Doctor Who: A Christmas Carol Review

 

There are so many adaptations of A Christmas Carol out there ranging from ones starring The Muppets to more serious adaptations. Yet there's always one version of this classic story that people really do tend to forget about for one reason or another with that one very episode also being the very one that i'm about to talk about today and so then join me as I review the episode that sees a great actor make his one and only Doctor Who appearance with the episode in question being called simply just "A Christmas Carol" enjoy.

The plot of the episode is The Doctor has just one hour to convince a greedy and really reluctant old man to help him save the lives of over four thousand people who about to crash their spaceship on Christmas Day. Now then interms of what I personally thought / felt about the actual plot that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought that the actual plot that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode was in all honesty not that bad with this episodes plot being the kid of plot that you'd expect a Doctor Who Christmas episode to have in that it's a bit of fun and really isn't meant to be taken all that seriously with the plot itself being a rather really entertaining and as well as being rather engaging plot in my freaking opinions anyways  / at least.

Starring in this episode is Matt Smith as The Doctor , Karen Gillan as Amy Pond and Arthur Darvill as Rory Williams. Also starring in this episode is Sir Michael Gambon as Kazran and Elliot Sardick , Katherine Jenkins as Abigail , Laurence Belcher as Young Kazran , Danny Horn as Adult Kazran , Leo Bill as The Pilot , Pooky Quesnel as The Captain , Micah Balfour –as The Co-Pilot , Steve North as Old Benjamin , Bailey Pepper as Boy and Benjamin , Tim Plester as The Servant , Laura Rogers as Isabella and Meg Wynn-Owen as Old Isabella.

Now then interms of what personally thought / felt about the actual acting that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual acting that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode was in all honesty really good. With alot of this episodes cast  turning in some really good performances in this episode was the same thing also being true for singer Katherine Jenkins who despite being a relative newcomer to the acting world manages to hold her own when acting with the likes of Sir Micheal Gambon and Matt Smith something which couldn't have been an easy task with the acting really being helped by this episodes script which whilst it's not the best Doctor Who Christmas script out there it's alot better then what it really should or perhaps even  could have been.

Doing the CGI for this episode is of course the legends and the greats that are currently over at The Mill and Real SFX. Now then interms of what I personally thought / felt about the actual CGI that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual CGI that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode was in all honesty not that bad. However that's also the issue as alot of this episodes CGI is really dated in all of the wrong ways as while this episodes would have been really impressive back in 2010 compared to today's standards the CGI in this episode does look rather cartoonish with the worst of those coming from the cloud effects which do look like a cartoon and not something you'd expect to see in a live action TV show.

As with all adaptations of the A Christmas Carol storyline at it the core of this story is the romance between Kazran and Abigail. With the two going from friends to dating each other however it's the romance part of the episode that just doesn't work as it's something that's incredibly rushed despite it being rather well thought out and heck out of all of their scenes together there are only two technically three scenes where both Abigail and Kazran are alone with each other without The Doctor and that's not really strong enough to get across that these two are really falling for each other this wouldn't be a big deal if their romance wasn't a key plot point and yet there romance is a key plot point and as such the two really should have had more scenes alone together so that there relationship could be more fully developed and be alot more believable then what it is in the final cut episode.

What was rather interesting is that alot of the characters in this episode do have counterparts in A Christmas Carol. With The Doctor taking on the mentle of The Ghost Of Christmas Past and The Ghost Of Christmas Yet To Come, Amy taking on The Ghost Of Christmas Present , Kazran is Scrooge , Abigail is a mixture of Belle and Tiny Tim and the main family in this episode is The Cratchet family heck the only one who doesn't get a book counterpart is Rory who it could be argued does share the role of the Ghost Of Christmas Present with Amy but that would be stretching as Amy spends alot more time in that role then Rory does but either way seeing these character fill out these rather iconic roles in a new a fresh way was rather interesting with Kazran's father Elliot basically play the Jacob Marley only he doesn't come to warn his son that he's going to be visited by three ghosts.

As is to expected by pretty much all of the Steven Moffat Christmas Specials this one is alot more lighter in tone. Which does make alot of sense as they could use this episode to get whole families to sit down and watch this episode with their kids and not have to worry about there kids seeing something that might either be to mature or to scary and plus with this episode being a Christmas Special you do generally want to watch something that's just a little bit more lighter in tone and while this episode does hint at Amy being pregnant in this episode which might cause a continuity problem with an episode later on in the series it is still a rather lighter and a more fun episode fun filled episode to watch and for Christmas Day viewing that's kind of what you want anyways as you really don't want to watch something that's rather really dark in tone on Christmas Day.

Now then while I cannot for the absolutely life of me remember whatever this episode grand total running time even was I do know for a fact that this episode has / had an exact grand total running time of roughly one hour and one minuet. Which was a rather solid running time for this episode for this episode to have but at the same time tho this episode doesn't really take fully advantage of it's longer as it's new characters aren't fully developed and so they don't really come across as being that memorable with the same thing also being true for the romance between Kazran and Abigail both of which are things that could have been given alot more time and attention as the episode has alot more time in order to fully time in order to fully tell it's story but I will admit that this episode really does gave some fairly solid pacing to it tho.

So now then as this is an action show that means that I have to actually talk about the actual action that's actually featured /presented to us in this very episode well then n all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual actin that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode was in all honesty not that bad. With this episode not really having alot of action in it as it is a more lighthearted episode but what little action we do get was rather fun and as to be expected from a Stephan Moffat script was also rather flashy and full to the brim with cheesy and fun moments and while the action in  this episode wasn't as good as the action in other Doctor Who episode it was still some really good action that was rather exciting when it needed to be and just downright fun to watch in my freaking opinions anyways / at least.

Overall if your not a fan of Stephan Moffat's scripts then this one won't win you over but as a Doctor Who Christmas Special Episode that's just meant to be a piece if light entertainment this was a rather solid episode in my freaking opinions anyways / at least. Now then i've talked about all of the good and as well as all of the bad things that are in this very episode in this very review and as such that means that this very episode earns itself a grand old score of exactly a 6 out of 10 from me.

Now then as for where I personally got all of the images that I personally used in this very review well then boys and girls and as well as ladies and gentlemen I personally got all of the images that I personally in this very review from the official Doctor Who fandom wiki page , Amazon . Co . Uk and Google Images. With my personally preferred website to use to get the images from these very episode that I used in this very review being Google Images simply just due to the fact that alot of the images that are on Google Images  are all really fairly high in quality and as well as them all being really fairly freaking high in definition.

A Christmas Carol 2019 Miniseries Review

British TV fans we are just a few days until December 25th and that means that every TV channel is either full of repeats or full of special episodes from our favourite TV shows. Well in order to kind of buck that trend the BBC together with American Network FX are releasing a new version of A Christmas Carol and while here in the UK the special will be broadcast from December 22nd to the 24th in America it was aired I believe as one full film one full nearly THREE HOUR film and so here is my review of "A Christmas Carol 2019" enjoy.

Now I don't really feel that I need to well you what the plot of this series since the book is so well known and so is the story. I will say tho that I don't really like how they handled this story yes it is dark as hell and more closer in tone to the original book but they add so much un-needed subplots and expand roles that don't need expanding. I honestly feel that the story should have been kept simple and not complicate things with un-needed subplots.

Starring in this miniseries is Guy Pearce as Ebenezer Scrooge , Andy Serkis as Ghost of Christmas Past , Stephen Graham as Jacob Marley , Charlotte Riley as Lottie/Ghost of Christmas Present , Joe Alwyn as Bob Cratchit , Vinette Robinson as Mary Cratchit , Jason Flemyng as Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come , Kayvan Novak as Ali Baba , Lenny Rush as Tiny Tim and Johnny Harris as Franklin Scrooge.

One of the things that this miniseries got praise for was the performance of Guy Pearce as Ebenezer Scrooge and it's not hard to see why since he is so good in this. The rest of cast also really do deliver a solid performance and given who's involved with the miniseries is that really something that is shocking because there are alot of great actors in this miniseries and all of them are truly great solid actors.

For some reason in America this is I believe being aired as one film which to me makes no sense at all since FX could have got more viewers by airing it daily. It also would have made it more watchable since no one likes watching a three hour programme in one sitting and so by doing so they are not only getting rid of any viewers they could have had they are also making whoever watches it struggle because it's three freaking hours long.

This is a co-production between the BBC and American network FX which I believe is now owned by Disney. For some reason tho even the BBC  are co-producing and possibly co-funding it it's the Americans who got to air the miniseries first which to me isn't a good thing because this is an English classic so we should get to air the special first or even at the same time as them not days later it's just baffling to me if i'm being honest and yes this does count as a British thing since it was produced here in the UK and was filmed here and has an English cast.

As anyone will tell you a big part of A Christmas Carol are the three spirits and they are rightfully treated with alot of respect and given alot of screen time in this miniseries. Altho for some reason Christmas Past is given the most screen time appearing in most of the first , all of the second and alot of the third parts I get that Andy Serkis is a big name but the other two are just as important to the story and they should have been given more screen time.

Now I said before that someone get's an expanded role in this miniseries and while I won't spoil who that someone is I do feel that it overall wasn't something that was needed. Giving that someone an expanded role overall adds nothing to the story and they honestly would have been better of keeping the small role for that someone that they've always had increasing their role just pretty much feels like filler which is something I can also say about the first episode which just felt like filler to me it was their for padding and very little else.

Whichever way you look at it this would have been a difficult book to adapt into three hour long episodes since the book it self is I believe very short. Even so it's not impossible but this miniseries while it does stick more to the tone of the book it isn't a faithful adaptation of the book with many scenes and whole characters cut out for no reason and this is really evident in the first episode which like I said feels like filler with very little of what's going on actually playing a part in the overall story.

If they wanted to add things then great do that but have them play a part in the story don't just have them be there because you have time to fill. Heck maybe even during the Christmas Past segment they could have seen what Scrooge's home life was like and see how that effected him as an adult we could have spent time delving into the psychology of the character thus helping understand more why he is the way he is and that would then make it more satisfying when he does change for the better at the end of the story.

Another change that this miniseries made was the fact that they made Scrooge really evil and I know that sounds weird to say but in all the other versions of the story he was always a nasty person but never full on evil. Here tho he's evil fully he mentally abuses a married woman just for kicks and reduces the quality of timber used in a mine that he owns knowing full well it could and in this case does cost the lives of several employees. This is something that just isn't needed because now it's harder to cheer for him when he does start to become good and I have to wonder why did they choose to make him so evil when how he's been presented in the past worked best.

Overall while this miniseries isn't bad it's also not that good either I don't claim to have read the book indeed those statements i've made before are educated cases based of what people have said and what comments i've seen. I do feel tho that even the most die hard fans of this book will either really like this version for being closer to the tone of the book or will really hate for all the things it takes out and so for me this miniseries this VERY long miniseries gets a 7 out of 10 from me.