TV Critics: Doctor Who; Frankenstein and the Vampyre; Downton Abbey

“Sad, funny, scary, romantic - ‘Dark Water’ is everything you could ask for from a Doctor Who finale the day after Halloween. Doctor Who has outdone itself this time thanks to Steven Moffat’s excellent script. It just blows every other episode in this series out of the water.”
Neela Debnath, The Independent

“The taut script bore many of Moffat’s hallmarks: rug-pulling twists, quip-laden dialogue and knowing in-jokes. For the night after Halloween, this was bone-rattling and suitably spooky fare.”
Michael Hogan, The Telegraph

“Steven Moffat  has been accused of over-complexity: seemingly making Doctor Who into a members’ club that you could only be part of if you followed it every week and could reassemble a sonic screwdriver while blindfolded. Now it’s once again a compelling sci-fi, a children’s show and event viewing.”
Alex Hardy, The Times

“I’ve been enjoying Peter Capaldi as the Doctor. More alien, more rock’n’roll, less boyband than the last two. I suspect my approval may mean he gets the opposite from the kids. Yeah, well, so what, it’s not your show any more.”
Sam Wollaston, The Guardian

“It will always be a struggle to shoehorn so much raw material into under an hour of television, but there were still somehow countless slow shots of the actress playing Clairmont gazing coquettishly at the camera as if coshed on the side of the head. This was a fascinating story, told with frustrating omissions.”
Ceri Radford, The Telegraph

“This documentary was good at showing the cultic atmosphere around Byron and his chums. I enjoyed this tale far more than I ever enjoyed any naff adaptations of these two famous horror stories.”
Matt Baylis, Daily Express

“It seemed that Downton as a whole had taken another high dive from the platform of common sense, landing itself in a treacly bath of melodrama, improbability and mawkishness.”
Ceri Radford, The Telegraph

“This series may have been slow to get going, but now with at least two marriages in the offing, Edith’s illegitimate child installed clandestinely in the nursery, and the awkwardly-named Isis out the way, things are looking good for an energetic finale.”
Sally Newell, The Independent

“Isis the yellow labrador has cancer. Can it really be because of the unfortunate associations of her name? Nah, I reckon it’s because, like the others who’ve departed or who are going, she can sniff a sinking ship.”
Sam Wollaston, The Guardian