentice
  • The Beast Below
  • Oxygen
  • Bad Wolf
  • Love & Monsters
  • Flatline
  • Human Nature
  • The Family of Blood
  • Blink
  • Turn Left
  • Dark Water
  • The Sound of Drums
  • World Enough and Time
  • Father's Day
  • The Zygon Inversion

Great

  • Deep Breath
  • Rose
  • Kill the Moon
  • The Satan Pit
  • Extremis
  • The Doctor's Daughter
  • The Girl Who Died
  • Death in Heaven
  • Last of the Time Lords
  • The Snowmen
  • Forest of the Dead (having recently rewatched this one? I'd consider upping it to amazing, tbh)
  • The Zygon Invasion
  • Gridlock

Good

  • The Fires of Pompeii
  • The End of the World
  • The Pilot
  • Planet of the Ood
  • Daleks in Manhattan
  • Evolution of the Daleks
  • School Reunion
  • Robot of Sherwood
  • Spyfall, Part 1
  • Fugitive of the Judoon
  • The Lazarus Experiment
  • The Sontaran Strategum
  • The Poison Sky
  • The Idiot's Lantern
  • The Eaters of Light
  • The Woman Who Lived
  • The Long Game
  • Vincent and the Doctor
  • It Takes You Away
  • Silence in the Library
  • Doomsday
  • The Runaway Bride
  • The Husbands of River Song
  • Boom Town
  • Mummy on the Orient Express
  • The End of Time, Part 1
  • Partners in Crime
  • The God Complex
  • Last Christmas

OK

  • Listen (in retrospect I was very unfair here, it deserves 'good' at the very LEAST)
  • The Woman Who Fell to Earth
  • New Earth
  • Day of the Moon
  • The Girl in the Fireplace
  • Flesh and Stone
  • Time of Angels
  • Aliens of London
  • Tooth & Claw
  • Under the Lake
  • Into the Dalek
  • The Eleventh Hour
  • The Bells of St John
  • Time Heist
  • Demons of the Punjab
  • The Rings of Akhaten
  • 42
  • Let's Kill Hitler
  • Knock Knock
  • Cold War
  • Angels Take Manhattan
  • The Empty Child
  • The Doctor Dances
  • Village of the Angels
  • Voyage of the Damned
  • The End of Time, Part 2
  • Age of Steel
  • Rise of the Cybermen
  • World War Three
  • Hide
  • Time of the Doctor

Bad

  • The Ghost Monument
  • Rosa
  • Asylum of the Daleks
  • The Impossible Astronaut
  • Smile
  • The Unquiet Dead
  • The Power of Three
  • Arachnids in the UK
  • The Unicorn & The Wasp
  • Amy's Choice (another one I was perhaps overly harsh on)
  • The Haunting of Villa Diodati
  • The Hungry Earth
  • The Next Doctor
  • The Caretaker
  • The Empress of Mars
  • Journey to the Center of the TARDIS
  • The Witchfinders
  • The Vampires of Venice
  • The Pyramid at the End of the World
  • The Day of the Doctor
  • The Pandorica Opens
  • the Big Bang (again, bit harsh)
  • The Stolen Earth
  • The Halloween Apocalypse
  • The Lodger
  • Once, Upon Time
  • The Christmas Invasion
  • Twice Upon a Time
  • Victory of the Daleks
  • Night Terrors
  • Army of Ghosts
  • War of the Sontarans
  • The Name of the Doctor
  • Praxeus
  • Eve of the Daleks

Terrible

  • A Town Called Mercy
  • The Doctor's Wife
  • The Curse of the Black Spot
  • Before the Flood
  • The Rebel Flesh
  • The Almost People
  • A Good Man Goes to War
  • Can You Hear Me?
  • Cold Blood
  • The Lie of the Land
  • Ascension of the Cybermen
  • The Timeless Children
  • Sleep No More
  • In the Forest of the Night
  • Fear Her
  • Journey's End
  • The Crimson Horror
  • The Waters of Mars
  • Closing Time
  • A Christmas Carol
  • Revolution of the Daleks
  • Planet of the Dead
  • The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos
  • The Wedding of River Song
  • Survivors of the Flux

UNWATCHABLE

  • The Shakespeare Code
  • Spyfall, Part 2
  • Dinosaurs on a Spaceship
  • Kerblam!
  • The Tsuranga Conundrum
  • Nightmare in Silver
  • Legend of the Sea Devils
  • The Power of the Doctor
  • The Return of Doctor Mysterio
  • The Doctor, the Widow, and the Wardrobe
  • The Vanquishers

Not seen it

  • Orphan 55
  • Nikola Tesla's Night of Terror
  • Resolution