Oof, not sold on him. He can be over-the-top, which works well in the pantomime sendups of Doctor Who that we’ve had in a couple of “episodes” already. Haven’t seen him in enough serious moments to tell if can carry gravitas. Time will tell.
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“Boom” was pretty serious, and I thought he definitely understood the assignment!
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Yeah, definitely a step towards what I’d like to see more of (though ‘step’ seems in poor taste when talking about this particular episode, I suppose).
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she has an extremely wide range and it’s honestly a crime that we didn’t see more of it. i LOVE her as the doctor but we barely get to see her shine! look up clips from the national theatre antigone, she has so much power and emotion that would’ve been so great for the doctor.
to answer the central question, i love fifteen, i was sold from the second the giggle aired, his episodes could all be awful and i would still be hopelessly attached. but i’ve liked all the episodes so far!
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Since all the episodes of this season have aired, I think I can make a semi-official opinion on what I think about him. It’s difficult because everything I don’t like about the Fifteenth Doctor are the same things I didn’t like in Thirteen, but I did end up liking her relatively quickly after my first impression.
I think the reason why I’m not jiving with Fifteen is because my expectation for his character pre-promo shoots ended up being wildly different than how he is actually portrayed. I wanted him to be a Neil DeGrasse Tyson/black!Carl Sagan-esque figure (studious, arrogant, nerdy/weird, classy, mostly serious but can crack a joke when needed) rather than male!Thirteen in his mannerisms. Every time I see him act incongruous to my original idea (which is basically all the time), it kind of feels like a slap in the face to my original headcanon. And that’s been happening since his first outfit was shown (way before Fourteen’s run aired); they weren’t what I wanted or expected the new Doctor to wear.
So, as of now, I’m not really a fan of Fifteen, but it’s 100% a “It’s not you, it’s me” situation. If I didn’t build up these lofty ideals of how I thought he’d be, things would be much different between us.
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Ncuti is giving a great performance, but I feel like someone saw him do the single tear and then said “DO THAT ALL THE TIME.”
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I don’t mind the crying because I come from the World of Six Fanatics, and Six is always crying or near tears. It’s Fifteen’s screaming that needs to be put to an end IMO.
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The scream out of the door of the TARDIS felt a bit contrived, I will agree.
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Same with Dot and Bubble. Okay, so these people don’t want you to take them into the TARDIS. Leave them be, why scream about it? “It’s your funeral” as they say.
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Both of these are cases where he’s presumably feeling intense and deep emotion, though–what else are you supposed to do about that? Like, if you found out that every time you’d gone anywhere for the last like 2/3 of your life you’d been unknowingly planting a time bomb, in the homes of your loved ones, at tourist attractions, at every school or store or office you’ve visited, would you not be having large emotions about that? How are you supposed to handle that?
And the thing about Dot and Bubble isn’t just that people have refused help, it’s that they’ve refused help because they’re so damn racist they’d actually rather die than accept support from a Black person. Being white myself I don’t know how it feels to be on the receiving end of that kind of racism, but can’t you imagine the sheer frustration of knowing that the only thing stopping these people from being saved is their own pointless racism? And knowing that if you were white they might’ve gone with you? Especially for a character who makes saving people such a strong part of his life and identity. I don’t know, I think I’d scream too.
It’s kind of funny that you say what you don’t like about him is what you didn’t like about thirteen, though, because I would’ve killed to see thirteen scream like that.
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It’s more in the delivery of the scream, I think. It looks and sounds ridiculous every time he does it; I can’t take it seriously. It’s like if a first-time actor walked into an audition and the director said “Show me how you portray anger/intense sadness” and the first thing you do is scream. Really? You can’t do any better than that?
(This is not a criticism of Ncuti. His acting is fine and he puts his all into those screams.)
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I have a feeling that whether you enjoy the crying and screaming depends a bit on how you process feelings yourself.
A lot of people cry openly for a variety of reasons where a lot of people bottle everything up and are “British” about it and “Carry On” without showing emotions on the outside so to speak.
For me I kind of feel like the crying Ncuti does in almost every single episode has become a bit farcical because it happens so much that the emotional impact I should feel as a viewer has eroded, and I absolutely loved it when Mel just went “get your s**t together, we’ve got work to do”. Also he showed very clearly in Boom that he is perfectly capable of keeping himself in check under severe pressure.
Loved the laugh/scream in Dot and Bubble, I felt that was really earned but did feel as if the one in Empire of Death was a bit too hamfisted - that could have been a shocked silent single tear, and honestly I think that would be more impactful.
Ncuti is a good actor, but in the end he doesn’t rank very highly among the 2005 Doctors for me, actually I would say that it is only the 10th Doctor that ranks below him at this point - but as always, this can very much be subject to change 
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That’s what did it for me - that moment of Mel (clearly remembering her time with Six and Seven) tells him to shut the fudge up and actually fix the problems was amazing, really used Mel’s history as a character to give a non-standard “all is lost moment.” And then you undermine that by giving us the most trite (“there will be birds”, really?) all is lost moment there is. And yes, the crying and screaming is great when it is used sparingly, but honestly, the scene with him screaming out of the TARDIS door, ironically, screamed “This is a pull for the trailer” for me.
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I’m 50/50 on the Fifteenth. There are moments that really grip me, and then other times my eyes roll so far that I get a headache. I’ve known people like he’s portrayed, and half the time I don’t want to be around them.
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Well that’s just crazy talk. To rank the best doctor lowest…
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The Fourteenth Doctor is just above the Fifteenth Doctor on this arbitrary list that only exists in my head if that makes you feel better 
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I would love to see a future doctor be like
That would take the Doctor being more normalized.
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The only correct way of ranking them is
10
11
15
9
14 (would probably be higher with more episodes)
12
13
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If i’m ranking just the Doctors:
11
9
12
10
14
15
13
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No no, the optimal list goes like this
12, 9, 11, 15, 13, 14, 10 
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