Doctor Who - A Christmas Carol product reviews

Taking the basics of Charles Dickensâ ™ A Christmas Carol, Steven Moffat skilfully wove the tale into a intriguing and layered Doctor Who story.

It starts off with some action, a spaceship falling from the skies, yet it wasnâ ™t long before Moffat slowed the pace right down. We are transported into a Dickensian world, where we are then introduced to the Scrooge of the piece, played by Michael Gambon. Only here, Scrooge goes by the name of Kazran Sardick. And he's more complicated than the average miser. He has the ability to save those in the falling spaceship, yet chooses not to, and thus comes the doctor and his use of time travel to try and convince our 'scrooge' to save their lives.

Katherine Jenkins is no slouch, either. She plays a pivotal role here, and avoids the fear of stunt casting in the process. Thinking back, she doesnâ ™t actually get a great deal of screen time, yet her slow demise, and Sardickâ ™s torment over which day should be her last, is wonderfully done.

Just as one can expect from the doctor, there were fantastic creatures (the flying fish), action, and plenty of laughs. This was a great Christmas special and had me eagerly waiting for the next years special.

This is the first Christmas Special to feature the new Doctor and also to be written by the new man in charge Steven Moffat, so there really was a lot riding on this one as it had a rather grand tradition to live up to, and did it what!

Steven Moffat has taken a very traditional Christmas tale and given it a very Doctor Who makeover. The story starts just after the ending of the last series and while it does have appearances by Amy Pond (Karen Gillam) and Rory Williams (Arthur Darvill) it is more a Doctor Who story, almost like Voyage of the Damned where is it mainly The Doctor and his guest stars. In this case we have the wonderful Michael Gambon (famous for the Harry Potter movies, and for almost crashing on the Top Gear test track and having a corner named after him), and the lovely Katherine Jenkins (who has never acted before, but does a passable job).

Like the traditional A Christmas Carol story this show features a crotchety old man Kazran Sardick (Michael Gambon) who, like Ebenezer Scrooge, does not believe in Christmas or it's meaning, and it's up to the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future - or in this case The Doctor - to help change the man so that all ends well and happily ever after (well almost anyway). This could have been a very cheesy and badly done episode, but with a master like Steven Moffat at the helm the odds of that happening were really very slim.

However with that being said I still honestly wasn't sure if I would actually like this story, but it was a genuinely good story and worthy of carrying the Doctor Who name, it was well written and still had all the action and humour I have come to expect from Doctor Who.

Of course we also have the Doctor Who Confidential which goes behind the making of the show, and is always a great watch as well.

I am now eagerly awaiting the return of Doctor Who in season 6 later this year, and I can't wait to see what is in store for us.