Hey guys, thanks for watching and leaving your comments. It's great to see so many people praising Moffat and I'll definitely be doing more positive videos on him in the future. We had our very good friend, Harry Bagg, edit this one. Not only did he help lighten our load so we could commit to some longer projects (cough cap essay cough) but he's done a fantastic edit. He's launching his own channel in the coming weeks, why not subscribe now and get ahead of the curve! IN THE BAGG: kzfaq.info/love/qPIf74MUZkl-_w72XwA5kg

You missed my favorite terrifying bit about the weeping angels (at least, until their return which sorta ruined it...) In 'Don't Blink' the angels pop up right behind people several times when they leave and then just... stop. Definitely a point at which they could've killed them, but instead they just froze there. And the reason they did is because the viewer can see them there, behind the characters. It's a great minor 4th wall break that usually doesn't get noticed until a second or third viewing, and ups their terror factor to me in a unique and weird as hell way.

I just realized that there were multiple occasions in which the Weeping angels could have succeeded in getting a character, being right behind them...but the only thing keeping them from doing so was the audience observing them. I’m going to put that under the “Yikes” category and move on.

Doctor Who is an absolute gold mine for a game I like to play called "where have I seen this UK actor before".

Me, as the big-brained 7-yr-old that I was: "Just wink and swap eyes when that eye gets tired."

16:20 - no, I disagree with the angels moving on screen being cool. It's a shame if you ask me, because never seeing them move on screen could have been a brilliantly subtle 4th wall break. We know the angels can't move when they're being observed. So why **shouldn't** that extend to the viewer? It's a minor thing, but I think it would have been more enjoyable to never see them move on screen.

I cannot even begin to explain how much Blink screwed me up. Soooo many sleepless nights.

"I died afraid and alone and in pain" is such a brilliant line.

I once walked past a cathedral that had four bronze statues standing outside. I remember standing there thinking “these are beautiful, but something’s off”. Didn’t really think about it until I walked past again an hour later, to find one of the statues missing. Turned out to be the best living statue artist I have ever seen

I had two problems with the weeping angels: 1. When you see them move in 'Flesh and Stone' it breaks the 4th Wall mystery that has been building up the whole time. The Angels never move so long as they are being observed by any living thing. The viewer at home is a living thing as well. That's why the idea that "whatever holds an image of an angel becomes itself an angel" was so terrifying, because your own TV set was holding the image as well. So when you see them move, it breaks that whole 4th Wall mystery. They are just like any other monster, bound to the TV show. 2. They were used too much and so subsequently defeated too much. Take "The Angels Take Manhattan". Too much. Otherwise, probably the best Moffat contribution to Doctor Who.

Weeping Angels The Silence Vashta Nerada The Empty Child These are all reasons why Moffat is my favorite writer on the show.

I remember when I was younger my parents had this angel statue that sat in the front yard. Wasn't quite weeping angel, but it was very much a eerie thing under the right context. So when the doctor who episode blink aired, I remember the night afterward driving to their house in the middle of the night to take that statue and move it till it was facing the kitchen window. The kitchen window is fairly high off the ground. In fact, just high enough that only the eyes and up on the angel are available to be seen...almost like it was peeking in. I got a call the next day from my dad to come help him move the statue as they were going to sell it.

Tbh seeing them move kinda ruined them in some way, I liked the idea that their true form was some unimaginable being that could do all these seemingly impossible things, but revert back into a mundane Statue form when viewed, like when at the end of Blink where they were tilting and tipping the Tardis around whenever the light flickered off.

If this does become a _"Moffat wasn't the devil incarnate, here's his good stuff"_ series, I am all for it. He seems to get the blame for every tiny flaw his era ever had thanks to his actual flaws being so publicised. The balance needs to be restored.

I wish you had also pointed-out how he set-up the angels defeat at the start of Flesh and Stone. Amy: So what if the gravity fails? Doctor: I've thought about that. Amy: And? Doctor: And we'll all plunge to our deaths. See? I've thought about it. It's played-off as little comedy, but it in fact prepares us to accept the change in gravity again once the power is drained.

2:40 the angels were actually warning us about the disease know as the dab They truly are a mistaken creature

The weeping angels were the scariest things I'd ever seen in my life whenever i was younger. The fact that they were virtually unstoppable, and their fangs shooting out of their faces whenever they're inches away from getting you, essentially displaying the inevitability of your own demise... terrifying.

moffat isn’t a bad writer, he’s just a bad director - all his stand alone episodes are some of the best in the series, but when you give him full control of the season, it’s too much

The “walk like you can see bit” along with seeing the angels moves makes me so annoyed with that episode. The angels turn to stone when viewed. It’s not that they won’t move if seen, it’s that they can’t. It’s to do with their biology. They would know any couldn’t see them because they could move. They were no longer stone.

“The image of an angel becomes itself an angel” But Sally had a picture of an angel at the end of Blink, unless that was the angel which sent the Doctor and Martha back

Yeah, that "move like you can see" and them moving as a stone... There is only one more thing which irks me in this episode: the angels don't cover their eyes, they see each other... yet it doesn't lock them indefinitely, like it did in Blink

The reason that the Weeping Angels are so scary and terrifying because they represent the threat that is only threatening because it is unknown or unseen. Three unknown is either exciting or terrifying and that affects you whether you see it or not

8:11 that's horrifying when you consider just how many pictures of the Statue of Liberty there are.

The bit where the doctor says “don’t turn your back, don’t look away, and don’t blink” is also so scary to me. The quality of the video and the background music omg, maybe I just get scared too easily but that part added to the horrifying nature of the weeping angels

The beauty of their first introduction is their ability to include the audience. We don't see them move on screen, because WE'RE observing them. If they're quantum-locked creatures that can't move under observation, it makes us feel like we're a part of the story when it seems like we're the ones keeping them in place. The TARDIS scene displays this perfectly. Why would they be motionless when the light comes on if no one else is in the room? It's because we're the ones seeing them, and thus, we keep them locked in place until the light goes out again.

People suggesting that Moffat stole the idea from SCP173 seem to forget that while 173 came out a few months before the angels first aired, the angels would have had to be filmed at least half a year before they aired, and be written sometime before that (scripts don't come out of thin air after all), meaning that the Angels came first, although it's possible for two things to be discovered at the same time.

When I was young, Blink scared me so much it wasn’t for about another 3 or 4 years that I was able to rewatch it. I actually knew people who had Blink banned in their house because it was so scary. I never really liked Time of Angels because when I saw it I was disappointed because they weren’t as scary as I remembered (but I think this was just me being older). Seeing this I think I appreciate it more now.

16:21 I personally felt that it would've been far more interesting if we don't see them move, feels like there's more tension to them figuring out that she doesn't see. shows that their power isn't limited through their slow movement. Also, I felt that their stone appearance would be more of a disguise and they wouldn't look like that if they moved.

one of my favorite facts is that the Angel's ability to turn into stone was described as a survival reflex they didn't have control of. Begs the question, "What scares the Angels?"

The angels CEMENTED their presence.

Having met Steven Moffat, I can soundly say that he's a lovely man and put his heart into Dr Who for his run.

Honestly, props to the cameraman for getting so close to the weeping angels

I really hated being able to see the angel move. I think part of their mystery was the unknown that surrounded them, and seeing them move robbed them of that, especially because they moved so slowly and looked the exact same as they did when frozen.

With Moffat being overly-criticized near the end of his run, I think we'll probably start to see history repeat itself again and Moffat's positives will be viewed more widely again now that Chibnall has had his first season. It was the same with Russell T. Davies when, by the time he was nearing his run, many fans were begging him to leave and acting like he was the devil incarnate. Moffat took over and was met with lots of positives before things started going downhill. I don't think the same thing will happen to Chris Chibnall though. Unlike Davies and Moffat, Chibnall's first season has not been met with a lot of positive reception.

2:39 I'm gonna mention that angel is dabbing before anyone else does

It seems to me the Weeping Angels are based (not exclusively, of course) on grief, how it empties the present and future, keeps you returning to the past. Being sent back in time (living with loss) isn't particularly traumatic once adjusted to, but the dislocated life is somehow less than the original would otherwise have been.

The weeping angels saying "comfy chairs" was the best part. Fight me.

That "walk like you can see" bit so dum. But the rest was so good

The Midnight creature was the scariest Who monster in my opinion. The fact we never see it yet get complete understanding of its malice and power is terrifying. It would have beaten the Doctor if it didn't get so confident in its power.

The weeping angels are the reason i refused to watch the show when i was a kid lol

Fun fact: Steven has weeping angel statues in his garden, or at least he used to. How do I know? I’ve seen them

Moffat was a hell of an episode writer. I've never denied that. He was just crap at season-long arc planning and long-term character development. Let him come up with a one-off idea with a well-defined character and he comes up with The Girl in the Fireplace, Blink, and The Silence in the Library. Ask him to plot a season and it's rushed or ham-fisted and forced throughout and he starts falling back on and over-using his one-off creations until their long in the tooth and boring.

ME: Has never seen a second episode of Doctor Who ever ALSO ME: *click*

Seeing the angels move was incredibly annoying, because in Blink we were told they were only statues when observed. Other than that, I really liked this story.

The weeping angels were what got me into Doctor Who. I have a little angel statuette in my room, which I swear moves around sometimes. I told a Whovian friend about it years ago and he immediately said it was a weeping angel. I thought they sounded cool so I watched the series. As I've been writing this comment, it actually occurred to me that I genuinely have no idea where that statuette is right now, so I think I'm going to go look for it so I don't have nightmares tonight.

2:39 is that angel hitting the dab?

I actually loved (and was scared by) the Weeping Angels in "Blink" but I did not like the two-parter because of all the extra powers they added. I loved that we never saw them moving (and that the audience in Blink was also an observer) but can move incredibly fast and they "killed" people by zapping them to the past. No slow and cheap "horror movie" head turn, no snapping necks.. oh and that image thing. It completely destroyed the mystery and scariness of the Angels for me (and haven't liked them since) but the things you pointed out about the remark about the two heads made by the doctor, the strong supporting cast and the appearance of the crack makes me want to rewatch this nonetheless as I remember I really liked those elements and little twists.

I went and re-watched 'Blink' after watching this video, it still gives me the shivers and remains one of my favourite Doctor Who episodes.

In my school there's a dim corridor with many posters (genius idea already) and the biggest Poster shows a metallic Angel, reaching out to something. It looks EXACTLY like Moffat's creation, and I always keep my eyes glued on it when I pass through

"the angels have the phonebox. I've got that on a t-shirt." Makes me laugh Everytime! 🤣

I love how Steven Moffet got a metric ton of hate, yet now that he's gone you can really see that he was actually quite good of a match for doctor who compared to whoever wrote the abomination that was season 11, yeah he had mishaps, he's a human, at least he is able to create iconic characters, enemies and most importantly stories. I truly hope that this docterwholess year means we get a quality series next year, I couldn't watch season 11 to the end, I got so bored of the inconsistencies, bland character development and forgettable enemies.

Ah, I remember the days when we thought Steven Moffat was bad, and now we have Chris Chiball...can we go back?

I was 6 years old when “blink” aired and I was terrified. I’m turning 20 in April and I’m still too scared to look at statues.

You know what's a truly amazing episode? Heaven Sent. It shows off what's amazing about not only the twelfth Doctor but also about Steven Moffet. It's awesome and the monster was terrifying.

I was with you until you talked about the angels moving being cool. That was a poor choice that damaged the creepiness and mystery of the angels

The weeping angels are my favourite doctor who monster by far, and blink is my all time favourite episode! Thank you for this epic breakdown!

The Silence had a bit of a scary vibe too. The whole "monster you can't remember so you have to make a pen mark on your skin, then suddenly you've got several marks...then just as suddenly you're covered in marks. That's creepy. Also wondered why Amy didn't keep that pic of the Silence on her phone, would have be an even more powerful weapon than the psychic paper. Actually, come to think of it, such a pic would be exactly like the M.I.B. neuralizer.

1:14 ...is nobody concerned about this bit? Hell, is nobody even curious? I _really_ want to know what was going on with this real-life statue

Moffat is nowhere near as bad as people seem to think

Ever since I watched the first weeping angels episode I could never walk past a statue without staring at it until it’s out of view, and getting the chills. 😧

Hmmm, you have a typo. In your title you said "the scariest doctor who monster" instead of "the scariest monster ever"

Just judging from your excitement you should really do a season 5 overview of DW 😊

People always talk about how Blink is the scariest episode, but no one talks about the episode "Midnight". That one honestly creeped me out way more.

I really miss the overarching stories in DW. That was my favourite part of RTD and Moffat's runs, trying to piece together the clues throughout the series to find the underlying mystery

Let me just say, when I was about 8/9, my brother decided that the weeping angels would be a great way to introduce me to the doctor who series.

I'm not ashamed to say that I sometimes have nightmares involving these creepy statues. If that's not a sign that a villain is suitably terrifying then I don't know what is

The "walk like you can see" thing was a desperate last-ditch attempt to buy Amy just a little more time and it worked. It was never meant to be the angels' weakness.

In my view, there is one glaring mistake in Steven Moffat's "Flesh and Stone" episode, something that I never understood … and it's this: in ‘Blink’ it was established, that the weeping angels - just like in quantum mechanics, where a superposition of quantum states can only exist until observed - can only move when they're unobserved. But unobserved not only by other (conscious?) beings, but also among themselves¹ - a rule that David Tennant's tenth doctor put to good use when the TARDISes departure locks the surrounding circle of (four) angels in eternal motionlessness. With the number of angels casually moving about in "Flesh and Stone", one should think that they would surely prevent themselves from ever moving at all, thus posing no threat (whatsoever) … (Now, I know it's just science fiction, but if you introduce „quantum-locked humanoids“, then why not even try to take such simple things into account?) Also, in agreement with many commentators before me, I would also like to say that showing the angels in movement was a bad choice and a mistake! ¹ Or, as the Doctor Who Wiki puts it: "their unique nature necessitated that they often covered their faces with their hands to prevent trapping each other in petrified form for eternity by looking at one another."

The Weeping Angels were the most terrifying antagonists of New Who but they got less and less scary with each appearance.

Doctor who: we created the most scariest creature SCP-173: am i a joke to you?

Moffat made some bad episodes so that the good-bad episode ration would be perfectly balanced, as all things should be.

I love the Moffat/Matt Smith era. It’s my favorite period.

The problem I have with ToA/FaS is that it removes my favorite part of the Angels, the fact that they turn to stone from being observed. Its not presented as a conscious decision in Blink, if they are being seen they are stone. It adds this cool, sciencey quantum mechanics angle (in quantum mechanics, the act of measuring/observing a wave can cause it to behave like a particle essentially. I'm not a science guy, but I think that's the gist) to a very fantastical monster, which I think is Dr. Who's greatest strength. Using odd scientific concepts with a fantasy twist. Its literally the entire reason the ending of Blink works at all. ToA/FaS completely throws that out the window by making it so that Angels observing each other doesn't trigger their statue state (which retroactively makes Blink's ending make no sense). Amy's "walk like you can see" just further ruins that for me, because by the established rules the fact that the Angels can move *at all* means that she can't see them. Setting aside the ridiculousness that the Angels, which are humanoid and, again as established in Blink, see from their eyes, wouldn't know how human sight works. While this two-parter is definitely a fun watch and is far from the worst episode Moffat produced, its really emblematic of his shortcomings as a long-form storyteller. He loves to escalate and do "cool" stuff for the sake of being cool, with no mind for the internal consistency of the story. In a vacuum, his ideas can be great. As part of a greater whole, they come off as poorly thought out and sensationalist. Its pretty obvious across his entire body of work (looking at you Jekyll.) He starts off strong, with clever writing and cool concepts. Then eventually undermines himself and loses sight of what made the early stuff good for the sake of spectacle. At least ToA/FaS isn't The Angels Take Manhattan though. Angel Statue of Liberty is what finally killed Dr. Who for me. There's so much in that episode that should be good, but Moffat's weaknesses are so prominent that it pretty much ruined the series for me.

Personally I think Moffat has created some of the best overall story lines as well as stand-alone episodes in Doctor Who, and to only focus on his flaws would definitely be throwing out the baby with the bathwater. I would love to hear a S5 overview from you

Scp - 173: Made of cement and stone. Weeping angels: Made of cement and/or stone. Scp - 173: Impossibly strong. Weeping angels: Impossibly strong. Scp - 173: Can only move when not in vision of living creatues. Weeping angels: Can only move when not in vision of living creatues.

I think the "walk like you can see" is fooling the angels to think that Amy that she's already a angel but when they realize she isn't there still curious so they go slow still think that it's there ally.

dont blink was perfection itself. you can't go up when your base is perfection.

Funny how two huge Hollywood stars who have been in iconic film roles not only pretty much started their careers on Doctor Who but also in the same year 2007. Carey Mulligan and Andrew Garfield. Also THE WEEPING ANGELS ARE AND REMAIN TO THIS DAY CREEP AF AND THEY NEED TO BURN IN THE PITS OF HELL

SCP Foundation: *"Allow us to introduce ourselves."*

The way to beat the angels: blink one eye at a time

The fact they were set up in an episode where it's a non-doctor story for the majority of the screen time speaks volumes about the quality of the Angels as a concept.

fun fact; SCP 173 existed before the weeping angels, leading many people involved in the SCP foundation have the theory that SCP 173 could be the inspiration or a part of the inspiration for the weeping angels

Personally I'm of the opinion that Moffat was a far better showrunner than people ever gave him credit for. Just like how people complained about RTD until he was gone (at which point he suddenly became some perfect showrunner that the series massively declined from), I think that people will appreciate Moffat more once we get some distance from him.

The midnight creature and the weeping angels were the scariest DW monsters for me

The weeping angels also inspired the SCP universe, which in turn has also inspired some movies like “Cabin in the woods”

I think personally I never hated a story of Doctor Who under Moffat or Russell T Davies, yeah some arnt as good but a lot of the time in these cases the ideas are really good but not pulled off to the best - never got the hate

Proud that he’s my uncle 💕

The Weeping Angels are one of the few creatures which are more inconvenienced by a muzzle flash than they are by a bullet.

I just realized... couldn’t they have blinked one eye at a time in blink, so they could still see the angels

Well, I remember reading something about that SCP-173 was written and posted before the blink episode...

It’s amazing that any living creature can stop the weeping angels dead in their tracks, including the viewer, because there’s many moments in “Don’t Blink” where no one is viewing the weeping angels bar the camera and they still turn to stone.

These angels inspired SCP-173 back in 2007 and, from that, the fictional SCP universe. Frankly,I’m grateful.

They gave me nightmares as a child. So scary but so clever. The scariest villain but also the most merciful.

also, when Amy and Rory *died* by the weeping angels, i remember that as a really sad moment

The bit where you said he had on his jacket and people complained about for continuity problems and realizing its him from later in the series is the true mind blown thing that forget. Love it for being low key at first but in thhe long run it adds to it.

15:00 I like to refer to that part of his timeline as the "I'm Amy's imaginary friend, but I came anyway!" paradox (when you're a time traveler, you tend to end up with a lot of paradoxes in your timeline; the universe just works around them)

Of all the efforts these guys have made for this video, I really would like to point out how good their Photoshop skills are.

Who had this in their recommended?

I remember being little and terrified of the angels, even with 11s double episode. I was about, 10 years old when the 11 one aired, when there was also a huge Ash cloud falling over *everywhere*. Although I was terrified I was also intrigued and I would go into my grandparents back-garden with a walkie-talkie, my aunty with the other, and hide, giggling into the WT "Angel Bob? Can you hear me Angel Bob?" I've always loved this episode. And Angel Bob as a character and concept. Love it

"It's the same rain," is a line that always gives me chills, and the line my dad was most excited for me to hear when he first showed me the episode