For over a decade, the whole family could gather around the TV on Christmas Day and watch a new Doctor Who Christmas special. These episodes were rarely as all-around well-executed as the series’ best episodes, but they were always packed with holiday spirit and undeniably fun to watch. No Christmas special exhibited these qualities more than the 2010 special, A Christmas Carol. Being both Steven Moffat and Matt Smith’s first Doctor Who Christmas special, it had quite a lot to live up to—and boy did it. I’d argue that A Christmas Carol is not only a great Doctor Who Christmas special but also a great episode of Doctor Who in general. Loosely adapting Charles Dickens’ classic book, A Christmas Carol, the special is jam-packed with Christmas spirit, spectacular performances, and a suitably timey-wimey plotline perfect for the 11th Doctor. It is easily my favorite Doctor Who Christmas special. (5 out of 5 wands.)

Doctor Who: A Christmas Carol (written by Steven Moffat, directed by Toby Haynes)
Amy (Karen Gillan) and Rory (Arthur Darvill) are trapped on a crashing space liner, and the only way the Doctor (Matt Smith) can rescue them is to save the soul of a lonely old miser, Kazran Sardick (Michael Gambon, Laurence Belcher, Danny Horn). But is Sardick, the richest man in Sardicktown, beyond redemption? And what is lurking in the fogs of Christmas Eve?