What happens when Rose is given the opportunity of changing history and saving her father?
Father’s Day marks the first Paul Cornell script in the TV series, the return of Camille Coduri as Jackie Tyler and the first appearance of Shaun Dingwall as Pete Tyler.
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Rewatched this one last week. All around a great and emotional episode, just cracks into my top 30 list. Lots to love here but I think the thing that really makes it work for me is the way it shows how Jackie has remembered Pete and built him up to Rose as sort of greater than he really was.
I like this episode. Even though im not 100 % a massive fan of the reapers as a alien/monster i can appreciate the design of them there like a half dinosaur and half bat
I loved that it was rose centered and the doctor took a back seat. A finding out what christopher eccleston was going through with his dad at the time makes me like this episode even more
Scare rating 8/10 although i was 14 years old so to a child that would of been a 10/10 rating 
Personally, I never really understood why people love this episode so much. I always found it kinda dull. I rewatched it a little while ago and it’s not bad, I like the Doctor saying he’s never met anyone who wasn’t important, and Rose is fantastic in it, but it just doesn’t hit for me in the way it clearly does for a lot of other people.
Wildly underrated episode. Cornell delivers his trademark of great character writing paired with a genius concept, turning Father’s Day into one of the first episodes where the main plot revolved around the actual mechanics of time travel.
It’s undoubtedly Rose’s best outing, Eccleston is on top form, the Reapers are a great design and idea and its conclusion is one of the most sombre and bittersweet in the show. Deserves so much more attention then what it gets.
This is an emotional masterpiece and sombre character drama by Paul Cornell. It showcases some of the best character work for Nine and Rose and perfectly mixes sci-fi with heavy-hitting emotional drama. I love how it further establishes Rose, her mother and her father and how it goes The Aztecs route of teaching us the rules and responsibilities of time travel. Eccleston taps into the darker side of his Doctor perfectly and Billie Piper is at her very best. And it’s always a joy to see more Camille Coduri. Shaun Dingwall is a likeable Pete: a flawed man but a loving father, ready to make the ultimate sacrifice to protect his daughter. Powerful stuff!
The Repaers are a great concept and they manage to make them very effective and scary. Oddly, they haven’t been featured on the show since. The CGI is pretty dated and they don’t look very realistic, but the idea is effective.
It’s an almost perfect 10/10 for me!
On to one of the best two-parters ever!
I absolutely love Fathers day, I think the character stuff is my favourite part of RTD1, and this is just that and so good.
Also in my dad’s top 3 episodes, I would’ve bee 3 when this came out, so can absolutley understand why
I rate this one at 4/5 
It’s a really good story and such a good use of the power of paradoxes.
Sean Dingwall is fabulous, Camille Coduri is great and Eccleston might give his best performance as the Doctor for me in this one.
I don’t think Billie Piper quite had the acting chops to pull off the part required of her in this story.
I think Pete Tyler should have been left alone after this story. Let that character rest on the pinnacle this script and Sean Dingwall’s performance left behind. Leave us wanting more 
And I got to say, the row that Rose and the Doctor have in Jackie’s apartment - that is when Rose starts going downhill as a character for me. She pressures the Doctor to take her to this point in time and does the one thing he tells her not to do by getting involved, and has the gall to act out spoiled and entitled thinking she knows better than him. People playing that sort of mind games “I’ll make you wait a long time!” , oh how stuff like that gets on my nerves.
It is very much a Paul Cornell story in the best way possible 
I have to agree with you on this. I’m not a huge Rose fan by any means, but I can stand her in Series 1. By Series 2 she is unbearable, which is one of the reasons I’m not a huge fan of Series 2 as a whole.
I really need to rewatch this one because my main memory is of the kids playing Mickey running away from the playground.
Oh and the Doctor opening the empty TARDIS - which is a great image.
Fully agree - I like it and I think a lot of aspects are brilliant but I often forget it exists and I wouldn’t have it as a pick to rewatch particularly
My absolute favorite episode of the entire show yet. It’s the time travel story everyone wants. Going back and telling their deceased parent how the future is gonna be. Paul Cornell I love you.
Also for some reason, even though I think I watched it for the first time this year, I felt really nostalgic while I was watching it for that first time. Like I had seen this episode before on a crusty old tv screen in church or at someone else’s home years ago while waiting for my parents to finish whatever boring stuff they were doing. I don’t know why. I did not remember having ever watched Doctor Who before, and still it felt like I was rewatching an old favorite. That strange feeling has probably contributed a lot to me liking it so much as well.
I like this episode a lot. I think that it shows the risk of time travel and how you can’t meddle in your own past. The end is also satisfying where he still dies but this time not alone. Billie is great in this one.
4/5
I like this episode well enough. It isn’t the greatest episode, but it also isn’t bad. It’s an episode I wouldn’t seek out, but I also don’t tend to want to skip it.
Brings back to what would you do in same situation and the consequences of your actions. Then you give the doctor whoness twist to it. Still enjoyable after all these years.
One of the most memorable episodes from this Season. I don’t understand why they have never brought the Reapers back as they are a great concept.
The Doctor really really should have known better though, especially to allow her to go back the second time - it just highlights how much of an alien he is that he wouldn’t realise what would happen.
I agree that Rose is starting to become a bit of a liability though - she clearly has learnt nothing from her mistake in Dalek, you would have thought that after that, she would be more careful!
I have really liked her up to now, but didn’t like the way she manipulated the Doctor at the beginning.
I still think it’s a great episode though, my one caveat being the changed timelines at the end meaning that Jackie should now have already known who the Doctor was when he met her in the first episode.
So I watched Father’s Day on Father’s Day, and that was amazing. I liked it a whole lot more than I remembered. I remembered the Reapers playing a bigger role then they actual did. I also forgot that they went to Pete and Jackie’s wedding, I thought they went straight to his death. Also, just realized that baby Rose is now around twenty. I really don’t have anything profound to add to the conversation. This episode was a lot better than I gave it credit for, it’s not done any favors by being right before The Empty Child. I don’t know if I’ve seen this more than once, maybe twice. It’s not one I return to often, usually gravitating towards Classic Who when I do watch. After having watched everything, I tend to focus on Big Finish these days. Anyway, I’ll stop rambling. It’s really good, but the reapers almost feel like they’re a background threat / a monster added because that’s what Doctor Who is, a show about the Doctor fighting monsters. Though I like it when we don’t see them or just see through their POV. Actually, having more character-driven pieces periodically wouldn’t be a bad thing. Okay, ramble over. I’m done now.
I love love love this episode. One of the best examples of Who leaning into the emotion, with an incredible performance from Billie Piper alongside Shaun Dingwall. Their scenes together are beautiful & heartfelt. & Eccleston shows more depth to the Doctor even though he isn’t in it as much. Such a shame we only got one season with him, this is in his top 3 episodes. The final scene between Rose & her dad when he realises what he has to do, I cried (again).
Okay first of all the stuff with Jackie was so funny. Every reveal you think is going to be the clincher that means she has to understand they’re time travellers but her mind just comes up with more ways Pete could have screwed up 
I really really like the use of time travel to explore everyday psychological questions. It looks like an episode of Eastenders, but there’s also big scary CGI demonic looking things and ordinary people trying to be heroes. Doctor Who at its genre-mashing finest!
Pete Tyler, you are a legend 
(joining the long line of unexpected legends inspired to brilliance by contact with the Doctor and companion/s)
Haven’t watched in a few years but might give a rewatch this weekend; I recall it being amazing