There is a sense of “it’s about time” with this review as it aired while this blog was in full swing, as evidence from the following series being covered as it aired, but I remember being really busy that Christmas and a few weeks later I hadn’t written a review for it, and it was too long since I saw it. So, here we are! “The Return of Doctor Mysterio” is a tongue-in-cheek look at the Superhero genre, specifically Superman, which while not exactly Christmassy it did at least lend itself to having a lot of fun. So let’s take a look!

The Husbands of River Song is a funny one, not just because it is legitimately funny, but instead of focusing on anything too Christmassy it instead ties a neat bow around the complicated history between The Doctor and River Song, making this the adventure she had just before her final appearance (or first appearance, from our and The Doctor’s perspective). Does it work? Well… let’s find out!

Last Christmas is another fun mix of Christmas stuff and a good Doctor Who story, it’s pretty much Inception with facehuggers and Santa Claus, and if that doesn’t sell you on it, nothing will! It also teased a better ending for a companion that she actually got in the end, but there you go… Let’s take a look!

The Snowmen sees Steven Moffatt return to form, being a story both festive and fun but also a good story in its own right. It sees the return of several side characters from previous episode “A Good Man Goes to War” and the return of The Great Intelligence, from all the way back in the Second Doctor’s run. Do all these elements add up? Do they pay off enough to ignore yet another story in Victorian London?! Let’s find out!

So in the previous review I talked about how “A Christmas Carol” managed to be both festive and tell a good story, well, “The Doctor, The Widow and The Wardrobe” forgoes plot entirely to tell a story about kids at Christmas and give a sappy (and unearned) ending for the hell of it. It’s pretty poor, to put it politely. Want to know more? So do I frankly, but we’ll never know…

A Christmas Carol is certainly the most Christmassy Christmas story so far in the marathon, which shouldn’t be a surprise given the title. Christmas-ness aside the story is a fun one, with some good use of time travel (though one that sort of breaks all the rules that The Doctor has been following his whole life…), a good sense of humour throughout and a pleasant, soppy ending. So a pretty good Christmas story then! Let’s take a closer look…

On first glance you may see the title, find out that this story contains someone pretending to be The Doctor and think it’s a rip-off of another story that appeared in the this marathon, but actually that’s the only thing the two have in common, and “The Next Doctor” is a great story in its own right. So let’s take a look at the last Tenth Doctor Christmas Special in this countdown (having already covered his actual last special some time ago…)

Good old disaster movies, they’re… not my thing at all, but they do often get shown around Christmas, so the next Christmas Special being very much a Doctor Who version of that makes sense. It also has Kylie Minogue as a sort-of companion, which is pretty much all the advertising was leading into it, but hey-ho. It was a big deal! So let’s have a look at “Voyage of the Damned” and see if it holds up past the big guest!

Having already reviewed the first Tenth Doctor Christmas story a few years ago, we jump straight to the second. The Runaway Bride features the debut of future companion Donna Noble, and even dabbles in the Dark Times (which is relevant to the current Time Lord Victorious storyline being released…) Overall though it is what it was always meant to be: a fun Christmas story, with a bit of Doctor rehabilitation after losing Rose in the previous story. Let’s take a look then!