How to Bingewatch Doctor Who: Skip/Watch List

 

New Who - the Revived Show 

[Updated through series 13]

Doctor Who is a great show, but let's be honest, it can be a bit intimidating to know where to jump in with a 59-year-old series. Luckily, I'm here to help! 

Let's start out with some history. Doctor Who started in 1963, but was cancelled in the 80s and subsequently revived in 2005. It's been running ever since. I'm assuming you want to start with the post-2005 revived show, called "New Who" or "NuWho," so this list covers that. I've also posted a list for the classic show. (And finally, if you're interested in why I think this is the greatest show of all time, I wrote this reflection on the first 60 years.)

Doctor Who - Twice Upon a Time - A Mess of Sentiment and Self-Indulgence

[SPOILERS]

My review of the previous episode: The Doctor Falls.

I feel like if you looked up the definition of placeholder in the dictionary, this episode would be right there.

That's not entirely anyone's fault. Steven Moffat always intended Peter Capaldi to regenerate at the end of series 10, but when incoming showrunner Chris Chibnall refused to start off on a Christmas episode, it was left to Moffat to come up with some reason for Peter Capaldi to stick around for an episode.

As it is, he pulls a few good moments together and coats the rest in sentimentality and a boatload of nostalgia. That's always an enjoyable experience, I guess, if you shut your brain off. If there's anything clear at the end, it's that Doctor Who is desperately in need of new ideas, and Steven Moffat is out of gas.

Broadchurch - By Grace Ye Have Been Saved

[The first of a series of posts which bind my twin loves, philosophy and TV detectives, for no reason whatsoever. Next up: Inspector Morse: The Transcendence of Art, Sherlock Holmes - The Aragorn Complex. Upcoming: Foyle's War and moral absolutes.]

“A solemn consideration, when I enter a great city by night, that every one of those darkly clustered houses encloses its own secret...that every beating heart in the hundreds of thousands of breasts there, is, in some of its imaginings, a secret to the heart nearest it!”

~Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities


Broadchurch isn't a murder mystery. Sure, there's a whodunit at the center of the plot, but that's not really what it's about. Instead of whisking in a clever clogs London detective who then, having dispensed almost divine justice, sweeps cleanly out of the aftermath, Broadchurch places its two main characters directly in the path of the storm.