'Doctor Who' Christmas Special Clip Brings 'Joy' To Children In Need
Everyone up on the hotel floor, everybody Christmas dinosaur!
It’s that time of year again! The United Kingdom is gearing up for the Christmas season, and so they have their annual Children in Need telethon. And as always, the long-running sci-fi series Doctor Who has brought something that will bring smiles to the children’s faces. While last year had a scripted short starring David Tennant as the Fourteenth Doctor shortly before the 60th anniversary specials began, giving the brief incarnation some welcome additional screentime, but that’s not the case every year in the long intertwined histories. Usually, the show is armed with a preview clip of the most immediately upcoming episode. That’s exactly the case this year, with incumbent Fifteenth Doctor Ncuti Gatwa introducing a clip from this year’s Christmas special “Joy to the World”, premiering Christmas Day on the BBC in the UK and Disney+ everywhere else.
Very quickly it is revealed that Villengard is behind the hotel that we were introduced to by the clip shared at San Diego Comic-Con. They are the arms-manufacturing corporation that has been mentioned as far back as series 1’s “The Doctor Dances” and manufactured the fake war on the barren planet in last season’s “Boom”. As Steven Moffat, the episodes’ writer (no seriously, he wrote all three), put it “Imagine in the far, far future, imagine that a hotel chain got hold of the idea of time travel. What's the first thing a hotel chain would do if they had time travel? They'd realise they had an opportunity to sell all the unsold nights in their own hotels in history." Their “conflict solutions” contraption explains they’re creating a customizable infinite energy source, which the Doctor calls out as insane. Joy recognizes the voice, and it’s of the Silurian we saw in the hotel in the SDCC clip. His consciousness has been uploaded to the device interface. The Doctor mentions that a star seed going off leads to total extinction, but of course Villengard is like “If they die they die”. Doc tells them the math is off. They don’t have enough time. But then it becomes very evident that they’ve gone far beyond human history to make the proper harvest. They would need 65 million years. That long ago sure sounds familiar, and right on cue is a dinosaur. It takes a bite, as the room, a tropical treehouse leans toward its sharp-toothed maw.
Because of the time of year, Christmas specials are usually the episode that get preview clips broadcast, as started with the pre-credits teaser from 2008’s “The Next Doctor”. 2009’s “The End of Time” and 2010’s “A Christmas Carol” did not confine themselves to their cold opens, and as such preview clips going forward didn’t either. 2011 brought both a fourth wall-breaking minisode “The Naked Truth” and the preview clip for “The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe”. 2012 saw a “The Snowmen” trailer released with “The Great Detective” minisode. In 2013, the Christmas special was not next to air, the 50th anniversary special “The Day of the Doctor” was, so it was the preview clip brought. “Last Christmas”, “The Husbands of River Song”, “The Return of Doctor Mysterio” and “Twice Upon a Time” followed suit over the next four years. The last time a preview clip brought to the event was 2018, for series 11’s “Kerblam!”, making the first non-special to have that distinction.
The clip wasn’t the only thing the show brought this year however. Fans had the chance to bid on the TARDIS used on set for the 2022 New Year's Special “Eve of the Daleks”. It is the first revival-era TARDIS to be offered at auction. This is a damaged TARDIS design featuring unique red time fractures pattern on the exterior caused by the Doctor’s attempts to reset the TARDIS from the events of the Flux. They could also bid for the waitress’s costume worn by Kylie Minogue as Astrid Peth in the 2007 Christmas special “Voyage of the Damned”.
At the very least, the show’s next anniversary on November 23 will be marked with the release of deleted scenes from the most recent season. Maybe there will be some extra surprises. “Joy to the World” then premieres Christmas Day on the BBC in the UK and Disney+ everywhere else.
Ssources: What’s On Disney Plus, TARDIS Wiki