Doctor Who: Night Terrors

They say your fears can become a self-fulfilling prophesy. In 8-year-old George's case, this is literally true.

He's scared of tons of things. So every night his parents tell him to metaphorically lock his fears in the cupboard. Well, George does that literal thing with them.

By the time the Doctor and friends have shown up, George's fears have taken on a life of their own, and have begun to suck in and terrorise the other tenants of his surrounding housing block.

As in The Eleventh Hour, Matt Smith is an enchantment to watch as he befriends a young kid before completely failing to help them.

Night Terrors wrings out its horror content with the patience of a full-length movie. Once Amy gets turned into a doll though, the fear is broken by the safety of waiting for her inevitable reversal just before the end. It would have been scarier if she had remained human.

As is often the way, the story's resolution doesn't really deliver on its earlier wonder. Just how can all this possibly be happening? The answer is simply that there's an alien who can do it. Both this explanation and the perception filter are such broad plot-devices that they can pretty well solve any mystery. It's a shame when such a well-executed episode as this gets most of the way through and then suddenly gives up.

Still, if you can accept these elements' reappearance along with yet more zombies, then this is a great episode to watch on Halloween.