Doctor Who: Flux brought a serialized structure to the thirteenth series of the revival iteration of the show. For longstanding Doctor Who fans, this serialized style is not new; having been employed throughout the entire Classic Series run.
Flux contains six episodes that were heavily interlinked and contributed to a wider story but had their own individual stories contained within them. Some of the episodes were better than others, with all of them receiving a high audience score online. Doctor Who has often been an underrated sci-fi show, but Flux certainly seemed to be a step-up compared to past seasons of the show featuring Jodie Whittaker as the Doctor.
6 Once, Upon Time
Coming at the midpoint of the series (Episode 3), Once, Upon Time deals with the Doctor and co being trapped in a time storm, falling through their respective timelines as the Doctor tries to keep them safe and get them out of it. As they all fall through their timelines, past, and future, we get a glimpse of how Swarm and Azure were defeated by the Fugitive Doctor (Jo Martin) years ago.
While the episode deals with many important moments and is a crucial watch for the Flux experience, it is unfortunately filled with exposition and falls short of delivering a memorable episode in an interesting way. Falling through lots of different memories for all of the characters results in a disjointed, choppy experience that's taking a long time to say a little. It's one of the weirdest episodes of modern Doctor Who, which does help it to stand out.
5 The Vanquishers
Being the last episode of the series, The Vanquishers was always going to have a hard time combining all of the different plot elements and bringing it all together in a satisfying way. The Vanquishers is certainly exciting, but it lacks substance in a lot of what it shows. All the plot threads are dealt with easily, including both the Flux event itself and the series' main villains; Swarm and Azure.
The editing also came across as choppy, and ultimately the episode falls short in lots of ways of reaching the heights of the other episodes featured in the series. While The Vanquishers is certainly not an awful episode, nor the worst DoctorWho finale, it fell short of not only the excitement that was surrounding it prior to release, but it also fell short of providing a compelling final episode where the threat feels real. A lot of the story beats feel similar to stories featuring other versions of the Doctor, namely the Tenth Doctor Series 4 finale Journey's End.
4 The Halloween Apocalypse
The Halloween Apocalypse (Episode 1) starts the entire Flux storyline off, detailing a huge space-time event that threatens the entire universe. The Doctor and Yaz are pulled into the chaos, the audience is introduced to Dan, Karvanista, Swarm, Azure, all of the main players of the series.
The Halloween Apocalypse is a solid episode that keeps a consistently quick pace throughout. While there's not much that can fault it, this is partially to be expected for the first part of a six-part story, so the episode does get an easier ride than any other in the series. It has a very memorable cliffhanger, with the main characters standing in the TARDIS console room as the Flux energy flies towards them.
3 Survivors Of The Flux
Survivors of the Flux (Episode 5) slows down a little unexpectedly for a penultimate episode and introduces a couple of new plot points, namely one involving a Doctor Who one-off character the Grand Serpent infiltrating UNIT throughout the ages in order to weaken it and allow the Sontarans through the Lupari shield to breach Earth.
While the Doctor is captured and finally discovers the Division, and the Grand Serpent is infiltrating UNIT, Yaz, Dan, and Jericho try to work out when the Flux event will start all the way from 1901. The Doctor finally meets Tecteun, her adopted mother, making this episode not just important to Flux but the entire show as a whole. Survivors of the Flux is a great episode that justifiably feels more muted coming off the back of THAT cliffhanger from Village of the Angels.
2 War Of The Sontarans
War of the Sontarans (Episode 2) introduces the titular villains back into the show after a few years of absence. Invading Earth both during the Crimean War and in the 21st century, trying to capitalize on the Flux event in order to finally take over the planet they've come after a few times before.
It's a great, well-paced episode that gives new companion Dan a proper introduction to the TARDIS team, and after years of treating the Sontarans jokily with the character Strax, the Sontarans are finally shown to be as menacing and dangerous as they deserve. War of the Sontarans is likely the Sontarans' best story.
1 Village Of The Angels
The fourth episode of the series, Village of the Angels is a near-masterpiece that sees the full return of Doctor Who's scariest monsters, the Weeping Angels. As operatives of Division, they stalk a village, picking off humans from the 1960s and again in 1901, killing them for the second time.
As the episode progresses it is revealed that the Angels are hunting a rogue Angel who holds the memories of everything to do with Division, including the Doctor's missing memories. The Doctor tries to help them, but falls right into their trap, being captured and sent to Division herself. The Angels have been fan favorites since their first appearance in Blink, and this episode is the only one of their subsequent appearances that has not only come close to Blink but threatened to knock it off its perch.