So, I know here on TARDIS Guide we have our star ratings of course, but that’s not what I made this topic to discuss. I’m an insane person who likes to rank all of the TV episodes from best to worst, according to my opinion. So I made this topic to discuss that sort of thing, something I don’t think TARDIS Guide has on its own, because I’m sure others do things like this as well. What sort of methods to people use? What kinds of ludicrous spreadsheets does everyone have? All of that stuff can go here.
My process begins with having a score out of 10 for every story, call it a preliminary, or I have historical data from the previous time I had done a full ranking, according to TG Stars x2 (except in the case of two-parters, as I’ll explain). Then I use the Metebelis Two Podcast’s Preference Revealer (linked below) for it to rank every story. And I do this blind to my previous rating spreadsheet, I want to do this stage all just in my head, unswayed by prior assessment. Now I say story because I keep two-parters together for the modern series, according to how I define a two-parter in those cases we’re all familiar with. The Preference Revealer does allow you to customize those settings however you wish.
Now, this is not my final ranking at this point, because it should match up with the scores out of 10, and if you use the PR once and it lines up perfectly like that, I’d be astounded. All the 10s should be together, then the 9s, the 8s, and so on. So I cross reference with the previous results, and decide if either that story should move up or down the ranking according to the out of 10 number, or if perhaps the story needs a new number to fit the ranking, maybe it’s telling me something. I make whatever adjustments I feel necessary to get the same numbers grouped and in order.
My last step is to then take all the 1s and Preference Revealer rank them amongst themselves, then the 2s, the 3s, all the way up to the 10s. The results of these smaller preference revealers become my final ranking of the stories. I do this pretty much after every new season.
Metebelis Two Preference Revealer:
Doctor Who Preference Revealer - Metebelis Two
I’m not affiliated with their podcast, and I’m not a listener (maybe I should give them a go, when I’m caught up on some of the ones I already listen to), but I definitely appreciate their work in making this tool that I have used so much. If they’re here, thanks.
