This episode revolves around Rose's independance and well basically she's going through the heartbreak that someone would be going through if a close family memeber were dying.

We see more of Mickey and Jackie and we find out what's happened sice we've left them at the end of the 1st season.

The acting is very good especially from Billie and her traumatic experience. We also see the return of Harriet Jones now Prime Minister of Great Britain. We leave on mixed feelings and Harriet Jones is being trashed after what the Doctor said but Rose has told him she wants to keep travelling. And then a montage for the next series which made me want to not wait...well I was really excited.

The Doctor and Rose land in the Powell Estate on Chrismas Eve and the Doctor faints onto Jackie and Mickie as soon as he leaves the TARDIS. They take him to lie on a bed in the flat. Rose then tells her mum 'she thought she knew him, and then he goes and does this'. Jackie tries to comfort her but Rose is side tracked by Harriot Jones on the tell. Harriot is now P.M and is doing an interview on a space project she is doing which in volves a space prob taking pictures from Mars. Rose and Mickie then go and do some Christmas shopping but get attacked by an alien Brass Band. When they get back to the flat, they notice Jackie's got a new Christmas tree and she think Rose sent it. She didn't! The Christmas Tree starts to revolve and cuts everything up. Mickie, Jackie and Rose go to save the Doctor who in the end blows it up with his Sonic Screwdriver. They all go outside where the Brass Band is but they teleport. The Doctor says they are 'pilot fish' and that 'something is coming' before collapsing again. In the flat Mickie does some resurch on the internet about Pilot Fish and that they swimm close to there daddies (sharks) before the sharks come. On the T.V. the Space Prob transmitts it photos but it isn't from Mars. There are Sycorax on the screen. At U.N.I.T HQ Harriot arrives for the low down and it's revealed the Sycorax want to invade. They say they will kill ''them''. They then enter the Earth's Atmosphere causing glass, plaster and brick to exsplode. Then they transmitt a signal to make all the A+ blood group,of which they have a bit of, to go to the highest roofs and threaten they will make them jump,by blood controll, if Earth doesn't surrender. Rose makes all her family go into the TARDIS but Jackie is stranded on Earth as the TARDIS teleports along with the P.M and various others.
On the space ship Rose tries to take controll but she is laughed at. The Doctor then revives to help her by absorbing Tea via some spilt on the TARDIS. The Doctor then frees all the A+'s and defends the Earth which leads to a sword fight on deck. Rose, Mickie and Harrot watch on as the Doctor loses a hand (he grows on back) and finally wins. However the Sycorax tries to kill the Doctor as he walk off but is to late and is sent tumbrling to his death The Doctor and Co. go back to Earth where Harriot has the ship detroyed by 'Torchwood'. This makes the Doc angry and he near enough sacks the prime minister. He then has Chritmas dinner with Rose, Jackie and Mickie.

This is a brilliant story with a strong plot and a terryfieing villian. The return of Harriot Jones and U.N.I.T is much appreciated and the fact that this is the first evr Doctor Who special really gives the episode a buzz.

Best Actor/ Actress; Billie Pipper

I watched series one. I even enjoyed quite a bit of it. But there was one thing increasingly disturbed me on the way to episode thirteen.

I really didn't like what the Doctor had become.

It's not Christopher Eccleston's fault, although he never seemed to catch the inherent oddities of the character to me. He was given a set of scripts that turned a hero into a time-travelling chauffeur, carrying the real star of the show to whatever time and place her greater common sense and interpersonal skill could be best used to save humanity.

Billie Piper was outstanding, and that's not something I expected to find myself saying when her casting was announced. But what the Hell had Mr Davies, that self-proclaimed Doctor Who fan, actually done to the Doctor?

Maybe my lowered expectations for The Christmas Invasion worked in my favour. The first forty minutes may have dragged at times (especially with Rose was wailing on her mother's shoulder about the Doctor abandoning her) but boy, did it pick up when the Doctor got going!

I had my doubts when David Tennant's casting was announced. I knew very little of him as an actor, but I knew his age, and I knew what he looked like; and in neither respect did he fit my mental picture of the Doctor. That's as good a call on my part as doubting Ms Piper proved to be.

From the moment he pulls the electrocuting whip thing out of the Sycorax's hand with an indignant line about its more trivial danger, the Tenth Doctor absolutely owns The Christmas Invasion, amply atoning for the length of time we're made to wait to see him. Darting around the highly impressive interior of the spaceship, talking at a million miles an hour, attention flitting between Rose, the Sycorax and Harriet Jones, he's instantly the Doctor, and immediately in charge. It's a joyous performance, infecting even the lines which ought to make you groan. "Can't get the staff," he says, deadpan, before debunking the blood control threat in the last way you could be expecting. Wonderful.

I loved the Lion King speech, with its emphasis on admiration for humanity. I loved the Doctor suddenly pulling himself up on being rude, something his last incarnation appeared to take pleasure in. Most of all, I loved the payoff to Rose's sulk about tea. "The solution to everything" indeed.

Tennant is obviously at home in the role, more so in twenty minutes than Eccleston appeared in a whole series. The Doctor has his old love of being the Doctor back, and that is the best piece of news since it was first announced he was returning to our screens.

It's just as well Tennant is so good, since the first two-thirds of the episode are spent showing how much the Doctor is actually needed. So much for Rose, the equal companion. Full marks to Billie, she gives it plenty of lip-tremble, but the character has guts, and the actress is at her best when showing them. Her scared, defiant little speech to the invading hordes was her best moment of the episode, but it all pointed up the same thing. Someone's gotta be the Doctor, as she said; pity only the Doctor can be.

Much has been made of the Doctor's power, bringing down a Prime Minister with six words, but really, didn't Harriet Jones destroy herself? What hope for a national leader who appears live on television admitting she can't cope with a crisis? It doesn't take a political correspondent to estimate the life expectancy of that kind of creature, even if she did hint at the kind of masculine genitalia her factual equivalent could do with displaying to his fellow "statesmen". The suspension of disbelief has its place in Doctor Who, but it works better for me with images of great big alien spaceships casting shadows over two great British fighting men than with an implausible PM pressing the self-destruct button on her career.

Still, Penelope Wilton is an actress who doesn't know how to give a bad performance, and just when the incessant introduction was beginning to grate came the payoff. The translated "Yes, we know who you are" was one more clever Russell T Davies touch. Like the Sycorax leader (a bravura turn from Sean Gilder) suddenly spouting English, making Rose and everyone else turn to the TARDIS. Like the revelation of the Sycorax on Jackie's television screen. He may have difficulty constructing a coherent plot at times, but the Head Writer certainly knows how to grab his audience.

Speaking of plot, I thought The Christmas Invasion RTD's best to date. I don't pick through every episode; if it's entertaining and it hangs reasonably, I won't mind the odd unanswered question (such as, what was the point of the pilot fish, except to add a bit of festive colour?). I could do without his obsessive interest in the Tyler domestic angle; Jackie still irritates, despite Camille Coduri getting one perfect moment in the kitchen. Just watch her look of hurt when Rose snaps at the inevitable "is he a different man?" question. I've seen that look on my own mother's face, more often than I care to remember. A few seconds of real relationship adds immeasurably to any programme. More, and you're watching Eastenders.

I'm no expert on special effects, but bashing up the Gherkin raised a cheer, and the Sycorax ship, like the Sycorax themselves, impressed. The image of still, silent figures ready to jump from great landmarks like the Coliseum was a bit grim (especially for a Christmas broadcast) but admirably effective in conveying the scale of the Sycorax threat. I could've done without Murray Gold's crescendo of music as the TARDIS doors opened up, but that's a nitpick. Otherwise, I barely noticed his work, which I mean as a compliment. Background music should remain that; it's only noticeable to me if it jars.

I haven't mentioned Mickey. Which means he didn't make me want to put a foot through the screen. That's an improvement on last year. Thanks, Noel Clarke.

And thank you, Russell T Davies for restoring the natural order of Doctor Who (with a bit of help from David Tennant). For the first time, I felt like I was watching my old favourite again. 8 out of 10!

I usually show this episode to introduce the uninitiated to the Whoniverse... Its got everything: robots, aliens, spaceships made out of asteroids, fightin' hands... who could ask for more? While I was initially upset over the 9th Doctor leaving... Tennet has quick became the most favored Doctor (surpassing even the King, tom Baker).. and this episode epitomizes what this new Doctor is all about...

On first viewing, I didn't like the plot-hole left by the "pilot-fish" but that was wrapped up later in the series (the next x-mas episode), so on rewatch it doesn't bother me any more... also, the Sycorax ROCK!!!