Well, here we are: the first Christmas special for the brand
new Doctor. During his first series, Matt Smith's portrayal
underwent some subtle changes as he experimented with the role.
For the most part, the Eleventh Doctor's scripts seemed to be
written for David Tennant, much in the same way that Tom Baker's
first series was written with Jon Pertwee in mind. That being
said, while he did display some very Ten-ish qualities in his
earlier stories, Matt Smith soon started pushing and pulling his
portrayal in different directions to see what fit best. In The
Beast Below, we saw the rage of the Eleventh Doctor during the
final scenes which would rarely be seen again. In The Lodger, a
lot of the comedy derived from how alien Smith's Doctor was
compared to his predecessors as he developed his trademark
physicality ("Are you capable of speaking without flapping your
hands about?" "Yes. No."). And throughout Series 5, we saw him
play around with the age dial, switching from childlike youth to
an almost literally lapel-holding old man. A Christmas Carol is
the first Matt Smith episode where he's completely nailing it.
This special was filmed as part of Series 6, so a lot of time
had passed since he first started on the show. The time for
experimentation is over, and the Eleventh Doctor has arrived.
Matt Smith gives one of his strongest performances in A
Christmas Carol, and although it took a while, this is one of
the first episodes that made me truly see him as 'the' Doctor;
the definite article you might say. He has a sense of confidence
throughout this story that he didn't have in the rest of Series
5, and in certain scenes you can really tell he's enjoying
himself. His arrival down the chimney into Kazran Sardick's
living room and the following scene of Smith rambling on and
bouncing around the room is incredible. Right in the middle of a
depressing sequence where Sardick, played to perfection by
Michael Gambon, is keeping a woman away from her loved ones and
letting a ship with 4003 people on board crash on Christmas, a
big ball of energy and whimsy rolls in and the Doctor takes full
control of the scene. He paces across the massive hall, filling
the space with his presence and talking aloud to himself with
some fantastic one-liners from one of Moffat's funniest scripts
("Big flashy lighty things have got me written all over them.
Not actually, but give me time, and a crayon.").
The first thing that struck me about A Christmas Carol on
transmission was the visual style. The pre-title sequence of the
spaceship about to crash land looks clearly inspired by the J.J.
Abrams Star Trek movie, with everything covered in lens flares
and the ship's interior being sleek and white and pristine. Toby
Haynes, who previously directed The Pandorica Opens and The Big
Bang and would go on to direct The Impossible Astronaut and Day
of the Moon (meaning he directed five Who episodes in a row),
brings the setting of Ember (the planet is never named in the
episode itself) to life. There are plenty of long, sweeping
camera shots that really show off the locations and sets, making
them seem a lot bigger and more alive. It's episodes like this
that really make me wish that Doctor Who would leave Earth
behind and do a full series set amongst the stars. Why would you
confine yourself to 21st century London when you could have
planets where fish swim through the fog?
This episode is the first in a trilogy of Moffat Christmas
specials that retell classic stories with a Doctor Who twist,
although as time goes on they get less and less to do with their
source material (to the point that The Snowmen pretty much has
nothing to do with the original animation other than the whole
'walking in the air' metaphor with the TARDIS parked on a
cloud). A Christmas Carol however pretty faithfully retells
Charles Dickens' original story. I love that instead of being a
pure coincidence, the Doctor knowingly decides to recreate the
original story as a way of softening up Kazran Sardick. It makes
it a little less cartoonish if the main character is in on the
fact that they're just telling the same story with a twist.
The idea of jumping into Kazran Sardick's past to change his
future doesn't entirely make sense considering if the Doctor
went back to meet Kazran as a child, surely as an adult he'd
have immediately let the ship land, but coming at the end of a
series which tells us that "time can be rewritten", I suppose we
have to trust that the Doctor knows what he can and can't do.
Also, because old Kazran didn't hit the boy at the beginning,
the Doctor might think he's able to be redeemed anyway, so by
changing time so he becomes a nicer person, he isn't actually
changing that much. It's not entirely water-tight when compared
with past representations of time travel in Doctor Who but there
are explanations and, in a sci-fi show, you kinda just have to
roll with it. If you're under the impression that Doctor Who has
never contradicted itself before with regards to the basic rules
of its universe, you clearly have never seen the TV Movie.
Amy and Rory spend a majority of the episode on the crashing
spaceship and with the exception of a few scenes where they
appear either as holograms or speaking on the other end of the
phone, they're basically absent from the plot. The companion
roles are instead filled by Abigail and Kazran, who go on many
adventures in the TARDIS over the course of the episode. Despite
her approaching death being an important dramatic element of the
episode, Abigail's character isn't given nearly as much depth as
Kazran, although the scene where she has Christmas dinner with
her family is a real highlight. Her kind and selfless
personality is certainly distinct (that's the whole reason why
she's in Sardick's vault after all), and Katherine Jenkins' is
surprisingly good despite this being her acting debut, but I
feel like more time could have been dedicated to the
relationship between her and her family to make the ending seem
more tragic. That being said, there's only so much you can cram
into an hour and the cast do a great job of selling the emotions
involved and making you care about the characters regardless.
A Christmas Carol is a fantastic special, and my favourite of
the Matt Smith Christmas quadrilogy. It's well written,
directed, acted, and it's just a good episode overall. It has no
glaring issues and it's a very original and unique take on the
original Charles Dickens story, which is rare for a book that's
over a century old that's already been retold countless times.
Next: The Impossible Astronaut