C+Q - Nightmare in Silver (2013)

I think there's value to the idea of not immediately throwing brand new Doctors up against Tier 1 villains. Peter Capaldi got the big three (the Daleks, the Cybermen, and the Master) all in his first year and it just felt too soon. I think we should get to know a Doctor first and see how they react to smaller threats before you bring out the big guns. That way, it's more exciting when a big epic showdown actually happens because you want to see how this new Doctor/villain combination will play off each other.

Nightmare in Silver is Matt Smith's definitive Cyberman episode. Other than Nightmare in Silver, the only Cyberman appearances in Smith's tenure are either cameos (The Pandorica Opens, A Good Man Goes to War, The Time of the Doctor) or Closing Time which didn't actually have that much to do with the Cybermen. Nightmare in Silver is first and only time that the Eleventh Doctor faces off against the Cybermen in an episode which is purely about them, instead of being part of a subplot or a pre-titles sequence, and by this stage in Eleven's career it feels more like he's earned it.

Nightmare in Silver is most noteworthy in hindsight for being the long-awaited debut of the current model of Cyberman. Despite looking a bit too much like Iron Man, these new sleeker designs look a lot better than the clunky, blocky Pete's World Cybermen introduced in 2006. Whereas the previous suits looked too cumbersome and moved too robotically, these new ones look a lot more like an upgrade of the human body and their more human outline serves as a reminder that inside each Cybermen is the remains of a once living person. Oddly, there are certain big selling points of these new Cybermen which haven't made it out of this episode. The Cybermites, a fantastic new creation and a logical upgrade from the large and easily-spotted Cybermats, haven't been mentioned since. Also, the Cybermen's new ability to assess a situation and instantly upgrade themselves accordingly could make for a truly unstoppable villain but unfortunately not even this episode uses this concept to its full potential.

Nightmare in Silver displays some of the most Clara-y Clara moments in the whole of Series 7, where she actually makes decisions and says things that no other companion would. Her position of Doctor-like authority over the punishment platoon combined with her 'duty of care' towards Angie and Artie help to give her a new level of depth and make her more of a fully-rounded character just in time for The Name of the Doctor, where your enjoyment of the episode is entirely hinged on how much you care about her.

Speaking of Angie and Artie, the kids are a serious weakness of this episode. And I don't mean that in reference to the skill of the young actors, who are actually very capable and perform their parts well. I'm also not complaining about their relevance to the story being told. Not only do they help to bring out a new dimension in Clara, but they also build in to the storyline with the Cybermen and help to raise the stakes when they get captured. No, I'm talking purely about the personalities they are given. Both Angie and Artie as characters on the page are insufferable to be around. Angie in particular is just terrible. All she does is moan and complain about everything. It really isn't a smart idea to have a negative child character when you're writing a TV show for children. Actually, I can't think of a single situation in which it's a good idea to mock your target audience.

Doctor Who is for kids, so we can assume that kids are able to relate to the struggles of adults like the Doctor and Clara. Therefore, when writing a child character, they should be as deep and complex as the adult characters. Artie is also pretty badly written, the highlight being when for no good reason he decides to speak out loud to the audience ("I'm not scared, if you're wondering. I just think I ought to turn the lights back on."). It just came across as being really awkward and forced instead of using subtlety to convey meaning through imagery and acting.

Matt Smith has been highly praised for playing both the hero and the villain in this episode. While it's undeniable that Smith is one of the most skilled actors ever to take on the role of the Doctor (and that includes Sir John Hurt), I'm not sure if this exact episode maybe is such a great display of that. If you want a beautifully nuanced Matt Smith performance, watch the old Eleventh Doctor scenes from The Time of the Doctor. In Nightmare in Silver, Mr Clever is basically just the Doctor but even more energetic and even more camp. I would've really liked to see Smith play the part of Mr Clever in a more restrained way; a cold and calculating villain like the Roger Delgado Master. It's still a great performance regardless and I appreciate how hard it must be to switch characters mid-sentence, but I don't think it's as wildly impressive as people say given how similar the two performances are. Mr Clever is just the Eleventh Doctor but with even more flailing (if that's even possible).

The chess game between the Doctor and Mr Clever is a cool idea though, and helped to parallel the conflict between logic and emotions. The presence of the giant Cyberman army seemed a bit out of place, given this episode is mostly all about one single Cyberman stealthily picking people off in the dark. The hype surrounding this episode was that it would make the Cybermen scary again, but a giant CGI army storming a castle in broad daylight isn't really the same sort of creeping terror that episodes like The Empty Child, Midnight, and Blink achieved in the past. I think this final scene would've been a lot more effective and made the Cybermen a lot more threatening if it was also happening at night, surrounded by darkness. It could've been really atmospheric and nightmarish (a Nightmare in Silver even) to have these powerful metal creatures marching at you through the pitch black like on the official poster. It also would've left a memorable image in the viewers' mind that might have become iconic for this episode instead of this episode having to frequently reference iconic visual motifs and story beats from The Tomb of the Cybermen, most notably when the Cybermen actually emerge from their tombs. A night attack on the castle could've been a huge memorable set piece but instead all subtlety was thrown out of the window and we ended up with a final act that looked just like any other New Who Cyberman episode.

Nightmare in Silver is a perfectly enjoyable episode of Doctor Who but it had the potential to be a modern classic and New Who's first truly outstanding Cyberman episode. There are some wonderful scenes, lines, and concepts but some of these concepts are wasted or used but instantly thrown away, like a dark and creepy tone being shattered by an overblown ending set piece in the middle of broad daylight. It's one of New Who's better Cyberman stories, mainly because this is one of the few which doesn't feature the Cybermen as either a cameo, a subplot, or a minor villain to some greater threat like the Daleks or Missy. Remember back in the day when there used to be years between Cyberman appearances? Yeah, let's have another break from them for a while.