Season 14 of the latest incarnation of Doctor Who may have just ended last month, but we’re already looking ahead to the 2024 Christmas special which will see the return of Ncuti Gatwa as The Doctor, along with a very special guest. Announced at San Diego Comic-Con during the ‘Into the Whoniverse’ panel, this year’s special will once again air on – you guessed it – Christmas, and features lots of surprises, not the least of which is Bridgerton star Nicola Coughlan.
Coughlan was on hand via video during the SDCC panel (via YouTube) to introduce the 2024 Doctor Who Christmas special, Joy to the World, which will see the actress portray the character of Joy (natch). “I am thrilled to be joining Doctor Who for the Christmas special this year,” she said, “and I am so excited for you to meet my character, Joy.” Coughlan would go on to call her new addition a “determined woman whose life is changed forever when she meets the Doctor.”
Her introduction was proceeded by a lengthy clip from Joy to the World, which sees Gatwa as the Time Lord traveling from Manchester in 1940 to the Orient Express in Italy in 1962, then on to Mount Everest in 1953, and finally to present day London in 2024, as it seems he’s just trying to deliver a nice tray of a ham and cheese toastie and a pumpkin latte to someone willing to accept the snack. Meanwhile, Joy has checked herself into a hotel for a week and is met by a Silurian before the Doctor makes his grand entrance. Check out the clip below.
Russell T Davies Calls the New Doctor Who Christmas Special “Mad”
Doctor Who
4.5/5
Originally premiered in 1963, Doctor Who is a sci-fi series that follows a powerful being known as a Time Lord, referred to as the Doctor. Using an interdimensional time-traveling ship known as the TARDIS, the Doctor travels time and space with various companions as they solve multiple problems and help avert catastrophe as much as they almost cause it. Though the Doctor is always the same character, they experience regenerations, allowing them to be recast every few seasons as a unique immortal being with new personality traits.
- Release Date
- December 25, 2023
- Main Genre
- Sci-Fi
- Cast
- Ncuti Gatwa , Millie Gibson , Susan Twist , Michelle Greenidge , Angela Wynter , Jemma Redgrave , Yasmin Finney , Anita Dobson
- Seasons
- 2
The Doctor Who Christmas specials are a relatively recent addition to the franchise considering its long history that dates back to 1963. The classic era featured few episodes that mentioned the holiday, and it wasn’t until the modern era, which began in 2005, that they became a regular occurrence, with Christmas specials airing each year and a New Year’s Day special added in occasionally for good measure. To date, there have been a total of 19 holiday specials, with the upcoming 2024 special being the 20th.
As to what fans can expect from Joy to the World, not much has been revealed other than that it will feature a new companion played by Varada Sethu, but as to the overall plot that was penned by Steven Moffat? Showrunner Russell T Davies isn’t saying much, but did tease recently in a behind-the-scenes video of Season 14’s final episode, Empire of Death, that this year’s Christmas extravaganza will be “one of the maddest” episodes that longtime fans of the series have ever seen.
“Now the Doctor voyages forward, and guess what always happens to the Doctor every so often? Christmas. Here comes Christmas. I can’t give away much more but work has begun on it already, and it’s mad, it’s one of the maddest Christmas specials you’ll ever see. It’s epic, it goes to so many different places. And it’s a great story of who the Doctor is when he’s alone.”
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With a promise like that, we’ll definitely have our pumpkin lattes ready come Christmas to see what new adventures the Doctor brings us next.
Doctor Who
is available to stream on Disney+.