Well, given more folk are watching TV at Xmas, it's
not surprising. So why can't the production team
afford to take a few risks with the Christmas episode?
Heck, the superior "A Christmas Carol" had us knowing
Abigail was going to die after the story ended, but that
didn't scare away the general public.


I do know of Gaiman fans who were won over to
watching DW after seeing "The Doctor's Wife".

That misses the point in a way though - they were Gaiman fans already, which is presumably what drew them to watch a Gaiman episode. Christmas DW is designed to draw in a wider audience from teenagers to pensioners who have no specific reason to watch except that they're too full of Christmas dinner to do anything but watch TV. Completely different scenario to fans of a writer watching his episode.

All this talk about death in a Christmas show... have we forgotten the previous entries? There was death in the first one, "The Christmas Invasion". Not much, and not a main character, but it was there. The next, "The Runaway Bride", had the deaths of a main character (of the episode) and of a whole species. In "Voyage of the Damned" the entire population of a huge cruise ship, except the Doctor and three other people, all died, including most of the people we focused on. These people were shown going to their deaths, one by one, as the story progressed. "The Next Doctor" had the shadow of the lost wife and wholesale destruction of parts of London at the end, and let's not forget the guys who were murdered by Cybermen in the graveyard. On top of that, we also had the portrayal of child slavery in that one. "The End of Time" gave us the death/regeneration of the Doctor, himself. "A Christmas Carol" ended happily, but in the background is the fact that, shortly beyond the end of the show, a beautiful young woman was going to die for having saved the lives of people she didn't even know.

The thought that death, hardship, or other unpleasant things have no place in Doctor Who, even at Christmas, is just not valid. These things make for great drama and have a long history in Doctor Who.

It doesn't necessarily follow that the episode has to be rubbish.

I can't believe that some posters seem to think that there is no place for death and destruction in DW Christmas Specials. What short memories they have. Or are they very young?

In my opinion there is no place in Doctor Who for characters being able to wish back into existence people who have died, or gone into an alternate Universe. Nor should they be able to wish and make the Doctor appear, or wish themselves home. It isn't The Wizard of Oz.

I am round my parents for Xmas and had to endure three soaps last night, all of them depressing. Therefore I was very glad Doctor Who had a happy ending and that the fantasy nature of the story neatly counterpointed the soaps to the fullest.
Along with Strictly the show cheered up an otherwise dreary evening.
I didn't find the episode any less sentimental than say, The Girl in the Fireplace.

People are saying that everything was wished back to happiness. That's not the case at all. He told the mother to wish, as it was Christmas and she had already called him an angel. He undoubtedly knew there would be an opportunity to help her at a later date, which he would know about because he has the TARDIS... Also, the crown on her head was the reason for her being able to pilot the ship, it being the reason for travelling in the vortex, not her. And wishing the husband back, that's not what happened either. You remember that the telegram said her husband was lost over the channel? The reason for this is because he wasn't lost not ever dead. Him being 'lost' was because he was flying to follow the only light source available to him: the ship his wife was piloting, through the vortex. No wishing involved!

Also, 'strong' meant woman/female. The girl was called strong too, but just too young. It was to do with their status on the reproductive scale. Those who reproduce are strong, those who don't are weak.

I don't think the show was the best ever episode, but it was certainly far from the worst...

The last thing I want is death and misery at Christmas. That's speaking as one who lost a family member a few weeks beforehand a few years back, December is hard enough and Christmas needs to be upbeat and magical if at all possible. I'm not saying the special yesterday was as good as some, but if the husband had really been dead it would have been terrible. Besides if you want misery you can take your pick of the soaps, Let's keep Who at least optimistic.

I have only seen the episode once, and will never watch it again, so I may be wrong in this, but I think when they were entering the Time Vortex at the end, Madge was told by the Doctor to think very hard about home, and what home means, and wish to be there? (I don't think she had to click her heels together 3 times, but she may as well have done).

And through the power of this wishing she got back home and at the same time brought her husband back from the brink of death and made him materialise on the lawn in his Lancaster.

Not through some sciency-wiency stuff on the part of the wonderfully clever Doctor, but because she was a woman, and a Mother, and therefore somehow strong.

No, Granny, that's not it really... Her husband was never at the brink of death. The reason he disappeared over the channel was that he had already been rescued. The reason she needed to think of home was that she was controlling the ship mentally through the vortex. The reason she was strong was because she was able to host the lifeforces due to the fact that she was a woman and had previously given birth. This made her able to use the headband. Calling it wishing was giving a name to something, not the actual thing itself. It was all there!

I don't think there's anything in my post that gives that implication...

I've never said it has to be rubbish - why on earth would I want it to be rubbish?

The point is, as far as I understand it from what others have said, that the episode is generally likely to be more fluffy and less complicated, and that those expecting otherwise are forgetting that it needs to be lighter in order to appeal to the wider Christmas audience.

It doesn't excuse yesterday's episode from being so bad, I thought it was rubbish until the last scene myself, and it can be done well (A Christmas Carol, in my opinion), but it does explain why there was basically no plot of substance. And, in my opinion, it also makes a comparison with anything other than previous Christmas specials futile. I wouldn't rank it in comparison to series 6, for example.

Sorry, but you have just made my point. Not calling it wishing is...well, wishful thinking!

Of course if you find this episode was acceptable, or even good, you are entitled to think so.

It's completely the end of the subject for me, I'm afraid, as I don't want to even think about it any more.

I don't see how I made your point for you. But as you're no longer discussing it, I'm afraid I never will. I thought it was quite clear in the difference...

Yes, I liked the episode, but it was below part for me, too. Certainly not on the same level as last year's.

Nothing wrong with a bit of sentimentality. However I found the whole special a total slush fest.

The episode should have pandered to a whole range of emotions. Instead all I have read was, "did you cry when the Doctor had a tear".

What it should have been, was exciting, scary with a dose of sentimentality to level it up.

Even Narnia had more action than this.

Everything seems to be about the power of love lately.

I'm with the OP here.

Sentimentality has it's place, but in this episode a lot of it was incredibly cliched, false and impossible to take seriously. Some of it worked, like Madge's reactions to her husband's death and the Doctor shedding a tear, but... all that about guiding lights and shining with the stars? The power of love? Again? It just didn't hit home for me.

Bringing the husband back at the end did feel like a bit of an afterthought. It was as though they felt obligated to save him, because Christmas, but had really planned for him to stay dead.

It really would have benefited from amping up the action/suspense/drama/complexity (because Christmas doesn't have to mean simple and cheesy) and losing the glurgy Hollywood cliches. This ep had real potential, and I did like the basic idea, but in the end it felt underwhelming, and as though they hadn't really put much effort in.

Oh- and for people who want something upbeat at Christmas... a dramatic story can easily have a happy ending.

This does irritate me a little. If you have to have things powered by love, at least explain how or at least why it works!

But it wasn't powered by love? She was strong because as a mother she could carry the species same as how she carried her children. Men can't bear children hence why they were weak. Mother Nature and all that, giving birth to life.

The only thing love did was to guide her home. As such, she had to think of everything including her "dead" husband. Travelling through the Time Vortex and all that jazz it's not out of the realm of logic that thinking about her husband dying wouldn't let her see it since you know time travel and so in the end she actually causes his disappearance but also saves him since he would have actually died without her.

I feel the same way. It's done. It's over. It was crap. Nothing much more to be said.

I really don't see how saving the father could be viewed as an afterthought, Deering as how he had been saved near the beginning. In his timeline, he gets lost, sees a bright light and follows it, then ends up in his wife's brother's garden on Christmas day. It's only from watching the wife's timeline that it seems like he had died/been lost. The saving of the father must have been planned.

It's Christmas Day...I;m happy with a bit of slush...after the *really dark adult oh think of the children* last series...Moffat can't win can he?