It is Christmas, but there is little cause for celebration as the Earth is invaded by the alien Sycorax. It is up to Rose and the newly-regeneratedTenth Doctor to save the world once again, with a bit of help from her boyfriend Mickey and her mother Jackie. But will the Doctor recover in time, and can Rose trust a Doctor with a new and unfamiliar face?
It is Christmas Eve; as Jackie prepares presents and Mickey works in the garage, both of them hear the distinctive sound of the TARDIS engines. Rushing out into the street of the Powell Estate, they see the TARDIS blink into existence above them, ricochet off a few buildings, then come to a crashing halt. A strange man stumbles out of the police box doors, greets them by name and wishes them a Merry Christmas before collapsing. Rose follows and, to Jackie and Mickey's questions, identifies the stranger as the Doctor.
They bring the Doctor to Jackie's flat and dress him in pyjamas belonging to Howard, Jackie's current beau, who has the habit of keeping pieces of fruit in his pocket for snacks. While Rose discusses the Doctor's change of appearance with Jackie, they do not see a wisp of vortex energy emerging from the Doctor's mouth, which then floats into space. On television, Prime MinisterHarriet Jones and project director Daniel Llewellyn give a press conference about the Guinevere One space probe, which is about to land on Mars. In space, however, the probe is swallowed up by an island-like spaceship.
That evening, Rose and Mickey go Christmas shopping, but are attacked by a group of masked Santas armed with lethal musical instruments. Managing to escape when the tuba mortar brings a giant Christmas tree down on the Santas, Rose realises that the Santas must be after the Doctor. She and Mickey rush home. When they reach the flat, Rose notices an unfamiliar Christmas tree in the sitting room, which Jackie says was delivered to the door. As they realise that none of them purchased the tree, it comes to life, whirling around with razor-sharp branches.
The three retreat to the bedroom, the "Christmas tree" in hot pursuit. Rose places the sonic screwdriver in the still-comatose Doctor's hand and asks him to help her. Reacting instinctively, the Doctor rises as the tree bursts through the door and disintegrates the tree with the screwdriver. He then strides outside the flat to see who was remotely controlling the tree. From ground level, the Santas stare up at the Doctor, but transmat away when the Doctor points the sonic screwdriver at them. The Doctor calls them "pilot fish" and collapses in pain, saying that Rose woke him up too soon: he is still regenerating. The energy leaking from him has attracted attention, and if the "pilot fish" could trace it, then something bigger is coming. He then loses consciousness again.
The first signal from Guinevere One arrives: a distinctly alien face, which is soon broadcast all over the world. Llewellyn is escorted by Major Blake to the Tower of London, which houses a facility run by the United Nations Intelligence Taskforce (UNIT). There, he meets the Prime Minister and her aide, Alex, who tell him that the cover story is that a student in a mask hacked into the television signal. Llewellyn is shaken to realize that extraterrestrial life does exist, and that both the British government and the United Nations are aware of this. A technician, Sally Jacobs, explains that the signal did not come from Mars but 5000 miles above the planet's surface, which means that there is a ship, and it is moving rapidly towards Earth.
As Rose and Mickey use his laptop to monitor UNIT's readings, the aliens send another signal. The aliens speak in their own language, but Rose does not understand it. Normally, the TARDIS would translate it for her, but it seems that with the Doctor unconscious, that function is not working.
At UNIT, Blake orders the use of translation software. With no sign of the Doctor, Jones asks Blake about "Torchwood". She knows that she is not supposed to know about them — not even the United Nations knows — but she wants them to be ready.
The software rather imprecisely translates the message. The aliens are the Sycorax, and they are claiming the planet as their own, demanding surrender or "they" will die. Their word for "human" also appears to be similar to that of "cattle", temporarily baffling UNIT. Jones declines to surrender, warning the Sycorax that the planet is armed. As dawn rises over London, the Sycorax respond. With a wave of the leader's hand, blue energy sweeps over a third of the world's population, mesmerising them. The mind-controlled people, Sally Jacobs amongst them, climb to the highest spots they can find (primarily the roofs of buildings), and stand at the edge, poised to jump.
Checking the UNIT staff's medical records, Llewellyn discovers that all the affected people have A+ blood. The Sycorax found the sample of A+ blood that was sent with other materials on Guinevere One to identify the human race in case of alien contact, and are somehow using that as a control mechanism. Desperate now, Jones gives an emergency broadcast on television, pleading for the Doctor's help if he is out there. She also informs the public that the Queen's Christmas speech has been cancelled because the Royal Family are "on the roof".
Just then, the shockwave of the Sycorax ship entering the atmosphere shatters windows all over the city; the gigantic craft takes position above the centre of London as the frightened population watch. Rose, driven to despair by the Doctor's comatose state and not knowing what else to do, asks Mickey and Jackie to help move the Doctor to the safety of the TARDIS. Jackie gathers food and other supplies, including a thermos flask of tea.
The Sycorax transmat Jones, Alex, Blake and Llewellyn up to their ship. The leader removes his helmet, revealing a skinless face surrounded by a mantle of bone. His hand hovering over a large glowing button, he demands immediate surrender, or he will order the controlled humans to jump. Llewellyn tries to reason with the Sycorax, but is reduced to a pile of bones by the leader's energy whip, as is Blake when he protests. Half of the world will be sold into slavery or a third will die; it is Jones's choice.
As Rose and Mickey move the Doctor into the console room, Jackie goes back to get more supplies. Rose, having apparently given up, broods by the console as Mickey tries to use the TARDIS scanner to tune into what is happening; but the time machine's advanced technology is detected by the Sycorax. Outside, Jackie watches helplessly as the TARDIS is transmatted up. Not realising that they are aboard the Sycorax ship, Rose steps out of the TARDIS, and screams when she sees the aliens. Mickey rushes out after her, dropping the flask of tea, which spills and starts dripping through the grilles at the base of the console next to the Doctor's unconscious form. He breathes in the fumes created as the tea sparks against various components.
Rose tries to bluff the Sycorax by quoting various things and races she has encountered on her travels, commanding them to leave, but is answered with laughter. The Sycorax leader taunts her attempts to pass off second-hand knowledge as authority, but as he gloats, his alien words start turning into English. Rose realises that the TARDIS translation is working again, and that can mean only one thing. On cue, the doors of the police box open and the Doctor stands there, smiling as he says, "Did you miss me?"
Easily deactivating the Sycorax leader's energy whip and breaking his staff, the Doctor bluntly tells the alien to wait while he gets more important things out of the way; namely, getting reacquainted with his friends. Disappointed at not being ginger haired, and somewhat annoyed at Rose's speed in giving up on him, he tells them that all he needed was a "good cup of tea; a superheated infusion of free radicals and tannin. Just the thing for heating the synapses." As the Sycorax leader demands to know who he is, the Doctor blithely strides across the ship's floor, nattering on cheerfully and still working out what his personality is like in this new incarnation. He walks up to the glowing button, discovers that it is powered by blood, and quickly deduces about the blood control. The Doctor tells the leader that in his unstable state, when he sees a large glowing button he just cannot help himself — and to everyone's shock, pushes it.
However, instead of sending the possessed crowds on Earth to their deaths, it simply releases them from the Sycorax control. The Doctor explains that blood control is like hypnosis: you cannot hypnotise a person to death as the survival instinct is too strong. The Sycorax were bluffing, and the Doctor merely called them on it. The leader says that they can still conquer Earth with an armada, but the Doctor demands that the humans be left alone, challenging the leader to single combat for the planet.
The swordfight goes from inside the ship to its exterior, but the Doctor is clearly disadvantaged, and in the midst of it, the leader cuts the Doctor's hand off. However, the Doctor is still in the first 15 hours of his regeneration cycle, and regrows his hand, which allows him to gain an advantage over the Sycorax leader and triumph. Holding the leader at sword point at the ship's edge, the Doctor extracts an oath from the leader to leave the planet and never return, in return for the Doctor sparing his life. As the Doctor walks back, celebrating his victory with Rose, the leader tries a final attack whilst the Doctor's back is turned, but the Doctor calmly bounces a satsuma he finds in Howard's dressing gown off a control button, opening a section of the ship's wing beneath the leader and sending the alien plunging to his death. The new Doctor is not a man willing to grant second chances.
The Doctor sends the other Sycorax on their way with a reminder that the planet Earth is defended. Transmatted back to London, Jones asks if there are more aliens out there and the Doctor notes that there are thousands; the human race is being noticed more and more. As Jones ponders this, visibly troubled, Alex receives a telephone call and quietly informs Jones that Torchwood is ready. Jones seems reluctant, but nevertheless gives the order to fire. Five green beams converge as one over London, and the resulting energy burst destroys the Sycorax ship as it heads into space.
The Doctor glares at Jones, furious, but she tries to justify the use of the weapon (engineered from a crashed spaceship ten years previously) as defending the planet, especially since the Doctor cannot be there all the time. The Doctor bitterly says he should have warned the Sycorax to run as the real monsters, the humans, are coming. When Jones asks if she should consider the Doctor another alien enemy, the Doctor warns her that he can bring down her government with just six words. He whispers them in Alex's ear: "Don't you think she looks tired?"
Jackie, Mickey and Rose serve Christmas dinner in the flat. The Doctor looks through the TARDIS wardrobe, finally settling on a brown pinstripe suit and a long brown coat. He joins the others for dinner, and they watch Harriet Jones on the television, fending off rumours about her ill-health and a pending vote of no confidence in the House of Commons. Outside, what looks like snow is falling over London, accompanied by shooting stars, but the Doctor points out that it is, in fact, ash — the remains of the Sycorax spaceship. It is a new start for Earth, however; with so many people seeing the Sycorax ship, there is no covering up the existence of aliens this time.
But there are new worlds to see and explore. With a now-trusting Rose by his side and eager to continue their travels, the Doctor looks up into the sky to choose a star for their next destination, assuring her that it will be, in the words of his previous incarnation, "fantastic".
The TARDIS has collided with other objects in flight before, with a Skonnon spacecraft in The Horns of Nimon, and missiles in Timelash and The Parting of the Ways.
The Tenth Doctor speaks with an Estuary English accent, in contrast to the Ninth Doctor's Northern one. In a December 23 interview on BBC Radio 1, Tennant explained that a line had been scripted for the Christmas special explaining that the newly regenerated Doctor had imprinted on Rose's accent, "like a chick hatching from an egg," but the line was cut from the final programme. He also briefly affects an American Appalachian accent.
During the Doctor's first scene with Jackie and Mickey, David Tennant's performance nearly causes actor Noel Clarke to corpse. He turns his face away from the Doctor and the camera in order not to ruin the shot as the Doctor says, "Merry Christmas!".
Just before the opening credits sequence, Jackie says the line "Doctor? Doctor who?", continuing the long-running in-joke.
Upon hearing that the Doctor has two hearts, Jackie asks "[Is there] anything else he's got two of?" In a line cut from the 1996 television film, Grace Holloway asks the Eighth Doctor a similar question once she finally accepts that he does have two hearts.
The ability of the TARDIS to translate languages was first described as a "Time Lord gift" by the Fourth Doctor in The Masque of Mandragora (1976). Although not stated in the television series, fans came to assume over the years that this ability was a function of the TARDIS. In The End of the World (2005), the Ninth Doctor confirmed that it was part of the TARDIS's telepathic field. Although the canonicity of the novels is uncertain, the 1995 Virgin New Adventures novel Set Piece by Kate Orman first established that the Doctor needed to be alive for the TARDIS's translation function to work.
Major Blake comments that Martians look completely different from the Sycorax, which could be a reference to the Ice Warriors. The first on-screen Ice Warrior attack against Earth was in the mid-21st century, in The Seeds of Death (1969), but a chronologically earlier encounter involving Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (and thus possibly UNIT as well) was alluded to by the Fifth Doctor in Castrovalva (1982). Blake could also be referring to the 1997 Ice Warrior invasion of Earth in the Virgin New Adventures novel The Dying Days by Lance Parkin.
Blake was not given a first name in the episode or any of the cast lists released to the press. The UNIT website, however, gives his first name as Richard. In a cast list published in Doctor Who Magazine #361, Alex's last name was given as Klein.
The story of the Doctor Who spin-off Torchwood is "seeded" in this special and in the subsequent 2006 season.
Although not explained in the episode, Mickey is presumably able to tap into the UNIT computers thanks to the Doctor's backdoor password, first used in World War Three.
The Big Ben clock tower is shown with scaffolding around it, in the process of being rebuilt since Aliens of London.
The Doctor asks Rose for her opinion of his new appearance despite the two having had a similar conversation in the Children in Need mini-episode. However, Rose never actually answered him in the mini-episode and, given his condition, he may also have forgotten that the conversation occurred.
Although the Ninth Doctor stated at the end of World War Three that Jones would be elected for three successive terms, her status as Prime Minister appears in jeopardy at the end of The Christmas Invasion which takes place during her first term. How this will turn out is, as yet, uncertain, although the commentary for this episode implies that her career does not survive.
The redesigned TARDIS wardrobe is shown as a multi-storey area in the TARDIS with a spiral staircase. In the original series, the TARDIS wardrobe was mentioned several times, and seen in The Twin Dilemma and Time and the Rani. Although the wardrobe was mentioned in The Unquiet Dead, this is the first time any part of the TARDIS beyond the console room has been shown on screen in the new series. In the New Series Adventures novel Only Human, Jack Harkness visited the wardrobe, and in The Stealers of Dreams, several other rooms were also visited.
A burgundy scarf resembling the one worn by the Fourth Doctor can be seen in some of the wardrobe scenes — this is a replica owned by producer Phil Collinson, made for him by his grandmother when he was a child. (The Doctor's scarf was seen to be unravelled in Castrovalva, but it is likely that he had more than one. The Seventh and Eighth Doctors also tried on long scarves after their regenerations, in Time and the Rani and the 1996 television film, respectively.) Also, the first outfit the Doctor picks from the rail is (or looks similar to) an outfit worn by David Tennant in Casanova. According to the commentary for this episode on the BBC's official website, all of the costumes from the Doctor's nine previous incarnations are included somewhere in the wardrobe.
At his request, David Tennant was credited as "The Doctor" rather than "Doctor Who" as Christopher Eccleston had been in Series 1, the first appearance of the definite article since Episode 3 of Survival (1989). However when one plays the DVD commentary in the Complete Second Series Box Set, the credit reverts back to "Doctor Who". No reason has been given for this.
The "Complete Second Series" box set includes several deleted scenes from the episode, most notably a moment on the Sycorax ship in which the Tenth Doctor attempts to utter the Ninth Doctor's catchphrase, "Fantastic!" but is unable to do so due to his new teeth (as referenced at the end of Parting of the Ways). The Doctor's later successful use of the word in the final scene is a reference to this cut sequence. Other deleted scenes included Danny Llewellyn complaining that UNIT has a mission control and that the Guinevere One team doesn't have one.
The Christmas special is a tradition in British television series. While this is the first story for Doctor Who clearly labelled as a Christmas special, the seventh episode of The Daleks' Master Plan, titled "The Feast of Steven", was written as a Christmas episode, even featuring a fourth wall-breaking Christmas wish to the viewers by William Hartnell. Although not shown at Christmas, The Unquiet Dead was set on Christmas Eve, 1869.
The episode's opening shot is a repeat of the opening shot of Rose, using a new arrangement of the same music.
During the live broadcast, the front page of the official BBC website stated: "THE CHRISTMAS INVASION is on BBC One NOW. HARRIET JONES SAYS: Switch this website off for Britain."[1]
The tie-in website "Who is Doctor Who?" was also updated with a message from Mickey referencing the Guinevere One website, and an appeal to the Doctor to bring back Rose.[2]
The cone-shaped building which has all its glass blown out from the ship's shockwave is 30 St Mary Axe, also known as the Swiss Re Building or "The Gherkin".
The climactic scenes of the episode were shot on location at Wallis House, Brentford, one of the Golden Mile's few remaining Art Deco buildings, directly opposite the Clayponds Avenue location for Invasion of the Dinosaurs.
The prototype of the Sycorax swords was auctioned on eBay to raise funds for the Great Ormond Street Hospital Children's Charity.[3] It raised £920.51.[4]
Music
The song playing during the wardrobe sequence, "Song for Ten" (named in reference to the Tenth Doctor), was composed by Murray Gold for the episode and sung by Tim Phillips.[5] The last time an original song was written for the series was "The Ballad of the Last Chance Saloon" in The Gunfighters (1966). "Song for Ten" is also featured as a slower, instrumental version near the end of the episode School Reunion.
The closing credits had a new theme arrangement restoring the traditional "middle eight" section of the theme which had been omitted in the 2005 series. This was performed by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, conducted by the series' composer Murray Gold. This arrangement was subsequently used for the closing titles of the 2006 series.[6] The Canadian broadcast used a different version without the middle eight for its Coming Soon trailer.
Various pieces of music featured in this episode were released in December 2006 as part of the Doctor Who Soundtrack (produced by Silva Screen). These included the "Song for Ten", the music played behind Harriet Jones' speech and the music played as the spaceship arrives over London. The version of "Song for Ten" released on the soundtrack, however, is not the version from the episode; this is a newly recorded version with vocals sung by Neil Hannon and additional lyrics referring to the events of the season finale, "Doomsday.
Outside references
The BBC tie-in website for the Guinevere One project indicates that the landing is supposed to take place on Christmas Day, 2006,[7] much like the Beagle 2 probe was supposed to in 2003. Had Beagle 2 landed successfully, its call signal to Earth was to have been a specially-arranged piece of music by the band Blur which contained elements of the Doctor Who theme tune.
At the start of Rose and Mickey's shopping trip a Routemaster bus is very briefly shown, presumably as a device to indicate that the episode is taking place in contemporary London. Most Routemasters were withdrawn from service on 9 December2005, approximately two weeks before the show was broadcast in the UK, and at least one year before the date on which the episode is supposedly set. However a small number of these buses remain on the streets of London serving "heritage" routes aimed principally at the nostalgia market.
The British Government plan to cover up the Sycorax's initial appearance by claiming it was a student in a mask hacking into the signal. A 1987 broadcast in Chicago of the Doctor Who serial Horror of Fang Rock was interrupted in this way with the hacker wearing a Max Headroom mask (See: Max Headroom Pirating Incident), while in 1977, a voice claiming to be Vrillon of the "Ashtar Galactic Command" broke into the signal belonging to the Southern Television region of ITV.
The Sycorax's scheme is similar to that used by the villain in the 1977 pilot for The Amazing Spider-Mantelevision series. The villain, a self-help guru, used post-hypnotic suggestion via radio signals to make his clients climb tall buildings, threatening to make them jump unless he received a ransom from the city.
The Sycorax, with their "curse"-like blood control technology and bone-motif costumes bear a passing resemblance to Faction Paradox, a time-travelling voodoo cult created by Lawrence Miles that were recurring villains in the Eighth Doctor Adventures novels.[8]
Harriet Jones responds to the US President's request to take command of the situation by replying, "He's not my boss, and he's certainly not turning this into a war," a reference to the popular perception that Tony Blair obediently followed George W. Bush's wishes in relation to the Iraq War.[9]
The Doctor's right hand is severed in a swordfight on the surface of the Sycorax spacecraft. His hand (and sword) tumble to the Earth far below, in a shot reminiscent of what happens to Luke Skywalker at the climax of the movie The Empire Strikes Back. Another Star Wars moment is when Torchwood fires its weapon, a five-beam laser system which converges to a single beam, not unlike the Death Star. The fate of the sword is addressed in an interactive "mini-mission" that starts at Mickey's website.[10] The fate of the hand itself is revealed in the Torchwood episode Everything Changes.
Jones's order to destroy the retreating Sycorax ship is a reference to Margaret Thatcher's decision to attack the General Belgrano in the Falklands War. The Doctor's six words that would bring down Jones's administration are a reference to rumours about how Thatcher looked tired at the end of her term of office in 1990.[11]
Popular culture allusions and in-jokes
This episode had a higher than usual number of allusions to popular culture.
The organisation that developed the spaceprobe, as mentioned on the website, is the British Rocket Group. Its logo is half-seen in the background during the televised press conference. This is a reference to the British Experimental Rocket Group from the Quatermass serials of the 1950s. The British Rocket Group was first mentioned in Doctor Who in Remembrance of the Daleks (1988). David Tennant starred in the 2005 BBC remake of The Quatermass Experiment as Dr Gordon Briscoe.
When the Sycorax leader demands to know who the Doctor is, the Doctor bows his arms and distorts his voice in imitation of Monty PythonGumbies, saying "I don't know!"
When the Doctor is trying to persuade the Sycorax leader to spare humanity, he finds himself quoting the first few lines of the song "Circle of Life" from the Walt Disney animated film, The Lion King (1994). Later, his command to "leave this planet and never return," with the Sycorax leader backed up to the edge of a lethal fall, mirrors one of the movie's final scenes.
Arthur Dent is mentioned by the Doctor, in reference both to the dressing gown he is wearing (the Doctor comments on how saving the world while in a dressing gown is very much like Dent), and to his being revived by Dent's favourite drink, tea. The Doctor previously quoted The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in Ghost Light; and mentions Oolon Colluphid in Destiny of the Daleks. Whether the Doctor actually met Dent or if he was just teasing Rose is unclear. The late Douglas Adams, the creator of Hitchhiker's Guide, was script editor for Doctor Who during 1979-1980, and wrote or co-wrote the serials The Pirate Planet, City of Death and Shada. At the time The Christmas Invasion was in production, a big-screen adaptation of Hitchhiker's had just been released. Coincidentally, both that film and this episode contain an identical joke ("Anything else he's got two of?"). Remarkably, in Adams' book Life, the Universe, and Everything, a group called the Silastic Armorfiends of Striterax play a crucially important part. The "Sycorax" and "Striterax" are very similar in pronunciation, as well as in their respective attitudes (i.e., fighting for the sake of fighting).
More significantly for the series, the Torchwood subplot itself seeds the upcoming spin-off.
Broadcast and DVD release
A "Coming Soon" trailer was shown at the end of this episode, featuring brief clips from the forthcoming series (up to The Age of Steel).
This was the first original episode of Doctor Who ever to premiere on a Sunday. (Although for a period in the mid-1970s, BBC Wales premiered the series on Sunday rather than Saturday evenings, one day after the rest of the UK had seen the episodes).
Immediately after The Christmas Invasion, digital viewers were able to press their "red button" to view a special interactive episode, Attack of the Graske written by Gareth Roberts and starring Tennant as the Doctor.
Overnight ratings for the episode gave a peak viewing audience of 9.8 million viewers, and an average of 9.4 — the second highest rated programme of the evening, behind EastEnders.[12]
The Canadian presentation on the CBC on December 26 2005 was hosted by Piper, who was attired for the occasion in a red Roots "Canada" sweatshirt. The episode was scheduled in a 90-minute long slot; as the episode and the presentations took less than the allotted time, the rest of the broadcast was filled with the start of two episodes of the animated programme Creature Comforts, which was set for the following 30-minute slot.
This episode was released together with New Earth as a basic DVD with no special features on 1 May2006, and as part of a second series boxset on 20 November 2006. This release included an in-vision commentary with Russell T. Davies, Julie Gardner (Head of Drama for BBC Wales) and Phil Collinson, recorded before the story aired. This commentary was also made available as an MP3 on the BBC Doctor Who website.[13]
On 3 December 2005, the annual Christmas edition of the BBC's listings magazine Radio Times was released, featuring a Doctor Who cover to tie-in with The Christmas Invasion.[14] This was the first time Doctor Who had featured on the Christmas edition cover in the show's forty-two year history, and the first Christmas cover for an individual BBC television drama since EastEnders in 1986. The Christmas Radio Times cover usually features artwork of a generic Christmas scene.
As confirmed by Russell T. Davies in the episode commentary, the Doctor Who section of that issue of the Radio Times contains a hidden message explaining what saves the Doctor: many of the paragraphs in the articles have an oversized first letter, which taken consecutively spell out "A cup of tea" (in the manner of an acrostic).
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