Capaldi was in fine form this year, just acting his heart out from beginning to end. He had some really great moments to shine, particularly his big speech at the end of the Zygon two-parter, and his fantastic one man band episode, "Heaven Sent." He solidified himself further into the role than he had in his first year, and I really liked his first year. With this year he has certainly overtaken Matt Smith in my top Doctors list (I love all Doctors equally, but some are more equal than others). Just a great run for his Doctor.
Now there are flaws to this season, it's ending was a tad unsatisfying in my opinion. "Hell Bent" didn't totally work for me, but it was still a solid episode, just not where I wanted the series to go. "Sleep No More" is a downright bad episode that just didn't really work on any level for me. Maybe my views on it will soften, but I just thought the monster was a dumb idea, the gimmick in it's presentation is tired and something I hate to begin with.
I'm not entirely sure that the arc for this season worked. The Clara storyline was essentially that she was trying to become more and more like the Doctor by taking more and more risks. It perfectly paid off in "Face the Raven" but it was undone with the finale, and that takes the series down a notch. Not a big notch really, because this season was so much fun and well written for the most part. But when you take in the main arc of Ashildr and her immortality and how it crosses the Doctor, and Clara and her risk-taking and thrill-seeking...did they really lead to anything satisfying? Clara's did, but then they unraveled it. Ashildr's story doesn't really go anywhere after a while. If the finale had nixed the Clara story and just went with the aftermath of the Time War and the Doctor's return to Gallifrey and somehow mixed in Ashildr as a main antagonist (or maybe something else I dunno)...maybe the finale would've capped things off better for me.
Enough complaints, this series rocked! I enjoyed all the stories, the ideas, the character moments. It was more story driven than last year's character driven series, but it still had plenty of character moments to enjoy. I also loved that most of stories were two-part stories, with the last three episodes forming a slightly looser three-part tale. It felt very much like the classic series serial format in that presentation. In fact the only single episode story of this entire season ended up being the one bad story of the year.
A great run, and luckily, this is about the shortest we've ever had to wait between series and the Christmas special, so a few more weeks and we have an all new Who to enjoy!
NEXT TIME: A Christmas Song
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