The 10 spookiest Doctor Who episodes to watch on Halloween - as voted for by YOU
We asked the fans to rank the scariest episodes of all time and here's what made their Wholloween watch list
3. The Empty Child / The Doctor Dances (2005)
The Doctor and Rose get more than they bargained for when they pursue a cylindrical object to the Blitz-torn London of 1941. While the Doctor finds homeless children terrorised by a boy wearing a gas mask, Rose is saved from certain death by Captain Jack Harkness, a time agent from the 51st century. The Doctor is led to a hospital full of inert patients, all apparently wearing gas masks and with the same injuries as the boy. Is it an infection, and if so, how can it be cured?
Christopher Carmichael makes a good case for this two parter: "Scared me as a child, still creeps me out now, just that feeling that the child will never stop looking and will tear the world apart for such a simple reason is really chilling."
"I couldn't finish it the first time," Rocio Kinnach confesses, while Ben Coleman says the episode gave him "nightmares for days".
"The cliffhanger with the boy in the house approaching Nancy. Knowing you’d turn into a gas mask zombie with seemingly no escape or cure was just terrifying. The fact it’s a faceless child with such an innocent voice makes it even scarier," Coleman adds.
"I don’t know about you, but that line can still send shivers down my spine – even if it’s not being said by a prepubescent monster with a gas mask," says RadioTimes.com Sci-Fi editor Huw Fullerton. "But then I did first watch this episode alone, with the lights off – a supremely tactical error for what might be one of New Who’s scariest episodes. Brrrr."
And Terry Lickle Dunn argues that it's "Moffat's best work...'Are you my mummy?'"
