The 25 best fan-made Doctor Who videos

3. The Tardis materialises like never before

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNEjx6XUbfQ

John Smith strikes again with an incredible take on the Tardis' dematerialisation effect, which breaks from the tradition of it gradually fading away and instead captures – as he puts it on the video's YouTube page – "what travelling through time and space might look like from the point of view of the Tardis, from take-off to landing, all in one shot." As you can see, that resulting shot is seriously impressive, with time and space seemingly warping itself around the box – a far more dramatic effect than its usual vanishing act.

2. The Twelfth Doctor's opening sequence

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXOBHnWiinY

This is probably one of the most successful fan-made videos ever made - seeing as it went on to actually become a part of the show.

Billy Hanshaw, a motion graphics specialist from Leeds, uploaded his own take on the titles in 2013, which opens with a swooping shot through the gears of a clock before the Tardis spins into view, spiralling through a surrealist vortex of clock faces. It became a viral hit on YouTube, notching over 885,000 views, and Moffat was one of them.

"It was the only new title idea I'd seen since 1963," he said. "We got in touch with him, and said, 'OK, we're going to do that one.'"

Hanshaw, as you can imagine, was chuffed – although he thought the whole thing was a "wind-up" when Doctor Who executive producer Brian Minchin got in contact with him.

"I had to pinch myself because I didn't know if it was really happening," he told BBC News. "It's one of those stories about people putting something on YouTube – it's usually a musician this happens to. They put a performance on there and they get picked up by a label. It's a similar kind of story. I thought, these things don't generally happen."