Disney+ drops Doctor Who Christmas special details and release date

David Tennant's only just come back for the 60th anniversary specials and already Doctor Who is planning life after him. With Ncuti Gatwa set to take over after the three episodes, we now have more details about his first proper adventure.

Festive specials are a Doctor Who tradition, and they have typically been significant moments in the show. David Tennant was famously introduced in the first Christmas special of 'New Who', and it looks like that pattern will continue. 

Disney+ is, of course, also in charge of Doctor Who now and has revealed that the special will air on Christmas Day itself (the 25th of December, in case you need to start shopping), at least in the US. Here in the UK, it will probably be on the BBC on the evening of Christmas Day, when you're nursing a belly full of way too much Turkey. But that's not all we've learnt. 

As you can see from the Tweet above, we can see that the episode is titled "The Church on Ruby Road". Given we know that Millie Gibson will be joining the show as new companion Ruby Sunday (If only she was born on a Tuesday), it's pretty much certain that this is when we will see her debut. From there, with the new TARDIS team assembled, it will be time for the new era of Doctor Who to begin. Russell T. Davies has confirmed that this will be a soft reboot of the show, and given his track record, I trust him implicitly to do it right. As long as he doesn't mess with the theme tune, he can't go wrong. 

We don't have any real information on the actual story of the episode yet, but there have been some rumours that television presenter Davina McCall would be in it playing herself. That reminds me of another series, Dead Set (streaming on Netflix) in which she performs her Big Brother hosting duties while a zombie apocalypse breaks out. I don't expect quite as much blood this time, more heartwarming Christmas fun.