"Nobody important? Blimey, that's amazing. You know that in nine hundred years of time and space and I've never met anybody who wasn't important before."
Episode #220: A Christmas Carol.
Companions: The 11th Doctor, Amy Pond and Rory Williams.
Air Date: 25th December 2010.
Amy Pond and Rory Williams are trapped on a crashing space liner, and the only way the Eleventh Doctor can rescue them is to save the soul of a lonely old miser. But is Kazran Sardick, the richest man in Sardicktown, beyond redemption? And what is lurking in the fogs of Christmas Eve?
The 2010 Christmas special is rather a let down to me. The story, as given away by the title, is based very loosely upon Dicken's classic A Christmas Carol. By it's self this isn't a bad idea but the implementation and the all to silly fairy tale elements spoil it. Flying fish and a giant flying shark? Good grief!
Even the time travel elements of the story contradict everything we've been told over the previous four decades. Once part of established events you can't go back and make changes but yet this is exactly what this episode consists of. The Doctor rewrites Sardick's memories by altering the events of his past. The Blinovich Limitation Effect is also ignored when the older and younger Sardick's interact with one another. I know that sometimes you have to let things slide in order to make a story work but these are big no no's in my mind.
Some elements, such as on board the space liner, do feel reminiscent of classic era sets and uniforms. In that regard I get some enjoyment out of the episode but the story is a real let down. Especially the reference to being Christmas. A Christmas special doesn't need to be set at Christmas, as I have said before. Attempting to do A Christmas Carol though does give it some bonus points though.
There isn't a lot to like in this episode to be fair. The pacing is wrong and the inclusion of the fairy tale elements, plus that it just ends, just leaves me disappointed with what could have been a good episode. My apologies for this being a rather negative review (and I would love to read your opinions) but this is probably the worst of the worst for Christmas specials.
