Doctor Who Series 9 Finale Review - Hell Bent

We're here folks, the series finale of Doctor Who, I'll be doing another editorial on the best and worst things about this season soon but until then, here are my initial thoughts on Hell Bent

Well, if you spent 4 and a half billion years in never ending cycle of dying and being brought back to life, you’d wake up a little cranky too!

I really don’t have much to say about the episode, it left me with an odd feeling of nothing. That’s not to say it was bad, it really wasn’t but… I left that feeling completely empty.

This is an episode that really warrants a full analysis in a Guilty Pleasure’s segment, sadly it’s reserved for a re-review of Kill the Moon, which my opinion has morphed on (it sucks) but back to this episode.

I really do feel that this episode would be better served analysed plot point by plot point, and whilst reviews like this usually contain spoilers I don’t go too far in depth unless it’s something that particularly frustrated me, and there’s nothing me that frustrated me

So I’ll try and give a few positives: The episode certainly lived up to its title, Hell Bent, the Doctor was absolutely definitely Hell Bent on bringing Clara back to the point where he’d kill for it. The episode remembered that Galifrey had an orange sky, erm… Ashildr was tolerable in this episode. I’m sorry, I’m struggling to pick out stand out moments

A few negatives? I felt the Cloister Wraiths or whatever they were weren’t scary, I felt the Doctor’s time on Galifrey was all too brief. I still don’t understand the motivation for trapping someone in a confession dial for 4 billion years… But honestly, none of these are major complaints that ruined my enjoyment of the episode in anyway.

This was supposed to be the emotional climax of the series, it’s less about the escalation of a threat to a big action finale (that’s more Russell’s style anyway) it’s more about the Doctor becoming and the ending is kind of fitting in that regard. The Doctor cared so deeply for this companion he went to ends of the Universe for her (I know he’s not exactly popular with fans but I never saw him try this sh*t over Adric) that was willing to break every rule he’s ever placed against himself for her. 

It’s honestly unlike any season finale this show has had thus far. I’m glad they glossed over the bullsh*t from the McGann movie. I know even mentioning it might have riled some fans up so I admire Moffat’s balls for that move.

I wouldn’t classify this episode as ‘ok,’ it’s not bad enough for that classification, it’s not really good enough for a great rating either.

Rating 6.5ish/10

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Images used in this review are from Doctor Who and belong to their respective owners. All images in this review are subject to fair use.