Broadcast and Reception
Overnight UK figures for the first broadcast of "Fear Her" was 6.6 million viewers, with a 39.7% audience share. Final consolidated ratings rose to 7.1 million. The episode received an Appreciation Index of 83.
Graham was happy with the episode himself and received letters from "loads of kids" who enjoyed it. When discovering that older fans had reacted negatively, he thought, "Well, it's a shame that they have, but it wasn't meant for them". IGN's Ahsan Haque gave the episode a 5 out of 10 rating, calling it "flat and formulaic" and everything about it was "slightly underwhelming", though he thought what did work was the mother-daughter teamwork at the end. He also noted "annoying self-aggrandizing moments that made no sense and served only to make the episode feel unnecessarily campy", such as the audience disappearing from the stadium and the Doctor carrying the torch. Comparing the episode to "The Idiot's Lantern" in terms of plot, he felt that the latter was "far more entertaining" and that "Fear Her" lacked originality and humour. Dave Bradley of SFX awarded "Fear Her" three out of five stars, describing the plot as "ordinary" but thought it was "a decent breather before grander adventures to come". He particularly praised the dialogue and thought "the claustrophobic effect of limiting the action to one household works".
In 2011, SFX published an article stating arguments for and against the episode. The "Defence" stated that, while some minor roles were played "broadly", Nina Sosanya and Abisola Agbaje were "extremely good", and opined that the unusual things happening in a typical housing estate and the lack of appearance from a monster were effective. The "Prosecution", on the other hand, described it as a "cheap filler" with a "cheesy" finale and called the lack of a monster a "severe disappointment". Topless Robot named it the third worst Tenth Doctor episode. In a poll conducted by Doctor Who Magazine in 2009 which asked readers to rank all 200 stories that had been released, "Fear Her" fell at 192 out of 200.
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