Top Five Writers: New Who

There are a great many reasons to love Doctor Who, and the writing is a vital one.  While the actors, for instance, always tear it up, the writing isn’t as reliable.  On a bad day, a subpar script can unfortunately drag the episode down despite the other elements firing on all cylinders, but when the writing is there, it buoys up everything around it, and you’re reminded just how special Who is.  These are my favorites of the bunch.

Toby Whithouse – Whithouse is interesting, because while he tends to work within a certain thematic wheelhouse, the stories themselves are always nicely varied.  He likes villains that make the Doctor reflect on who he is, and he’s managed to do that with everything from giant bat creatures in a school to fish vampires in Venice to a cyborg in the old West.  His Doctor-villain tête-à-têtes are consistently the best!

Best episode:  “The God Complex”

Gareth Roberts – After writing a couple excellent celebrity historicals in the RTD era, Roberts carved out a different specialty for the Moffat years.  Generally, it’s putting the Doctor in a supremely ordinary-life scenario and letting fun ensue (the Doctor as your flatmate!  The Doctor as your babysitter!  The Doctor as your coworker!)  More particularly, though, he’s become known for his pair of “Craig episodes” – funny, charming, and touching, often all at once.

Best episode:  “The Lodger”

Paul Cornell – It’s a shame that Cornell hasn’t written for the show since series 3, because he’s really remarkable.  Both the stories he wrote for the show are just gorgeously emotional with top-notch explorations of the Doctor-companion relationship, as well as excellent material for the companions over all.  He also does quite well with his one-shot characters.

Best episode:  “Father’s Day”

Neil Gaiman – No surprise, Gaiman excels at neat concepts.  While all the super-upgrades in “Nightmare in Silver” are a little ridiculous, the Cyberplanner makes the whole thing exceedingly worthwhile, and he was absolutely the best writer to take on the task of examining the Doctor’s relationship with the TARDIS (and vice versa.)  He can do humor, he can do menacing, and he can do beautiful, each with equal aplomb.

Best episode:  “The Doctor’s Wife”

Jamie Mathieson – It’s a shame about “The Girl Who Died” (I still have to believe the issues there are mostly on Moffat’s side,) but Mathieson was such a relief in series 8.  I feel like he has a better handle on Twelve than almost anyone else who’s written for him, which I hugely appreciate, because I sometimes feel like I adore Twelve despite what the writers do with him.  Twelve’s and Clara’s relationship is at its best in his first outing, and I’ve never seen it equaled.

Best episode:  “Mummy on the Orient Express”