Beautifully paced, atmospheric mood piece with everyone on top form and great effects for the era. Sarah Jane gets tonnes to do and it rules! Honestly a low key pretty much perfect story. Not my favourite of 4's era, but certainly up there.

The concept here is stellar, as is Patrick Ross' prose! It really flows incredibly well with some killer dialogue and characterisation to boot. I think they nailed the vibes of this TARDIS Team perfectly.

That being said, I'm with everyone else here that the story is a bit too light and isn't as character focused as I'd like. While the Bill stuff is fun, I wish this was more about 12 having to grapple with the Time War and opening up about it to her.

And while Cox does a better Capaldi than Dudman.... It's still not great. Can Big Finish please just hire a Scot to do him already?

Still, a fun, good free listen!

Really good! I always love when the Mara gets psychedelic stories with unsettling dream sequences and this had that!

All performances were great, but India Fisher especially. She was outstanding!

I also especially love the political commentary as well. I do wish Dekkar didn't get away scott free but Charley's take down of him was pretty grand at least.

This was solid and fun with good performances, but I feel like the women's march and the sci-fi stuff never really came together with each other and felt quite disparate.

Matthew Jacobs is back! And returns with a beautiful story about what it means to love and create. I know nothing about opera but I still adored this, and how character focused it was. Fab concepts and performances all round!

I liked this about as much as Kinda! I really like when Five is kinda ineffectual and struggles to take command of a room; I think it's a character trait very unique to Davison's incarnation and he always plays it flawlessly. The world felt well developed and fleshed out (better so than Kinda's for sure), with all the characters being interesting and having depth - especially Martin Clunes'. Clunes' performance is great! But the main standout - like Kinda - is Janet Fieldings as a possessed Tegan. She continues to excel in the role!

My biggest issue with this, like Kinda, is the pacing is very languid at parts. And the loss of the freaky dream sequences is a bit of a shame really.

Still, a good time!

I liked that! But I didn't love it!

The opening sequence feels incredibly Moffat quips and all, but I appreciate that these somewhat died down once we got into the meat of the story after the opening sequence.

Performances round the board were amazing, but Gatwa puts in one of his best yet! I really love his take on The Doctor, and I really love how Moffat writes for him specifically. The scene where he acts like an awful person to manipulate Joy was amazing. I love when Doctors have a mean, manipulative edge to them.

Joy herself was good but I think a little underdeveloped. I wish we had gotten more time with her, and because we didn't, I didn't feel as attached as the story wanted when she sacrificed herself.

The long way round scene was perfect.... Or would have been if it didn't leave me feeling like Anita was more developed than Joy.

Still, I absolutely adore seeing other sides to this Doctor that we haven't seen before in Season 40.

The setting of a time hotel rules, and I really love how the story utilised its internal logic and rules. Moffat has always excelled at this within episodes!

The ending itself... I have mixed feelings. As I said, the sacrifice didn't feel earned emotionally to me really. And the Bethlehem reveal genuinely made me laugh at how earnest it was. Just felt silly to me.

Still, what a fun episode overall! Definitely in the upper middle of Christmas specials for me.

Looks bloody gorgeous! Shame the pacing made it incoherent, the music was too loud and didn't fit, and it just was too rushed with a lot of the best character moments removed!

The ending was amazing but that and good colourisation do not make up for the issues.

These aren't for me. But that's okay. Not everything Doccy Who has to be.

If I had a nickel for every time Big Finish did an experimental 8/Charley two-hander, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice

Not much to say other than what an absolutely fun story! Linx is a very entertaining villain, Elizabeth Sladen is amazing from the jump with instant chemistry with Pertwee, Pertwee puts in such a fun performance as 3, and the dialogue is witty and entertaining throughout.

Just a delight!