Random Scariest 'Doctor Who' Moments (13 items)

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  (#1) 'Blink' Introduced Audiences To The Terrifying Weeping Angels

  No discussion of the most unsettling Doctor Who moments can be had without mentioning the Weeping Angels. These extremely old creatures that look like Victorian statues wait until someone turns their back on them or blinks, and then they strike. 

  With enough time, the Weeping Angles can drain the life from their victims while sending them back into an undetermined era of time seemingly at random. Their first appearance in "Blink" shows just how well Doctor Who works at telling a horror story.

  It's hard to decide what's scarier - the idea that you won't even know that you're being zapped to the past or the sharp fangs and furrowed brows of the Weeping Angels. Strangely enough, the writer behind the episode - Steven Moffat - claims that the creatures are based on a real object.
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  (#2) 'The Empty Child' Features A Creepy Little Boy And People's Faces Transforming Into Gas Masks

  "Are you my mummy?" Those four words are the soundtrack to one of the most horrifying episodes of Doctor Who's return to form in 2005. "The Empty Child" features the Doctor grappling with a creepy little kid with a gas mask for a face. That visual is freaky enough, but it's what happens to people who come into contact with the boy that's really upsetting.

  Anyone who comes in contact with the boy with a gas mask for a face grows a gas mask of their own. The episode shows this transformation in a lengthy take that is downright Cronenbergian (which originally featured a skull-cracking sound effect the BBC ultimately cut for being "too horrible"). It's hard to watch even for the most dyed-in-the-wool horror fan. Parents reportedly flooded the BBC with complaints the episode terrified their children, and to this day the network hosts a parental advisory guide for "The Empty Child" on their website featuring children's "fear ratings."
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  (#3) An Invisible Threat Chews Through Characters In 'Silence in the Library'

  In what is ostensibly a gothic ghost story, the Doctor is drawn to a library in the 51st century where spooky things immediately start happening. The lights in the main library go out one by one in a fairly terrifying scene, and that's after the Doctor and Donna encounter a disembodied head. It's a cute disembodied head, but it's still freaky.

  Those scares don't compare to the Vashta Nerada, particle-sized creatures that are extremely carnivorous. This episode could have been a standard Doctor Who episode, but there are astronauts chased down long corridors by unseen creatures and an imminent threat that's only discernible as a double shadow. "Silence in the Library" is an intriguing story that will make you think twice about visiting unknown planets on a whim.
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  (#4) 'Midnight' Is One Of The Darkest 'Doctor Who' Episodes Ever

  As one of the smallest Doctor Who stories, “Midnight” squeezes every ounce of terror that it can out of a single setting. Nothing about this episode is fun or lighthearted, making it an outlier in the early run of the series. In the episode, a mysterious creature mentally rips apart a group of people - the Doctor included.

  “Midnight” features an unseen creature that takes over the mind of a passenger on a transport ship. Rather than fight off the being, the Doctor nearly loses everything to the creature when it convinces everyone that he’s been possessed.

  As always, the Doctor gets out of the situation, but he doesn’t really win anything, and writer Russell T. Davies never explains the backstory of what the audience has just seen. It makes the episode all the more chilling.
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  (#5) 'The Impossible Planet' Pitted The Doctor Against Possessed Astronauts And The Devil

  “The Impossible Planet” and its follow up episode “The Satan Pit” ask the question, “Who would win in a fight between the Doctor and the devil?” After landing on the mysterious planet Krop Tor, the Doctor meets a crew of engineers attempting to drill into the core of the planet to understand how it’s orbiting a black hole.

  The closer the crew gets to the center of the planet, the creepier things get. Messages appear in an “impossible old” language and a crew member is possessed by something called “the Beast” that has him slay the rest of his crew members.

  In the following episode, the Doctor literally goes face to face with the devil while Rose has to fight off possessed Ood. The Doctor is thrust into confusion about whether or not he’s actually dealing with Satan or just an alien who’s well versed with human history. It’s spooky stuff.
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  (#6) The Doctor Discovers The Origin Of All Nightmares In 'Listen'

  Doctor Who has long explored the things that frighten us as children. The show is technically for kids, so this makes sense, but in “Listen,” the Doctor tries to get to the heart of our fear of things that go bump in the night. When the Doctor goes in search of a creature that’s always with us, hiding in the corners we can’t see, he gets to the bottom of the fear that something is going to grab us from under the bed.

  As always, this episode features eerie visuals, but it’s the hunt for a creature hiding beneath our beds that creates a more existential fear than Doctor Who usually tosses out. Even though this episode ends on a fairly upbeat note, there’s still a sense of dread surging through “Listen.”
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  (#7) The Creatures From 'Waters of Mars' Spew Water From Their Demonic Mouths

  From 2008-2010, Doctor Who aired a series of specials that were essentially short films that allowed the Doctor to explore worlds without tethering himself to a specific storyline. Arriving on the last day of Bowie Base One, he finds the place overrun with water demon/vampire-like entities.

  The monsters are fairly lo-fi, with soaking wet faces and disturbingly cracked mouths. As the creatures track down the Doctor, the special ratchets up the tension, and even though the audience knows that the Doctor is getting out of this, it’s not entirely clear how he’ll stop these creatures.
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  (#8) 'Human Nature' Features Horrifying Scarecrow Creatures And An Especially Vengeful Doctor

  Living scarecrows are always horrifying no matter the context, but in “Human Nature,” the creatures raised by the Family of Blood are just one part of a disturbing gothic tale. The episode finds the Doctor effectively shutting down the part of himself that is the Doctor and opting to live as “John Smith.” 

  The scarecrows that the Family of Blood use to search for the Doctor are definitely scary, but the most unsettling thing about this episode is the way the Doctor deals with the Family of Blood. He locks them all up in their own personal hells - a small girl is trapped in a mirror and one alien is turned into an undying scarecrow that is crucified in a field.
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  (#9) The Master's First Appearance, 'Terror of the Autons,' Plays Into Automatonophobia

  When we first meet the Master in “Terror of the Autons,” an episode starring the Third Doctor, he’s flanked by a group of Autons in giant carnival masks -  and it’s absolutely horrifying. The most recent episodes of Doctor Who have definitely ratcheted up the effects, but it’s this kind of lo-fi horror that makes the show truly scary.

  These masks draw upon our fear of creatures that almost look human, be they wax figures, robots, or models designed to look human. Even if you don’t suffer from automatonophobia, these figures will keep you awake at night.
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  (#10) The Foretold From 'Mummy on the Orient Express' Is A Genuinely Creepy Mummy

  As far as mummies go in film and television, the Foretold is absolutely the most upsetting version of this classic horror trope that has maybe ever existed. The mummy, or Foretold if you want to be technical, has all of the trappings that you look for in a creepy Egyptian evil being: bandages, the staggering gait, and even a sarcophagus.

  The Foretold turns out not to be a cursed Egyptian creature, but rather a stealth soldier. Still, this horrific mummy is creepy enough to give audiences the heebie-jeebies. The opening scene of this episode is genuinely chilling, especially when the Foretold sucks the life force out of an elderly woman's skull.
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  (#11) Mirrors, Alternate Dimensions, And Creepy Caves Abound In 'It Takes You Away'

  Alternate dimensions are never a good thing, especially in Doctor Who. If any episode of this series is similar to Event Horizon, it's "It Takes You Away," an episode that sees the Doctor and her companions stuck in a series of parallel dimensions conversing with their deceased spouses.

  The conversations are caused by the Solitract, a sentient universe that's so desperate for company that it traps the Doctor's companions. On top of the pseudo ghosts of everyone's wives, there's a creepy looking alien named Ribbons that has a very Buffy the Vampire Slayer look. All in all, it's deeply upsetting.
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  (#12) 'State of Decay' Pitted The Doctor Against Gothic Vampires

  After arriving on a planet that's still operating under feudalism, the Doctor and his companions come across a group of vampiric lords who carry out a yearly tradition of draining some of the youngest villagers under their thrall.

  Aside from the vampires, one of the scariest things about this episode is the way that the three lords keep their people devolved into a medieval state rather than allowing them to advance technologically. This episode features one of the more upsetting concepts, an amphitheater floor that pulses to a heart beat. That may not be a jump scare, but it's a concept that is almost Lovecraftian in nature.
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  (#13) 'Love & Monsters' Is A More Comical Episode, But Its Villain, The Abzorbaloff, Is Pure Nightmare Fuel

  Fans can and will argue about the best episode of Doctor Who until the Medusa Cascade folds in on itself. "Love & Monsters" is one of the most joyous episodes of the series, but also features easily the most disturbing creature in the show's history, the Abzorbaloff.

  The Abzorbaloff is something that craves human contact - so much so that it absorbs any person that it touches, including their thoughts and memories. When someone is absorbed, their faces stretches through the alien's skin. The creature is truly gross looking and there's something that's always going to be disturbing about people shoving their faces through drippy, latex skin. Upping the creepy factor: the Abzorbaloff was designed by a child who won a contest to create a new Doctor Who monster.

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