If you were planning to introduce a friend to Doctor Who, which story would you use?

Answer 1

Interesting question.
I thought of Genesis of the Daleks, because the Doctor's quite quirky in that one, you have a storming performance by Michael Wisher as Davros, and of course the thrill of seeing the first Dalek.

Robots of Death is one that genuinely stands the test of time - weirdly beautiful robots, a true sense of tension, plenty of death and some pretty good psychology too.

Horror of Fang Rock is another one that has genuine tension and the "people trapped in close confines" feeling of creeping danger. Performances were slightly over the top, and the alien, when you saw it, was a little dodgy though.

If I was choosing anything from the "new" series, it would probably be the two parter from season 2 - Rise of the Cybermen and Age of Steel. While not as good an origin story as Genesis of the Daleks, it had a good contemporary moral, a great looking redesign for a classic monster, and a sense of genuine peril and pace, with the Doctor essentially "talking" his enemies to death.

Of them all, I'd go for Robots of Death because the design is supposed to be OTT, so it doesn't really age in the way that some of the Earth-based stories have, and you still get the moral of the dangers of relying on technology to the point of indolence. Fantastic stuff.

Answer 2

Very interesting...Well, so as not to scare her off completely, start with the first Christopher Eccleston version. He's modern and it's a good place to start. Truth is, there are very few Doctor Who DVD's available to allow her to see the classic versions. So she'll only get a few hit's and misses along the way. If you're lucky enough to have a connection for VHS versions, you've got a bit of a better chance at the classics, but again, not the entire running (not even entire seasons).

Good luck