Doctor Who - A Christmas Carol

It's taken me a while to review this, purely because I didn't feel I could talk about it without watching it for a second time. It was just simply too barmy to review after seeing it half-drunk and ill with gossiping relatives in the background on Christmas Day. So after a re watch, here's what I think...

As I already said, barmy. The episode single-handedly threw out about 7 established rules of Doctor Who, much as did the finale to the previous series.

Kazran was the villain of the piece. Or was he? We discover quite early on that it's not necessarily Kazran's fault that he's the miserable bugger that he is, but his fathers. Michael Gambon plays both characters excellently, but he was never going to be anything different.

Katherine Jenkin made her acting debut as the two-dimensional Abigail. Jenkins didn't give the greatest performance ever. The best advice to her would be to stick to singing to the troops. At least the previous two singers in the series (Billie Piper and Kylie) were able to act. On the plus side for Jenkins, she's probably the better singer.

The story itself was engaging if not different. Smith's Doctor decided to have a bit of fun whilst converting Kazran to his way of thinking. Tennant's Doctor would have simply screamed, shouted and used the word 'huuuuumans' a few too many times to get his way.

Keeping Amy and Rory out of the majority of the story was a good idea. We were yet to see Smith's Doctor working on his own. Gloing off evidence of past companionless stories and the way Smith did for 3/4 of ACC, a case for a companionless series could actually be starting to form. Although let's let Amy and Rory's characters to flow their natural course first.

A Christmas Carol was a very mixed bag. It was all over the place and nowhere near generic Doctor Who as many of the previous Christmas specials have been. But it was good. Probably the best Moffat has been since he took over the series, with the possible exception of last series Angels 2 parter. Very enjoyable and light-hearted as a Christmas special should be, A Christmas Carol is worthy of an 8/10, making it considerably better than a fair bulk of the last series.