Doctor Who: Joy to the World
December 25, 2024 10:35 AM - Season 15 (Specials) - Subscribe
When Joy (Nicola Coughlan) opens a secret doorway to the Time Hotel, she discovers danger, dinosaurs and the Doctor. But a deadly plan is unfolding across the earth, just in time for Christmas.
Directed by Alex Pillai. Written by Steven Moffat.
Directed by Alex Pillai. Written by Steven Moffat.
Totally confusing and utter schlock, so a pretty typical Moffat episode in my experience. The only fun and interesting part was the Doctor's year in the hotel. Also, the final scene? Come on.
posted by fight or flight at 11:11 AM on December 25, 2024 [1 favorite]
posted by fight or flight at 11:11 AM on December 25, 2024 [1 favorite]
The year in the hotel is everything I really loved about Moffat's writing; for all his weaknesses, and they are legion, I don't think any other writer for this show ever had as much fun with the dramatic possibilities of time travel.
The rest of it is what I kind of don't like about Moffat's writing, although I can accept The Doctor just never learning the code as a goof on the puzzle-box excesses that had so much to do with why I stopped watching this show when Moffat ran it. Steven Moffat, of all people, saying that a wizard did it, that it's just a TV show and I should really just relax, is some funny stuff.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 1:11 PM on December 25, 2024 [3 favorites]
The rest of it is what I kind of don't like about Moffat's writing, although I can accept The Doctor just never learning the code as a goof on the puzzle-box excesses that had so much to do with why I stopped watching this show when Moffat ran it. Steven Moffat, of all people, saying that a wizard did it, that it's just a TV show and I should really just relax, is some funny stuff.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 1:11 PM on December 25, 2024 [3 favorites]
Loved it. And I tend not to enjoy the Xmas Specials. Maybe the premise was a bit convoluted but as always Moffat makes the non-linear, timey-wimey stuff work. Even the structure of the episode plays with time on a meta level.
The year in the hotel stuff was great. The COVID backstory for Joy was wonderful - especially since a show like Doctor Who might have never addressed it, even though it often visits historically significant moments.
It's also a post-Ruby story that deals with the emotional fallout from that. And Moffat finds another way to dig into the Doctor as a character and deconstruct him a little - the no chairs thing is so obvious and here it says a lot.
I think Nicola Coughlan got a little shortchanged, since she's not in about half the episode, but she is the emotional/dramatic centre and she makes that work.
I also don't mind that Moffat loves to recycle some of his own ideas because building on the show's own history can make it feel cohesive. Oh he's got a technology that is both life threatening and allows you to live on after you die? Fine. It works for the story and gives the tech an emotional resonance.
I hate that the show is parcelled out in small chunks over the year so I appreciate even a middling episode once in a while. But I thought this was solid. Still not enough to keep me satisfied until the next season though.
posted by crossoverman at 8:20 PM on December 25, 2024 [3 favorites]
The year in the hotel stuff was great. The COVID backstory for Joy was wonderful - especially since a show like Doctor Who might have never addressed it, even though it often visits historically significant moments.
It's also a post-Ruby story that deals with the emotional fallout from that. And Moffat finds another way to dig into the Doctor as a character and deconstruct him a little - the no chairs thing is so obvious and here it says a lot.
I think Nicola Coughlan got a little shortchanged, since she's not in about half the episode, but she is the emotional/dramatic centre and she makes that work.
I also don't mind that Moffat loves to recycle some of his own ideas because building on the show's own history can make it feel cohesive. Oh he's got a technology that is both life threatening and allows you to live on after you die? Fine. It works for the story and gives the tech an emotional resonance.
I hate that the show is parcelled out in small chunks over the year so I appreciate even a middling episode once in a while. But I thought this was solid. Still not enough to keep me satisfied until the next season though.
posted by crossoverman at 8:20 PM on December 25, 2024 [3 favorites]
Intriguing premise, fantastic middle section that isn't related to the main story, and a terrible conclusion where the stakes were too high and the payoff made no sense. It was an entire season of Doctor Who in one hour.
posted by Gary at 1:44 AM on December 26, 2024 [4 favorites]
posted by Gary at 1:44 AM on December 26, 2024 [4 favorites]
I can't entirely parse out what is bothering me about Who lately. I definitely think there is competency in the RTD 2 era, whereas Chibnall seemed like 100% hot mess for most of his run. But I wouldn't want to oversell that and say I think things are well-written.
Also, I am starting to suspect I really don't care much for the 15th Doctor. Gatwa seems fine and I don't blame him for the writing in his era any more than I blamed Whittaker for the writing in hers. Not necessarily anyway. could be how he plays him. I suspect it's the writing, though. Something is missing.
There is something inherently lovable/trustworthy about this Doctor that I don't like. The Doctors have been lovable at points before, some more than others. And in a wide angle, looking at things from a distance way, you can always trust the Doctor. But there's also a bit of sour, mercurial alienness, a bit of fuck you I'm gonna do what I'm gonna do self-absorption to the Doctor when they're done right and I just don't see that here. 15 yelling at Joy that she was a loser was extremely transparent, because he's a big teddy bear and you know this Doctor would never do that.
I could just be overreacting to not having been in the mood for this particular episode. Or maybe I'm forgetting examples of this Doctor being thornier and more complex and/or maybe the new season will add the rough edges I have come to love.
I would like to go back to the Doctor being a weird crank who is nevertheless going to save the universe. 13 was a nice correction from leaning too hard into that. 15 feels like an overcorrection.
I find myself looking forward to 16 already.
I have no preference for the demographics of 16. Man, woman, white, POC, young, old, gay, straight, pan. I do not care. But I really hope that after Gatwa finishes his run as the adorable Doctor, we get one who is a little more slippery, a little less wholly warm-hearted.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:31 AM on December 26, 2024 [4 favorites]
Also, I am starting to suspect I really don't care much for the 15th Doctor. Gatwa seems fine and I don't blame him for the writing in his era any more than I blamed Whittaker for the writing in hers. Not necessarily anyway. could be how he plays him. I suspect it's the writing, though. Something is missing.
There is something inherently lovable/trustworthy about this Doctor that I don't like. The Doctors have been lovable at points before, some more than others. And in a wide angle, looking at things from a distance way, you can always trust the Doctor. But there's also a bit of sour, mercurial alienness, a bit of fuck you I'm gonna do what I'm gonna do self-absorption to the Doctor when they're done right and I just don't see that here. 15 yelling at Joy that she was a loser was extremely transparent, because he's a big teddy bear and you know this Doctor would never do that.
I could just be overreacting to not having been in the mood for this particular episode. Or maybe I'm forgetting examples of this Doctor being thornier and more complex and/or maybe the new season will add the rough edges I have come to love.
I would like to go back to the Doctor being a weird crank who is nevertheless going to save the universe. 13 was a nice correction from leaning too hard into that. 15 feels like an overcorrection.
I find myself looking forward to 16 already.
I have no preference for the demographics of 16. Man, woman, white, POC, young, old, gay, straight, pan. I do not care. But I really hope that after Gatwa finishes his run as the adorable Doctor, we get one who is a little more slippery, a little less wholly warm-hearted.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:31 AM on December 26, 2024 [4 favorites]
My feeling is that 15 is more distant than other, crustier Doctors. He's friendlier and huggier and more prone to tears, but I don't think he's very human; he loves people, but he seems somehow above people. I think this is always a factor with this character, but the difference here is that there's no arrogance (as with 12), and not even really any frustration (as with 9 and even 10); he's sort of accepted that humanity kind of sucks at the same time that it's kind of great, he would do anything to protect humanity, but ultimately he's smarter and better-looking than humanity and that's just kind of how it is. There may also be an element of burnout there, of unwillingness to go deeper because he knows how that ends.
Of course, that last may also be a larger problem with this incarnation of the show, the "new" version that's turning 20.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 9:10 AM on December 26, 2024 [2 favorites]
Of course, that last may also be a larger problem with this incarnation of the show, the "new" version that's turning 20.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 9:10 AM on December 26, 2024 [2 favorites]
(I'll say, too, that they really missed a bet by teasing Susan as his granddaughter and then not going there. I would like to see this Doctor have a relationship like that.)
posted by kittens for breakfast at 9:16 AM on December 26, 2024 [2 favorites]
posted by kittens for breakfast at 9:16 AM on December 26, 2024 [2 favorites]
That actor is begging to come back to the show, many fans are begging to have her come back, the story supports it, and they hinted at it, so I am not sure what the holdup is.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:47 AM on December 26, 2024 [2 favorites]
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:47 AM on December 26, 2024 [2 favorites]
The year in the hotel is everything I really loved about Moffat's writing
I'd unironically love a Pertwee-style series with a current-era Doctor is stuck on earth without a Tardis and has to make do. Mop the stairs, embiggen the microwave, save the world, etc.
posted by nathan_teske at 11:14 AM on December 26, 2024 [2 favorites]
I'd unironically love a Pertwee-style series with a current-era Doctor is stuck on earth without a Tardis and has to make do. Mop the stairs, embiggen the microwave, save the world, etc.
posted by nathan_teske at 11:14 AM on December 26, 2024 [2 favorites]
Yeah, I loved the time hotel, I loved the Star Seed, I loved the doctor's year as a handyman, that was all fine and good, and the cute little nod to and swiftly moving past the bootstrapping problem was all right. I'm not sure they really tied Joy's mom's hospital Covid death to why she was in a hotel room on christmas, and the whole last quarter of the episode was just lathering on the feeeeeeeeellllllliiiiiiings and emoooooooootiooooonnns and gag gag gag too much guys, too much. I mean I know the holiday specials tend to get mawkish, but _oof_.
posted by Kyol at 7:14 AM on December 27, 2024 [1 favorite]
posted by Kyol at 7:14 AM on December 27, 2024 [1 favorite]
Oh and a return of mavity, I'm not sure how far they're going to drag that out.
posted by Kyol at 9:16 AM on December 27, 2024 [3 favorites]
posted by Kyol at 9:16 AM on December 27, 2024 [3 favorites]
Enjoyable - especially how this Doctor managed his year off and the pandemic memories and riffing on loneliness - but a couple of quibbles:
- I miss the days when time travel was special and could easily go wrong. It was something only the Doctor really did (with a lot of care), along with his companions and we viewers. The Hotel facilitating time travel as a tourist hoot (while fun and great for visuals, and leaning hard into showing Disney+ viewers what they're getting here the can't get elsewhere) just seems wrong and devalues everything the Doctor does. And how does a villainous corporation not be ludicrously wealthy/successful if they can use time travel so easily?
- the faceless villains get off scott-free after causing at least four deaths ('living on' as an AI isn't a cure). Yes, the concept is meant to be that they're faceless, and its a Christmas episode so we don't need baddies, but we could at least have gotten an ambiguous line from the Doctor along the lines of "Oh, this will have been terrible for their bottom line" (cv The Sunmakers) to close it off a little.
posted by jjderooy at 11:44 AM on December 27, 2024
- I miss the days when time travel was special and could easily go wrong. It was something only the Doctor really did (with a lot of care), along with his companions and we viewers. The Hotel facilitating time travel as a tourist hoot (while fun and great for visuals, and leaning hard into showing Disney+ viewers what they're getting here the can't get elsewhere) just seems wrong and devalues everything the Doctor does. And how does a villainous corporation not be ludicrously wealthy/successful if they can use time travel so easily?
- the faceless villains get off scott-free after causing at least four deaths ('living on' as an AI isn't a cure). Yes, the concept is meant to be that they're faceless, and its a Christmas episode so we don't need baddies, but we could at least have gotten an ambiguous line from the Doctor along the lines of "Oh, this will have been terrible for their bottom line" (cv The Sunmakers) to close it off a little.
posted by jjderooy at 11:44 AM on December 27, 2024
I enjoyed it more than I thought I would, deus ex moffatt aside. SM made me quite sick of timey-wimey shenanigans by going to that smaller-on-the-inside well way too often, but this managed to use it to structure the plot in a way that was clever, if, as jjderooy points out, a terrible cheapening of an already cheapened technology (ie. time-travel as bougie luxury).
I presume that the returning Villengard Corp. (one of his oldest enemies, the Doctor says), will end up being a front for either the Daleks or the Master (or maybe some other Big Name Baddie) because the name sounds like "Villain Guard" and RTD loves that on-the-nose corny shit.
As for Gatwa, I very much like him, and would be happy to watch him for another couple years -- if they would write decent material. But I can't really be objective about any Doctor. My parents plopped me down in front of the show on PBS when I first started forming memories, and Tom Baker's Doctor is my most primal media/fictional character. On top of that, I met Pertwee in person when I was 8, and it was like meeting Superman for real. I wanted the Doctor -- any Doctor -- as my best friend/mentor/parental unit more than anything, even when he was a jerk (admittedly, Hartnell was a little less appealing, but then again the B&W stuff was a bit too ancient and dire for me to even process). So, I pretty much love every iteration of the Doctor, even if I do get tired of them at times (or at least, of the bad story-lines they suffer through). The actor would have to really shit the bed, or just be an obviously horrible human being, for me to not like them.
posted by Saxon Kane at 7:21 PM on December 27, 2024 [3 favorites]
I presume that the returning Villengard Corp. (one of his oldest enemies, the Doctor says), will end up being a front for either the Daleks or the Master (or maybe some other Big Name Baddie) because the name sounds like "Villain Guard" and RTD loves that on-the-nose corny shit.
As for Gatwa, I very much like him, and would be happy to watch him for another couple years -- if they would write decent material. But I can't really be objective about any Doctor. My parents plopped me down in front of the show on PBS when I first started forming memories, and Tom Baker's Doctor is my most primal media/fictional character. On top of that, I met Pertwee in person when I was 8, and it was like meeting Superman for real. I wanted the Doctor -- any Doctor -- as my best friend/mentor/parental unit more than anything, even when he was a jerk (admittedly, Hartnell was a little less appealing, but then again the B&W stuff was a bit too ancient and dire for me to even process). So, I pretty much love every iteration of the Doctor, even if I do get tired of them at times (or at least, of the bad story-lines they suffer through). The actor would have to really shit the bed, or just be an obviously horrible human being, for me to not like them.
posted by Saxon Kane at 7:21 PM on December 27, 2024 [3 favorites]
This was okay by Who Christmas episode standards. A lot of Gatwa running around doing his best hyper-Tennant imitation. The ending was utter nonsense, of course. And, yeah, Bethlehem? Really?
posted by Thorzdad at 1:10 PM on December 29, 2024
posted by Thorzdad at 1:10 PM on December 29, 2024
It was nice to vouch for Anita for a Time Hotel job, but I think she was companion material.
posted by dr_dank at 5:43 AM on December 30, 2024 [3 favorites]
posted by dr_dank at 5:43 AM on December 30, 2024 [3 favorites]
I think there is a tendency to forget the weakness of previous Dr who when getting frustrated with the current era.
And there is definitely something to this season, and this Christmas special, repeating many sins of the past, as after all it has the same writer and showrunner.
But all that said, I think Gatwa's era has been astonishingly good so far. There have been several truly excellent episodes, and some perfectly good ones. And yes, the season finale was terrible, but they often are/were! I still love Dr Who for the new and the weird.
I would definitely place this episode in the perfectly good camp. It suffers from the sins of basically every Christmas episode; the soppy ending was a bit too much, although I do think the decision to explicitly call out the government for their behaviour during COVID was rather nice. And I don't think Joy was a well drawn character, seeing as she spent most of the run time hypnotised.
But the time hotel was great fun, the slow year was lovely, and ultimately I felt myself carried a long. The plot mostly worked, and I enjoyed Villengard again being beaten by it's own AI.
I am definitely looking forwards to season 2
posted by Cannon Fodder at 3:35 PM on December 30, 2024 [1 favorite]
And there is definitely something to this season, and this Christmas special, repeating many sins of the past, as after all it has the same writer and showrunner.
But all that said, I think Gatwa's era has been astonishingly good so far. There have been several truly excellent episodes, and some perfectly good ones. And yes, the season finale was terrible, but they often are/were! I still love Dr Who for the new and the weird.
I would definitely place this episode in the perfectly good camp. It suffers from the sins of basically every Christmas episode; the soppy ending was a bit too much, although I do think the decision to explicitly call out the government for their behaviour during COVID was rather nice. And I don't think Joy was a well drawn character, seeing as she spent most of the run time hypnotised.
But the time hotel was great fun, the slow year was lovely, and ultimately I felt myself carried a long. The plot mostly worked, and I enjoyed Villengard again being beaten by it's own AI.
I am definitely looking forwards to season 2
posted by Cannon Fodder at 3:35 PM on December 30, 2024 [1 favorite]
I do think the decision to explicitly call out the government for their behaviour during COVID was rather nice.
Yep, this. Some of the Covid-era misdeeds of the UK government have only been coming to light recently, from what I understand, and Joy's rant about how she had been a person who followed the rules and stayed home like she was supposed to while others partied was very similar to actual rants I've heard others say in the past year. I think it's a large part of why the Tories were clobbered in the election this past July.
I thought this was fine. Not the best, not the worst.
There is one thing from the Time Hotel that I thought they would do more with - one of the doors for one of the rooms was clearly meant to be a door to The Shire.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:05 AM on December 31, 2024 [2 favorites]
Yep, this. Some of the Covid-era misdeeds of the UK government have only been coming to light recently, from what I understand, and Joy's rant about how she had been a person who followed the rules and stayed home like she was supposed to while others partied was very similar to actual rants I've heard others say in the past year. I think it's a large part of why the Tories were clobbered in the election this past July.
I thought this was fine. Not the best, not the worst.
There is one thing from the Time Hotel that I thought they would do more with - one of the doors for one of the rooms was clearly meant to be a door to The Shire.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:05 AM on December 31, 2024 [2 favorites]
I liked it; as noted above, very much appreciated that it acknowledged that COVID happened, was awful, and that the Johnson government was shitty about it: "those awful people and their wine fridges and their dance parties."
It was nice to vouch for Anita for a Time Hotel job, but I think she was companion material.
Yes! Yes! Now & future Doctor talk about how alone they are -- "a great big spaceship and there aren't any chairs" -- and I do think that there's a note of loneliness behind Gatwa's very charismatic performance; he spends a year with Anita not being alone; Joy tells him "you need to find a friend"; and ... Anita gets shunted off to the Time Hotel? Hrrmph; she got short-changed.
The little UK TV easter egg of the "Mr Benn's Any Era Clothes" shop.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 5:57 PM on January 6 [1 favorite]
It was nice to vouch for Anita for a Time Hotel job, but I think she was companion material.
Yes! Yes! Now & future Doctor talk about how alone they are -- "a great big spaceship and there aren't any chairs" -- and I do think that there's a note of loneliness behind Gatwa's very charismatic performance; he spends a year with Anita not being alone; Joy tells him "you need to find a friend"; and ... Anita gets shunted off to the Time Hotel? Hrrmph; she got short-changed.
The little UK TV easter egg of the "Mr Benn's Any Era Clothes" shop.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 5:57 PM on January 6 [1 favorite]
I thought this was pretty good; better than the season finale by a mile. I think it took some big brass gender-nonspecific glands to write Joy into that particular scene at the end, but it worked.
Did she assimilate her mom? What would that be like, stuck in the same head as your parent for some odd millions of years, and that head happens to be a star? I could almost see Joy returning as a villain if she acquires a taste for absorbing people.
posted by jordemort at 7:27 PM on January 6
Did she assimilate her mom? What would that be like, stuck in the same head as your parent for some odd millions of years, and that head happens to be a star? I could almost see Joy returning as a villain if she acquires a taste for absorbing people.
posted by jordemort at 7:27 PM on January 6
I enjoyed this. The best part was the year with Anita at the hotel. She should have absolutely been the new companion--I loved her "seen it all, not concerned about the guy cleaning the stairs while holding a newspaper with both hands" attitude, and her reactions to the microwave that was bigger on the inside, the nav system that takes you where you need to go, and the lovely new blue color of her car. I'm sure she will make many new friends at the Time Hotel, but I would have love to see more of her.
I liked Nicola Coughlan, but she was really underutilized. I feel like we got closer to Trev (who I absolutely loved) and the nice Silurian hotel manager who was accepted by the staff for just being himself, in the best Fred Rogers tradition.
I love Ncuti, I really do, but I wish he would cry less. I want to see more Doctor backbone, where he delivers a great monologue explaining why the baddies need to be very afraid of him.
posted by ceejaytee at 9:10 AM on January 7 [2 favorites]
I liked Nicola Coughlan, but she was really underutilized. I feel like we got closer to Trev (who I absolutely loved) and the nice Silurian hotel manager who was accepted by the staff for just being himself, in the best Fred Rogers tradition.
I love Ncuti, I really do, but I wish he would cry less. I want to see more Doctor backbone, where he delivers a great monologue explaining why the baddies need to be very afraid of him.
posted by ceejaytee at 9:10 AM on January 7 [2 favorites]
Returning after a re-watch: I disagree about Anita being companion material. She was nice and all, and a good partner for a year of sitting in a hotel, but she didn't seem to want anything more than just being a hotel manager -- well, she seemed to want the Doctor's Little Doctor, but that's another story. She didn't have the drive or curiosity for a different life or deep need for something more that the best companions have, so I'm fine with never seeing her again.
posted by Saxon Kane at 12:52 PM on January 10
posted by Saxon Kane at 12:52 PM on January 10
You are not logged in, either login or create an account to post comments
I wonder if I am even a fan of this particular Doctor. So much cuteness and crying. There's a whole season coming up, so there is time to bring me around. I'm not resistant to Ncuti Gatwa himself, it's this iteration. Or maybe I'm just reacting to a terrible episode after a long break. Anyway, I need more inscrutable weirdness from the Doctor, more mercurial mystery.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:40 AM on December 25, 2024 [2 favorites]