History NightmareFuel / DoctorWhoClassicSeries

** '''Next episode - THE DEATH OF DOCTOR WHO'''.

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS21E2TheAwakening The Awakening]]" has the Malus, a being that only knows how to destroy. [[https://gillatt.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/malus.jpeg Oh, and it looks like this...]]

** The primitive humanoid Gonds are tested for samples of high intelligence, and the rejects are vaporised. No Gond has been accepted during the tests, which have been going for a good thousand years.
** Plus, the Krotons plan to [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness kill everyone on the planet]] when they leave.

** The seed pods multiply as fungus which then swells up and bursts into fumes which suck out all the oxygen in your lungs, killing you instantly. The remnants of the smoke travel invisibly to rapidly breed into more fungus.
** An Ice Warrior transports himself to Earth and spends a number of scenes just eerily striding through the countryside, across the foam, killing anyone foolish enough to stand in his way.

** The nightmarish abductions make up for some pretty strong Nightmare Fuel. Along come the Time Lords, and decide that the only fitting punishment for the perpetrators is [[GoodIsNotSoft BEING ERASED FROM TIME, SPACE, HISTORY AND ALL OF EXISTENCE.]]

** The Autons first appeared here, and have come back numerous times since: they're animated mannequins who want to kill you. Think about that. Yeah.
** The Auton faces alone creep some people out.

** The end of episode 6. Yeah, it's an evil MirrorUniverse, but ''the world ends and everybody dies''. And the last shot of the episode is of the only remotely sympathetic secondary characters watching a river of magma crawl toward them, knowing there's nothing they can do to save themselves.
** The horror of the ending didn't set in until you start thinking about what must have been happening further away from the penetration site. All over the world, innocent people were falling into fissures, burning alive, being beaten to death by crazed proto-human zombies, or turning into said zombies, and 99.9% of them would never even know why.
** There's an absolutely terrifying shot in that final montage which brings the above horror home: in the midst of seeing lava spewing everywhere, people running all over the place, we see two men, sitting dazed in the middle of the lava mists, as the world goes up around them. Just sitting. While the world dies around them. There's something so moving and yet so horrific about that single moment that it almost overwhelms the final shot of Episode 6 mentioned above. Almost.
** The ExpandedUniverse implies the alternate reality Earth is being ruled with an iron first... by an ''evil version of the Doctor''. Apparently, his second incarnation chose one of the faces he was offered before his own exile began and took over the world, becoming just like Ramon Salamander.
** Earlier on in the serial, the alternate universe version of Benton is caught by a pack of the monsters, and forcibly turned into one of them. The whole scene is eerily similar to the TransformationSequence from ''Film/AnAmericanWerewolfInLondon'' (even though it technically predates that film).

** Imagine being stuck in an enclosed complex, miles away from civilisation, with the man in charge being [[JerkAss prepotent and irresponsible]], as well as being occasionally harassed by a couple of creepy men who seem to do everything in synch. You try to distract yourself, so you go lie down- what's that pounding noise? Is that foam coming closer to the windows? And where'd that piece of seaweed come from? What's going on? Why are the two of you here? [[http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/classic/photonovels/fury/two/800/43.html W-what's he-]] HOLY FUCK, WHAT ARE THOSE TENTACLES, WHERE'S ALL THE FOAM COMING FROM, WHAAAAARGH...

** Those really bizarre sound effects in episode 1.
*** Make that almost ''everything'' in episode 1. When Jamie and Zoe are lured into the void by a mysterious intelligence, the imagery starts to get incredibly surreal. Then there's that ending... After an onslaught of deafening noise as the Doctor struggles to keep hold of sanity, the TARDIS ''explodes''. Jamie and Zoe cling to the console as it spins in a black sea of nothingness. Zoe spots the Doctor floating, unconscious, some way off, and screams like there's no tomorrow. The rest of the serial is tame in comparison.
*** The moment the TARDIS materialises in the white void, he is ''terrified'', but he doesn't even know why. He just knows they aren't safe, and delivers every line in a terse whisper, determined to find a way out as soon as possible. It gives the whole first episode a palpable air of dread and menace, which only increases when the surreal visuals start appearing.
*** When Zoe whimpers "The Doctor!" and then suddenly starts to scream like that, an image followed by a close-up of the Doctor's face, I felt certain he was about to turn into a monster, or something.
** Jamie [[http://www.bfi.org.uk/sites/bfi.org.uk/files/styles/08_columns/public/image/doctor-who-the-mind-robber-1968-001-jamie-face-stolen.jpg?itok=BG0QVwu5 ''loses his face.'']] Aaaaugh!
** Zoe and the Doctor coming face to face with Medusa. Nuff said.

** Cybermen rising from the sewers of London, beginning their invasion from within the capital. And if that wasn't enough they come ''with horrifying sounds''. Even to this day, nobody knows how or why exactly Cybermen are producing such noise, which makes it even more scarier.
** Professor Watkins tells Vaughn he'll kill him when he gets the chance, so Vaughn challenges him by giving him a gun. After a moment of doubt, Watkins does in fact shoot him — Vaughn takes the bullet no problem. [[ImplacableMan His body's made of metal!]]

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS1E1AnUnearthlyChild An Unearthly Child]]": Episode 2 displayed a whole human skeleton with its skull tilted to stare out at the audience, and [[NothingButSkulls a cave of piled human skulls]]. The episode (prior to the serials having collective names) was aptly titled "The Cave of Skulls".

** One Voord, traveling through the sea of acid, got a tear in their protective suit. Slow and painful death apparently ensued.
** How about the bit about Barbara being trapped in an icy mountain, at the mercy of a deranged hermit? Who is the former TropeNamer [[VasorGambit for a form of murder]]?
* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS1E6TheAztecs The Aztecs]]" takes human sacrifice and rolls with it. Not to mention Barbara's realisation that she can't possibly hope to change that aspect of history.

** The early series' sense of hopelessness and despair in its purest form, as Daleks have taken over Earth entirely. Before the Doctor shows up, there is no one around fit enough to stand up to them, let alone defeat them. Couple that with that they choose the most fit among the survivors and turn them into robotic slaves, you got yourself a solid 3 hours of nightmare fuel. Heck, this story (not counting "The Daleks") was by far the show's darkest moment, and its ticket into a lifetime of full-fledged Nightmare Fuel.
** The Slyther may not be the best SPFX out there, but imagine a prison camp not only run by Daleks, but guarded by what is almost certainly another Davros special.
* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS2E3TheRescue The Rescue]]": Vicki is a teenaged girl virtually alone on a planet, save for her crippled crewmate who turns out to be a psychopath who killed the rest of his crew and committed genocide just so he could save himself from the Earth authorities by blaming it on a monster, who is also himself in disguise.
* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS2E4TheRomans The Romans]]" functions as a light humour piece for the most part, but towards the end, the Doctor realizes that he just may have caused the Great Fire of Rome... and [[EvilLaugh laughs eerily]].

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS2E7TheSpaceMuseum The Space Museum]]": First you find yourself in a silent shadow of the world a few minutes into the future, where you yourself leave no footprints, walk about unseen and unheard, like a ghost. Then you see your ''own stuffed and mounted corpses on display''.

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS2E9TheTimeMeddler The Time Meddler]]": Imagine a full-scale invasion of organized {{Pirates}}, hundreds of ships. Yeah. That's what the historical Viking invasion of 1066 was.

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS3E4TheDaleksMasterPlan The Daleks' Master Plan]]". The whole thing:
** It begins with a politician, an admired and respected public figure, revealed to be allying himself with the Daleks and basically selling out the whole of humanity for his own benefit.

** The Doctor manages to steal a vital component of this weapon, but in his escape he and the crew are forced to stop in the planet [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast Desperus]], a prison planet, where they just dump the convicts on the surface and leave them to fend for themselves.

** The lot are accidentally teleported to a planet plagued with invisible monsters, which only the Daleks are able to keep at bay.

** Victims of the Daleks' activation of their Time Destructor include themselves (hyper evolved into as the novelisation puts it "starfish creatures") and the Doctor and one of his companions. He survives although is weakened by the millions of years of time that washed over him, she is less fortunate. And the audience gets to watch as she screams and ages to dust.
* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS3E5TheMassacre The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve]]": Somehow, a minute and a half of etchings to the sound of shouting and drums brings home the horror of one of the most terrible events in French history more effectively than any sort of live action could.

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS3E10TheWarMachines The War Machines]]", where brainwashed workers build said Machines until they collapse. Something of a FridgeLogic moment as an AI would surely realise that human beings need regular food and rest to work efficiently.

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS4E2TheTenthPlanet The Tenth Planet]]": The original Cybermen make their first appearance and prove to be extremely unnerving. Not to mention they basically looked like futuristic versions of Frankenstein's monster, and also spoke in a creepy singsong voice:

** Later in the serial, the scientist catches wind of the Daleks' true nature, which leaves him such a shock that he cannot speak without his voice trembling, and by the end he's gone completely insane, believing that the Daleks have come to replace man as the dominant species. And the eyes. ''God, the eyes''.

** Not to mention his final moment of madness:

** Heck, that guy was creepier than the Daleks.
** At the beginning of that same story, after the Doctor's regenerated for the first time, he huddles around in disorientation, eventually pulling out a chest with some old belongings, including his recorder, a [[ItMakesSenseInContext 500 year-old diary]], and a piece of metal which makes him remember a single word: Extermination.

** From an outsider's perspective (which is exactly what Ben and Polly both have at the time), regeneration itself is downright terrifying. Someone you know very well has collapsed, after seeming to be ill for quite some time, only to be bathed in light and to emerge from it as someone who looks and acts totally different, but insists they're the same person you knew. Are they actually the same person? If so, why do they act so different now? Can you trust them? How often does this happen? Will you ever see your old friend again...?

** The Macra in their original story are sentient and cunning. The clips on Lost in Time are terrifying, especially when the "Controller" is pleading in vain for mercy and very obviously not in control. Thank God these things eventually devolve.

** The AndIMustScream horror of the victims paralysed in their little boxes, staring, only able to scream mentally... absolutely terrifying when this happens to Polly.

*** This somewhat becomes Narm if you watch what's left, read the scripts, and learn that the reason is insultingly vague: They lost their identities. In a gigantic explosion. Yeah.

** The scene where they all start waking up and climbing out of their hive-like tomb... ugh. The music that plays during that scene is pure nightmare fuel too. [[note]]Which is quite a feat, considering it was just stock music at the BBC.[[/note]] [[http://youtu.be/of6ThsLtHqs?t=42s Listen here.]]

** By the time ''The Tomb of the Cybermen'' comes around, we've seen enough of the implacable cyborgs to be immediately scared by them, but this story also introduces [[BigCreepyCrawlies the cybermats]], small, creeping cybermooks designed to look vaguely like silverfish, but with a pair of bug-eyes (complete with pupils) which seem to ''pulsate'' during the extreme close-ups given in the scene where they crawl over some of the sleeping main cast.

** Earlier on in the story, the Doctor, Jamie, Victoria, and the expedition team all split up into small groups and explore various rooms in the city of Telos. Jamie goes into one of said rooms with a man named Haydon and they begin messing with a control panel, which activates a mechanism used for weapon-testing that hypnotizes potential test subjects. Jamie falls under its control very quickly and what results is something that brings to mind the image of a moth being attracted to a bug-zapper.

** The serial progresses with a plot which wouldn't be out of place in an action movie (almost [[Film/JamesBond Bond-like]]) right up until the very end, the only time when the Doctor and [[{{Doppelganger}} Salamander]] meet, engaging in a duel inside the TARDIS which causes them to accidentally flip the dematerialisation switch. Only problem, the doors weren't closed, and Salamander is flung out by the turbulence into the vortex, screaming, left — possibly — to die an unimaginable death — but note, the next story has the Doctor speculating on how Salamander is now floating in the Vortex for all eternity, [[FridgeHorror raising the possibility that he remains alive. And aware.]] And then, [[NothingIsScarier it just ends]]. Thankfully, the next story picks up at this very moment.
** There's something disturbing about how Fedorin chokes and dies.

** Due to the disbelief of a pompous collector and the fact that the only man who knows how to fight them has grown old and is now mocked, the Yeti make a nightmarish takeover of London, covering the entire city in a web which is also the physical manifestation of [[EldritchAbomination the being that controls them]], which spreads so far that the first look the Doctor and co. have of the city includes a man who was ensnared alive, and the only way people have found to survive is to retreat into the underground, where the Yeti and said web are steadily closing in on them, leaving them with nowhere else to go. When [[EnsembleDarkhorse Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart]] tries to lead a team of soldiers to a safer area on the surface, they run into a few Yeti, who kill everyone except himself... [[SerialEscalation BUT that's not all]]. There's clearly a traitor among the small group of survivors who turns out to be dead from the start, his corpse animated by the same abomination which masterminded the whole thing. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRBWOTFNotM This]] lost trailer is a testament to any remaining doubt anyone may have had about "behind the couch".

** There is a scene where Jamie and Zoe are trapped between the pages of a closing book — and [[TheVirus are turned into fiction]].
** And that's a {{Cliffhanger}}, so we get to see it twice.

*** Patrick Troughton's acting is what really sells it. The moment the TARDIS materialises in the white void, he is ''terrified'', but he doesn't even know why. He just knows they aren't safe, and delivers every line in a terse whisper, determined to find a way out as soon as possible. It gives the whole first episode a palpable air of dread and menace, which only increases when the surreal visuals start appearing.

The classic series may have had a lower budget than the revival series, but it resulted in ''many'' historical and sci-fi scares to send children hiding behind the couch...

NightmareFuel in the classic series.

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS1E2TheDaleks The Daleks]]":

-->'''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS16E2ThePiratePlanet The Captain]]''': Doctor!

-->'''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS15E6TheInvasionOfTime Stor]]''': Doctor.
-->'''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS13E1TerrorOfTheZygons Broton]]''': Doctor.
-->'''The Black Guardian:''' Doctor, you shall die for this!

** We see a lake full of horribly mutated aquatic creatures. One of them takes a [[RedShirt very unfortunate]] Thal, and before that we hear their cries. All through the night, our heroes heard them.

*** Never mind the claustrophobia, the sequence where the Daleks close in on her, with the audience [[ImpendingDoomPOV looking through the eye stalk]] of one of them as it corners her is one of the most terrifying sequences in the show!

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS25E2TheHappinessPatrol The Happiness Patrol]]", whilst on first viewing is pretty innocuous and has a really unconvincing villain in the shape of the Kandy Man (a giant Bertie Bassett-shaped thing that isn't quite a robot, and definitely isn't nice- being an execution robot with a disturbing squeaky voice and [[ToThePain sadistic sense of humour]], who enjoys making its victims in, it its own words, "die with smiles on their faces") is actually really fucked up:\\\
The story revolves around Helen A and her husband/partner Joseph C who rule a colony on the planet Terra Alpha where it is illegal to be unhappy. The scene that's really nightmarish is when a man is executed by Helen A and Joseph C for the crime of unhappiness. A huge pipe is lowered over his head and molten candy is poured over his head by the Kandy Man. It's not clear if it's boiling hot, or if he drowns with his lungs full of molten sugar, but either way it's very disturbing. This is made even worse when (just before the camera cuts to the next scene) Joseph C leans forward, scrapes some candy off the corpse with his finger and eats it with a grin on his face. Urgh.

-->'''The Master:''' Predictable as ever, Doctor.//

'''Dalek:''' Doctor.
'''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS16E2ThePiratePlanet The Captain]]''': Doctor!
'''Cyberleader:''' Doctor.
'''Davros:''' Doctor.
'''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS15E6TheInvasionOfTime Stor]]''': Doctor.
'''[[Recap/DoctorWhoS13E1TerrorOfTheZygons Broton]]''': Doctor.
'''The Black Guardian:''' Doctor, you shall die for this!

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS8E3TheClawsOfAxos The Claws of Axos]]": Axos. Ship, captain, and crew are a single parasite that eats all living matter off a world, after persuading someone desiring to be seen as a public benefactor to disburse the [[{{Unobtainium}} axonite]].

** The Gargoyle. Sure the bad costuming effects can be distracting, but how he was capable of vaporizing people... -shudder-

* "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS10E1TheThreeDoctors The Three Doctors]]" has a man's face entrapped in cosmic lightning, a bizarre antimatter alien that is initially believed to destroy anyone it touches, giant walking blobs that can shoot lasers and are immune to bullets and rockets, and Omega has had his entire body eroded away by exposure to his antimatter world and exists now as nothing more than his essence full of rage and hatred. Seriously, when he takes of his helmet...

** A fungus that can sense when an endotherm is passing and fire spore slurry at them. If not treated, the fungus chokes you. Then, there's the whole FridgeLogic of what would have happened to the universe if the Daleks had succeeded in mastering invisibility.

** If the Exxilons' chanting and frightening Monk outfits aren't scary enough, just wait until you see their eyes.

** The Second Doctor's forced regeneration sequence isn't a pretty sight. First multiple images of himself surround him and start spinning around him, then his face is obscured in darkness as he starts spiraling down into the black abyss repeatedly shouting "No!" It doesn't help that after the rules of regeneration were established later on, [[HarsherInHindsight this particular regeneration is basically]] [[FridgeHorror the Second Doctor being executed by the Time Lords.]] Seeing the clownish, playful, fun-loving, childish version of the Doctor meet such a bleak is just chilling.

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