Doctor Who, Dark Water -TV review: A belter of an episode

It's everything you could want from the first of a two-part finale

Michelle Gomez and Peter Capaldi star in 'Doctor Who' (BBC)

The big guns have come out this week as writer and Doctor Who showrunner Steven Moffat hits us hard with a belter of an episode.

Danny Pink is dead within the first five minutes but it’s okay, we have a Tardis. Moffat sets up the premise and whisks us off on a ride.

Thick of It fans, along with the rest of us, are itching to see Chris Addison and Peter Capaldi reunite on screen. Who knows, maybe next week Addison will be grabbing Capaldi by the scruff of the neck and shoving him against a wall as he unleashes a furious diatribe? Please let this happen.

And who said there would be no snogging action for the Doctor in this series? Missy locks lips with the most irritable man in Scotland for an uncomfortably long time. Undoubtedly, even the adults will have been looking away in horror, it’s only a wonder the Time Lord doesn’t end up with red lipstick on the end of his nose after Missy keeps kissing it repeatedly. Michelle Gomez looks like a deranged Mary Poppins as the villainous Keeper of the Nethersphere.

Let’s not forget the fanboy references either, those familiar with the classic series will have spotted nods to The Tomb of the Cybermen and The Invasion as the Cybermen clunked down the steps near St Paul’s Cathedral.

Sad, funny, scary, romantic - ‘Dark Water’ is everything you could ask for from a Doctor Who finale the day after Halloween. There are creepy skeletons that turn out to be disguised Cybermen and even Clara is channelling Stephen King’s Carrie.

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Doctor Who has outdone itself this time thanks to Moffat’s excellent script, it just blows every other episode in this series out of the water - well, maybe apart from next week’s concluding instalment.