Stories Television Doctor Who Series 4 Episode: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Midnight 1 image Overview Characters How to Watch Reviews 14 Statistics Related Stories Quotes 3 Transcript + Script Overview First aired Saturday, June 14, 2008 Production Code 4.8 Written by Russell T Davies Publisher BBC Directed by Alice Troughton Runtime 44 minutes Story Type Bottle Episode, Companion-Lite Time Travel Future Tropes (Potential Spoilers!) Base Under Siege, Bleak Resort, Lost the TARDIS, The Doctor’s Name Story Arc (Potential Spoilers!) Lost Planets Inventory (Potential Spoilers!) Psychic Paper, Stethoscope, Sonic Screwdriver Location (Potential Spoilers!) Midnight UK Viewers 8.05 million Appreciation Index 86 Synopsis The Tenth Doctor and Donna Noble go to the leisure planet of Midnight for a simple, relaxing holiday. However, life with the Doctor can never be that simple, and things go horribly wrong for the Doctor when he decides to go off on a bus trip to see the Sapphire Waterfall, starting with the bus shutting down. When a mysterious entity infiltrates the shuttle bus, no one is to be trusted. Not even the Doctor himself... Watch Watched Favourite Favourited Add Review Edit Review Log a repeat Skip Skipped Unowned Owned Owned Save to my list Saved Edit date completed Custom Date Release Date Archive (no date) Save Characters Tenth Doctor David Tennant Sky Dee Dee Donna Noble Catherine Tate It Has No Name First Appearance Spoiler!Click to reveal 👀 Show All Characters (5) How to watch Midnight: Watch on iPlayer Doctor Who Confidential Blu-Ray Series 4 [Steelbook] Blu-Ray Series 4 DVD The Complete Fourth Series DVD Series 4 Volume 3: Silence in the Library – Forest of the Dead – Midnight Reviews Add Review Edit Review Sort: Date (Newest First) Date (Oldest First) Likes (High-Low) Likes (Low-High) Rating (High-Low) Rating (Low-High) Word count (High-Low) Word count (Low-High) Username (A-Z) Username (Z-A) Spoilers First Spoilers Last 14 reviews 27 May 2025 · 178 words Review by Jann Review #60 Stop Copying Me! This episode was absolutely amazing. This is in the top 10 episodes of the entire show. It's a really good psychological horror episode that follows a bunch of people on a space truck tour. And when the monster strikes they turn on each other so quickly and this is a scarily perfectly accurate depiction of what humans are like in real life. I bet if you was on that space truck you would have panicked and turned on your fellow passengers because you've only just met them of course they're up to something...right? It's a companion lite story which works so well because it gives the doctor a chance to shine and boy does he shine bright in this. Tennants performance is absolutely amazing this is easily his best performance as the doctor up to now. The fact that we never ever see the creature (the well never happened be quiet!) Makes it 10 times scarier. Overall a perfectly accurate psychological horror that does a good job at depicting our fears and emotions as humans. 10/10 Jann View profile Like Liked 0 24 May 2025 · 799 words Review by DanDunn Spoilers This review contains spoilers! While it’s debatable whether or not this should be the Tenth Doctor’s greatest story, this is easily the best written work of Russell’s career. You may have noticed I’ve not been very kind towards Russel as I’ve taken shots here and there at his writing and show running. It’s not that I don’t like Russell’s works or appreciate what he brought to Doctor Who, I do see the appeal behind his era and the Tenth Doctor era holds a special place in my heart as being my starting point for Doctor Who. But I found that Russell often took a very flawed approach with his writing and show running decisions; his episodes in particular carried a lot of tropes and motifs that quickly became not only repetitive but very grating; the animal-based aliens, the random psychic characters, foreshadowing that’s way too self-aware and an over emphasis on angst. Also, a lot of things he introduced as a showrunner are still plaguing Doctor Who to this day, which I feel is really holding the show back from properly growing. Whether it’s Steven Moffat or Chris Chibnall and especially Russell's return, it always feels like the show’s still trying to hang on to that past glory Russell’s era had when Doctor Who is all about change and moving forward. Midnight has quite the interesting history, allegedly this was an idea that Russell had written very early on in his tenure, but he kept putting it off because he wasn’t sure it would gel with the audience. Then we finally get it at the tail end of Series 4, by which time Russell had already announced his departure and it was too late to write anything like this ever again. Midnight is very different from anything Russell’s written for Doctor Who before and since and it plays on his greatest strength as a writer, the ability to write characters as believable people in a believable setting. The idea of the monster is simple and not overly ambitious meaning it doesn’t come off as ridiculous and ill-thought like a lot of his previous monsters and it takes a very traditional Doctor Who formula and tweaks it ever so slightly to create one of the most intense, atmospheric and claustrophobic stories the show’s ever put out. The formula being the Doctor’s gift for taking control of a situation the moment things go awry, except this time he tries to take control and he fails! Throughout the episode we see things spiral further and further out of control as the Doctor is backed into a corner and becomes more and more scared, but not by the monster, but by a group of ordinary frightened people who we spent the first half of the episode getting to know as a friendly group but are now being driven further and further into survival by any means necessary, with no companion to help him. This is quite honestly David Tennant’s best performance as the Doctor as we see him put on the usual charm and clever nature the Doctor often exhibits but as the situation gets worse and worse, we see that transition into sheer helplessness and terror. That last scene between him and Donna really nails just how shaken the Doctor is following this event, just that traumatised look on Tennant’s face before the credits roll was pure gold. The horror in this is spot on thanks to a chilling score from Murray Gold, a terrifying performance from Lesley Sharp and a brilliant concept for the entity that’s never seen or properly understood. The episode is so good at letting your imagination ponder on what this entity might be, from that perfect setup where one of the drivers notices something like a shadow far off in the distance making a ducking movement like it’s running, running towards them, the knocking at the door scene where it almost toys with the passengers as they panic more and more before moving toward Lesley Sharp’s character. Which is then followed by Sharp giving a phenomenal performance that still to this day has me in a stunned silence every time I watch it. The entity in this is never named, seen or properly defined, all we know is that it’s malevolent and can perfectly sync with other people’s voices. If there’s ever a Doctor Who story that can conceivably be done as a stage play, with its single setting and limited number of characters, Midnight is a deserving candidate. Given Russell’s hesitancy towards going through with this episode only for it be regarded as one of his biggest triumphs, I was hopeful we would get more like this in his second run of the show, where Russel forgoes his usual bag of tricks and focuses on his true strengths as a writer. DanDunn View profile Like Liked 0 29 April 2025 · 4 words Review by gabe_the_cool 1 i hate everyone there gabe_the_cool View profile Like Liked 1 29 April 2025 · 46 words Review by BSCTDrayden 6 Every watch I think this cannot get any better. On third watch, as part of a double bill with The Well, I've realised this might be my favourite episode of NuWho, and a contender for my favourite DW story ever. Perfect in every way. Molto bene. BSCTDrayden View profile Like Liked 6 28 April 2025 · 32 words Review by Guardax 2 The first time I watched it on a binge in 2013, didn't really 'get' it. The second time I watched it was in 2020 during covid. It scared the living daylights out of me. Guardax View profile Like Liked 2 Show All Reviews (14) Open in new window Statistics AVG. Rating981 members 4.66 / 5 Member Statistics Watched 1854 Favourited 469 Reviewed 14 Saved 4 Skipped 1 Related Stories Captain Jack's Monster Files (Minisode) Captain Jack’s Monster File: Midnight Rating: 2.64 Story Skipped Webcast Reviews(1) More Actions View Sets Close Related Sets Set of Stories: Captain Jack’s Monster Files Add Review Edit Review Skip Skipped Unowned Owned Save to my list Saved Doctor Who Season Two • Episode 3 The Well Rating: 4.08 Story Skipped Television Reviews(61) More Actions View Sets Close Related Sets Set of Stories: Doctor Who Season Two Set of Stories: Doctor Who (2023-) Set of Stories: Fifteenth Doctor Add Review Edit Review Skip Skipped Unowned Owned Save to my list Saved Quotes Add Quote Link to Quote Favourite DOCTOR: Taking a big space truck with a bunch of strangers across a diamond planet called Midnight? What could possibly go wrong? — Midnight Show All Quotes (3) Open in new window Transcript + Script [Spa] (On a glittering alien world, an attendant brings a telephone to Donna. She is lounging by the pool, wearing a bathrobe.) DONNA: I said, no. [Public telephone] DOCTOR: Sapphire waterfall. It's a waterfall made of sapphires. Show Full Transcript Open in new window View Script (PDF)