Fear Her

The TARDIS materialises on Dame Kelly Holmes Close on the day of the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympic Games. The neighbourhood is preparing for the passing of the Olympic torchbearer, but the mood has been destroyed by the inexplicable disappearances of several local children. A council worker, Kel, also mentions that cars have been breaking down momentarily all day. The Doctor and Rose investigate and realise that the source of the problems is a solitary 12-year old girl, Chloe Webber, who is able to cause people to disappear by drawing them. The Doctor hypnotises Chloe and finds that she is possessed by an immature Isolus, an alien life-form used to traveling through space with a family of billions and which has crashed its pod to Earth due to a solar flare. The Isolus has befriended Chloe as she had a troubled childhood and it relates to her loneliness. Besides snatching people, this has also caused Chloe to draw a life-sized, exaggerated figure of her late violate father, which briefly has become animated.
The Doctor explains that if they can find the Isolus pod and provide it power, the alien will leave Chloe. A frantic Chloe draws the Doctor into one of her paintings, forcing Rose to try to find the pod herself. She rationalizes that the pod is located on the spot on the street where cars have been breaking down, and is able to dig it up with the council worker's help. With Chloe having already caused the entire crowd at the Olympic stadium to disappear and now intent on making everyone in the world disappear, Rose tries to find out how to power the pod. Thanks to visual indications from the Doctor's "picture", Rose understands that she needs to offer the pod heat mixed with emotional strength, which she does by throwing the pod towards the Olympic Torch. As the missing children start to reappear, Rose realises that so will the demon-like drawing that Chloe had made of her father. Rose and Chloe's mother are able, though, to calm Chloe enough and the - unseen - monster disappears.
As the torch-bearer approaches the Olympic Stadium, he staggers, but the Doctor completes the run and lights the Olympic Flame, allowing the Isolus to peacefully leave Chloe's body and return home. As the Doctor and Rose walk off to watch the Games, Rose remarks that however hard they attempt, nothing will ever split the two of them up. However, the Doctor becomes uneasy and surmises that a storm is approaching.

Love & Monsters

"Love & Monsters" is presented as an excerpt from the video diary of Elton Pope, a young ELO fan, describing his encounters with The Doctor. Elton's on-camera narration forms a present-day frame story to a series of flashbacks related to his investigation of the Doctor. Elton recounts a chance meeting with the Doctor, and recalls having seen the same man as a young child. Searching the Internet, he discovers others, including Ursula Blake, who have also reported similar experiences with the Doctor. Elton and Ursula form LINDA—"London Investigation 'N' Detective Agency"—with three others, Bridget, Bliss, and Mr. Skinner, and meet in a library basement to discuss their experiences, but soon their activities become more social in nature. Elton and Ursula become closer through these meetings.
One day, LINDA finds its meeting interrupted by the portly Victor Kennedy, who points out that LINDA has lost its cause and reinvigorates the group to seek out the Doctor's location. Elton is given the task of getting close to Jackie Tyler, Rose's mum. Elton manages to find Jackie but when he starts asking too many questions about Rose, Jackie shoos him off. Meanwhile, two of LINDA's members, Bridget and Bliss, appear to have left the group, Victor explaining their absence as having decided to move on in their lives. After one meeting, Elton and Ursula depart, while Mr. Skinner remains at Victor's request. When Ursula realizes she had forgotten her phone, the two return, and discover that Victor is really a grotesque alien being (later named an "Abzorbaloff" by Elton), with the faces of the former LINDA members and others protruding from his body, still conscious of themselves. Elton is unable to stop the Abzorbaloff from absorbing Ursula, but makes for his own escape.
As the Abzorbaloff chases him, Elton is forced down a dead-end alley. However, moments before the Abzorbaloff can touch him, the TARDIS appears and the Doctor and Rose step out; Rose angrily confronts Elton for upsetting her mom. The Abzorbaloff, now with the Doctor in range, tries to absorb the Time Lord, but the absorbed members of LINDA use their willpower to hold back the Abzorbaloff's body, forcing it to drop its cane. The Doctor realizes that the cane contains a field generator that keeps the Abzorbaloff in control of its body, and Elton smashes the cane apart. The Abzorbaloff and the absorbed people begin to dissolve, and while the Doctor realizes it is too late to save the others, he manages to use his sonic screwdriver to keep Ursula's essence alive in a piece of cement tile, which Elton has kept in his room. The Doctor realizes that he has seen Elton before as a young child, and apologizes to him for the death of his mother at the hands of an elemental shade he had been chases years ago.
In the conclusion of Elton's narrative, he demonstrates that he and Ursula still have a romantic, if not unconventional, relationship. He further postulates that while one could have a conventional life, "the real world is much stranger than that; it is so much darker, madder, and so much better."

The Satan Pit

While the Doctor and archelogist Ida investigate the strange door deep in the planet Krop Tor, Rose and the rest of the human crew flee from the advancing Ood, all possessed by The Beast and regroup to come up with a plan. The group initially believe Toby to be possessed by The Beast, but when they observe a force leaving his body and return to the Ood, they conclude that he has regained his own will. The Doctor makes contact with the crew, revealing that while the door had opened, nothing came out of it. He offers to rappel down the sides to explore further.
As the crew struggles to fight against the advancing horde, attempting to free Captain Zack who is trapped inside the control room and making their way to an escape rocket, the Doctor descends into the open door into a seemingly bottomless pit. The Beast communicates with the Doctor and the rest of the crew through the Ood; the Beast explains he is the epitome of evil across many different religions, as he had been sealed in the planet's Pit since the creation of the universe by the Disciples of the Light, and is seeking to escape. When the Doctor runs out of rope, he opts to drop down, causing Rose to be distressed over his fate. Ida finds herself unable to return to the surface and running short on air. As the Ood continue their attack, the crew is whittled down to just Zack, Rose, Danny and Toby, who board and launch the escape rocket.
The Doctor finds himself in a cave depicting the capture of The Beast, and discovers two jars on pedestals a few feet from each other. Touching them causes the cavern to fill with light, revealing the giant physical form of The Beast, complete with caprine head and humanoid body, chained to the walls of the cavern. The Doctor quickly deduces from the unintelligible grunts coming from The Beast that the consciousness of The Beast has already managed to escape. He also comes to understand that Krop Tor was a perfect prison for The Beast, as should he escape, the gravity field keeping the planet in orbit about the black hole would collapse, taking The Beast with it. The Doctor, aware that Rose will be put in danger by destroying the gravity field, proceeds to smash the jars, destroying the generators and causing the planet to fall into the event horizon, The Beast's physical form writhing in pain. The Doctor, though willing to sacrifice himself, manages to come across his TARDIS in another part of the cavern.Meanwhile, the escape rocket struggles against the black hole's gravity with the energy source now destroyed. The Beast repossesses Toby, defiant from being killed. Rose takes a yellow-stripped Boltgun and shoots out the rocket's viewscreen and disengages Toby's harness, causing the possessed being to be sucked out into space and into the black hole. The cabin is shortly sealed by automatic shields, but the rocket is still lacks the power to escape the gravity well. They suddenly find their ride has smoothed out and are being moved far away from the black hole; the Doctor, over a communications channel, reveals that he and Ida are both safe, and that he is using the TARDIS to tow the rocket to safety. However, the Doctor reports he did not have time to go back and save the Ood, innocent victims of the Beast's possession. Once safe, the respective crews regroup and then depart to go their separate ways. As they return to Earth, Zack reads off the list of personnel that died, including the Ood.

The Impossible Planet

The TARDIS arrives inside a "Sanctuary Base" used for deep-space expeditions; as Doctor and Rose explore it, they discover strange alien writing that the TARDIS is unable to translate. After a slight misunderstanding when first meeting the Ood, a docile race of empathic servants who work on the station, the travelers meet the crew of the base, led by acting Captain Zachary Cross Flane. The crew, which includes Science Officer Ida Scott, Head of Security Mr Jefferson, and archaeologist Toby Zed, are on an expedition on an anomalous planet, named "Krop Tor", in orbit around a black hole. Zack explains that a gravity well exists around the planet, allowing them to safely enter or leave the event horizon of the black hole, and that it is generated by an immense energy force ten miles within it, which they are drilling towards to understand its power. As the Doctor and Rose are acquainting themselves with the crew, the base is struck by a planet-quake, causing the section of the base containing the TARDIS to fall into the planet, and the two become resigned to help out the crew.
As the drill nears its target, a malevolent presence begins to make itself known; the Ood's translation spheres reveal messages about the Beast awaking, while Toby is unknowingly possessed by the Beast and kills a crew member. When drilling is complete, the Doctor offers to go with Ida into the bowels of the planet. After travelling down the shaft, the Doctor and Ida find a large circular disk, inscribed with more undecipherable markings, which the Doctor believes is a door. As they watch, the door begins to open; simultaneously, the Beast repossesses Toby and the Ood. The possessed Toby warns Rose and the remaining crew that the planet is now falling towards the black hole, and that the Beast is free, while the Ood, now claiming to be the Legion of the Beast, begin to close in on them.

The Idiot's Lantern

The Doctor, intending to take Rose to an Elvis Presley concert in New York City, mislands the TARDIS in Muswell Hill, London on the day before the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. The Doctor's curiosity is piqued when they see people, their faces covered by sheets, being taken away by police. The Doctor befriends teenaged Tommy Connolly who shows him his grandmother, devoid of any facial features and lacking any brain activity. Tommy admits the problems started when they all started buying inexpensive television sets in preparation for the coronation from Mr Magpie. The Doctor follows where the police are taking the faceless people while Rose investigates Magpie's shop. There, she discovers an entity calling itself the Wire, an alien being that managed to escape execution by its people by turning itself into an electrical form, and now presents its as a spokeswoman on Magpie's television sets, seeking to consume enough minds to recreate its own body and planning on using the wide broadcast of the coronation to do so. Rose is unable to flee before the Wire steals her face as well.As the Doctor is studying the other victims, the faceless Rose is brought in by the police. The Doctor races back to Tommy to enlist his help as they go to Magpie's store and confront its owner. The Wire reveals its plans to the Doctor and tries to consume him and Tommy, but the Doctor fights back with his sonic screwdriver. The Wire retreats into a portable television Mr. Magpie created, and he escapes, intent on reaching the Alexandra Palace transmitter. The Doctor, with Tommy's help, uses equipment from Magpie's shop and his TARDIS to create a device to capture the Wire, and shortly follow Mr. Magpie. As Magpie connects the portable device to the tower, allowing the Wire to start to draw in the viewers' minds while killing Magpie in the process, the Doctor is able to connect his device to the transmitter. The Wire is pulled into the device, and viewers continue to safely watch the coronation; similarly, the minds and faces of those consumed by the Wire are returned to normal. The Doctor shows Tommy that he has captured the Wire on a Betamax cassette, which he will have Rose remind him later to tape over in order to destroy the entity. Rose is reunited with the Doctor, and the two celebrate the coronation with the rest of London.

The Age of Steel

Having escaped from the alternate universe's Pete Tyler's home from an army of Cybermen, the Doctor is able to disable the robots, saving his group. Insisting to Pete that everyone inside his home, including his wife Jackie, is likely dead, the Doctor directs Pete, Rose, Mickey, and the Preachers, including Mickey's alternate universe counterpart Ricky. Jake, and Mrs. Moore, to get back to London to warn the authorities. As they flee, Pete explains that he was working with Lumic, the man that has created the Cybermen, only to learn of his plans and provide that information to the Preachers. Meanwhile, Lumic orders the Cybermen to bring those humans under control of his EarPods to the Battersea Power Station for conversion.
When they reach the city, the group discovers Lumic's zeppelin moored near the power station and make towards it; Ricky is killed by the Cybermen during their incursion. After inspection the station, the Doctor determines they must destroy the EarPod transmitter, located on the zeppelin. The group splits up: Mickey and Jake to board the zeppelin, Pete and Rose to pose as affected humans to try to disrupt the conversion process, and the Doctor and Mrs. Moore to find their way to Lumic. Pete and Rose are captured by the Cybermen when one, the converted Jackie, catches sight of them. Though Mrs. Moore is killed by a Cyberman, the Doctor discovers that each unit contains an inhibitor signal to prevent their human side from taking over, and determines that if he can disable the signal, the converted Cybermen will likely kill themselves over their moral dilemma. However, he is captured by the Cybermen before implementing his plan.
Taken to Lumic's office, the Doctor discovers the Cybermen have captured Pete and Rose, and they have forcefully converted Lumic into their leader. When Mickey and Jake successfully disable the transmitter, Lumic reveals they will simply take the humans by force. The Doctor, aware that Lumic's office is under surveillance by Mickey and Jake, subtly attempts to ask for the inhibitor code. Mickey eventually recognizes the Doctor's plan, locates the code in the zeppelin computers, and sends it to Rose's phone. The Doctor plugs the phone into the computer systems, causing the inhibitor signal to drop and sending the army of Cybermen into despair. As the conversion facility begins to go up in flames, the group escapes to the zeppelin, leaving Lumic to die.As the city recovers, the Doctor, Rose, and Mickey return with Jake and Pete to the TARDIS, the power cell sufficiently charged to allow the TARDIS to return to the proper dimension. However, Mickey reveals that he plans to stay with Jake and Pete in the alternate universe, as to take care of Ricky's grandmother and continue the Preacher's fight and destroy Lumic's other factories. After the TARDIS' departure, Mickey recounts to Jake how he once "saved the universe with a big yellow truck".

Rise of the Cybermen

As the Doctor and Rose reminisce about a past adventure while the TARDIS is in-flight, Mickey begins to feel upset that the two take him for granted. However, before they can comment, the TARDIS is rocked by a huge explosion and goes dark. The Doctor determines that they have fallen out of the time vortex into the void, and have landed somewhere, but that the TARDIS appears dead. They find themselves on Earth in London, but in a parallel universe. Zeppelins fly in the skies and Rose spots an advertisement featuring her father Pete Tyler as a successful business leader, when in her own universe Pete has died. The Doctor notes that the TARDIS can only operate on power from its own universe, and spots a dim but glowing power cell in the bowels of the ship. The Doctor breathes into it, giving away 10 years of his life but allowing the cell to start recharging, a process that will take about 24 hours after which they should be able to return to their universe. Given the wait, Rose and Mickey decide to go and check on respectively Pete and Mickey's grandmother, both alive in this universe. The Doctor, worried for both, ends up chasing after Rose.
The Doctor and Rose discover that most of the population of this universe wear special "EarPods", devices that, when activated by a signal, download massive amounts of news and information directly to the wearer's brain, information that is also received by Rose's mobile phone. They learn that the EarPods as well as Pete's company are owned by the powerful John Lumic, owner of Cybus Industries, who is presently failing to gain approval from the Ethics Committee of Great Britain for his "ultimate upgrade": a method of sustaining the human brain indefinitely within a cradle of copyrighted chemicals and allowing its impulses to be bonded onto a metal exoskeleton. Lumic secretly has been capturing homeless people and putting them to work in his Battersea Power Station factory using the EarPods as methods to control the homeless. Having been denied permission by the President of Great Britain, Lumic tells his right-hand man Mr Crane to begin the upgrade process. Crane drives an International Electromatics lorry and kidnaps more homeless people, but instead of just fitting them with EarPods, he orders them into a room filled with cutting and other machinery which transforms them into the new prototypes.
Mickey arrives at his grandmother's house to find her still alive, but before he can get acquainted with her, he is grabbed by people in an unmarked van and taken to a country house. One of his abductors, Jake, who calls him "Ricky", tells him that he is the most wanted person in Great Britain, and that they have evidence of Lumic's dealing with the homeless people. When they arrive at the base, the real Ricky, Mickey's counterpart in this universe, is there, and explains he is the leader of the "Preachers" who reject the EarPods and have been tracking Lumic's actions. After clearing the confusion between the existence of Ricky and Mickey, the group learns of pending action by Lumic and, with Mickey in tow, make towards Pete Tyler's estate.
The Doctor and Rose arrive at Pete's estate and learn that there is a large party there that night, where the President of Great Britain and Lumic will be present. The Doctor and Rose pose as part of the serving staff to investigate, and learn that this Pete and Jackie Tyler are childless but have a pet terrier called Rose. Rose meets both Pete and Jackie and learns that they have just separated secretly. As the party gets underway, Lumic presents his plans for his prototype, which the Doctor recognises right away. Before he can act, the partygoers hear the sound of troops surrounding the building, an army of metal men, which the Doctor tells Rose are Cybermen. As the Cybermen break through the windows, Lumic explains that they have been selected to be upgraded to "Human.2", and that every human will receive a compulsory free upgrade. The President resists, and is electrocuted by a Cyberman who informs them that this is the only alternative to conversion. As Jackie flees into the basement with a Cyberman in pursuit, the Doctor, Rose, and Pete jump out a window and find the Preachers there, firing their ineffective weapons at the Cybermen. As the episode closes in a cliffhanger, the Doctor, Rose, Pete, Mickey, Ricky, and Jake are surrounded by the Cybermen who, deeming them incompatible for upgrading, announce they will be deleted and move in for the kill.