Twice Upon a Time (TV story)

Twice Upon a Time was the 2017 Doctor Who Christmas special. It was the final episode under showrunner Steven Moffat's tenure, and featured the last regular appearance of Peter Capaldi as the Twelfth Doctor.

Concluding the Twelfth Doctor's life, as teased in World Enough and Time and The Doctor Falls, this episode displayed the Doctor's regeneration and introduced Jodie Whittaker as the Thirteenth Doctor, the first female incarnation of the Doctor in the series history.

After a surprise appearance at the end of The Doctor Falls, the First Doctor was an integral part of this narrative. Here, he was portrayed by David Bradley, who had previously played the original actor William Hartnell in An Adventure in Space and Time. Though so-called "classic" Doctors had appeared on 21st century Doctor Who before, this episode was the first televised interaction between a Shepherd's Bush- and a BBC Wales-era Doctor since 2007's Time Crash. Archival footage from The Tenth Planet was used to bookmark the First Doctor's place in this story. The special also introduced Archibald Hamish Lethbridge-Stewart, credited as "the Captain", a new member of the Lethbridge-Stewart family.

Ben Jackson and Polly Wright made a brief re-reappearance in the programme for the first time since their exit in 1967's The Faceless Ones. Bill Potts joined the two Doctors, and Captain Lethbridge-Stewart, as a Testimony glass avatar. Past companions Nardole and Clara, made similar brief appearances. The "good Dalek" Rusty, from Capaldi's second episode, Into the Dalek, made his second appearance—in Villengard, a location mentioned only once before on television, in Steven Moffat's second television story, 2005's The Doctor Dances.

Synopsis
As the Doctor nears regeneration, he stumbles on his younger self, also refusing to change. It takes a captain, a glass avatar and a familiar face to convince the Doctors the universe still needs them.

Plot
The First Doctor nears his death after an encounter with the Cybermen from Mondas. He is freed from his restraints by his companions Ben and Polly, now that the threat is over. However, he is weak, his body beginning to regenerate. Refusing to give in, he leaves and wanders the South Pole, mumbling to himself that he will not change. Nearing his TARDIS, he hears a voice in the distance claiming to be the Doctor. He approaches the man knelt in the snow next to the TARDIS, also claiming to be The Doctor.

The scene transitions to the Twelfth Doctor as he gets to his feet, shocked to see his past self. The Doctor is delighted at meeting his first incarnation, but realises that he is refusing to regenerate. The First Doctor is confused and dismisses his future self as just another Time Lord, until he notices his TARDIS has changed in size. The Twelfth Doctor questions why his younger self is refusing to regenerate, fearing the consequences the decision might cause. However, the snow suddenly freezes in midair, capturing the pair's attention, as a man dressed in World War I attire approaches them.



On Christmas Day 1914, the soldier, a captain in the British Expeditionary Force, lies in a shell hole on the battlefield in Ypres. His revolver is aimed at a German soldier, who also has his sidearm trained on the Captain. Both men realise they will kill each other in self-defense, their respective troops far away in their trenches, unable to assist either of them. Just as the Captain prepares to accept his fate and fire, a wave of energy flows through the field, freezing everything around him. As he exits the hole, a bright light suddenly flashes and encapsulates him. He collapses to the ground in the arctic and, hearing the two Doctors discussing the static snow, he approaches them.

The scene once more shifts back to the Twelfth Doctor's perspective. A portal of light opens in the distance, and the two Doctors approach it. The First Doctor orders the portal to reveal itself, while the Twelfth Doctor declares that the planet is protected, to the confusion of his first incarnation. However, the light quickly vanishes, surprising the Twelfth Doctor as "that almost never works." The First Doctor returns to the Captain, telling him to enter his TARDIS, and the Twelfth Doctor coaxes him to follow. As they enter, the First Doctor is shocked by the changes to the TARDIS interior, while the Captain is shocked by the room's size. The Twelfth Doctor attempts to convince his younger self they are the same person by displaying that he too is undergoing regeneration. He also points out that the First Doctor's TARDIS is 70 feet away, and they are inside a later version of the TARDIS, hence the differences in appearance. Regardless, the First Doctor remains sceptical. The First Doctor notices the Captain's unease, telling the soldier to sit down and orders the Twelfth Doctor to fetch some brandy. He does so, and the First Doctor notices that there is less in the glass than he remembered.

Suddenly, the TARDIS shakes violently, prompting the Twelfth Doctor to attempt to take off, only to find that the engines are unresponsive. Looking upwards out of the TARDIS doors, he sees large metal claws pulling the TARDIS upwards. Once the TARDIS has stopped moving, the Twelfth Doctor instructs his predecessor to confront their captors. A humanoid glass figure seated at the top of a staircase speaks to the Doctor, addressing him as "The Doctor of War." The figure requests the return of the Captain in exchange for a friend of the Doctor. Much to the confusion of the First Doctor, Bill then exits one of the corridors. The Twelfth Doctor quickly exits the TARDIS to hug her, before slowly pulling away, drawing his sonic screwdriver, and scanning Bill. To her surprise, the Twelfth Doctor demands that she proves herself to be real, as he believes Bill to have sacrified herself to defeat the Cybermen. Bill insists she is her real self, explaining how Heather had saved her. The Twelfth Doctor asks where Heather is now. Bill struggles for an answer.The Twelfth Doctor decides to confront his captor directly and runs up the staircase. He is slowly followed by his younger self, who questions the need to move so fast. They find an empty chair with several panels behind it. The First Doctor takes to observing the panels, commenting on their extraterrestrial origin. He turns to his older self, his eye glass dropping from his eye as he notices the Twelfth Doctor wearing sunglasses to scan the panels. They turn to the chair, where a woman made completely of glass materialises. While the Twelfth Doctor scans the panels with his sonic screwdriver, the original Doctor looks more closely. He berates the Twelfth Doctor for not noticing the asymmetrical features of the woman's face, blaming his use of the sunglasses instead of his eyes. The Twelfth Doctor shyly agrees, and his younger self throws the sunglasses to the ground. The Testimony proceeds to explain its desire for the Captain back in exchange for Bill, insisting the Doctors return him to them. The Captain, having heard the conversation, exits the TARDIS. He declares they let him be taken, not wanting any harm to come to Bill because of his cowardice. However, the Twelfth Doctor disagrees. Picking up his sonic sunglasses, he races down the stairs, remarking he will stop the Testimony once he learns its true purpose. The First Doctor once more berates him for revealing his plan, both firmly declaring they are the Doctor. The Testimony, in an effort to ruffle the First Doctor, reveals the history he is destined to create as a "Doctor of War", which perplexes him.

The Twelfth Doctor presses on with his plan to escape, using the sonic screwdriver to activate the crane which pulled the TARDIS up to take them down, the team jumping onto the chains to escape as well. The Testimony refuses to let them escape, halting the chains and pulling the TARDIS back into the ship, although the team manage to jump to the ground before being pulled back in. Bill expresses concern about what they will do without the TARDIS but the Doctors reveal they have another, younger version, at their disposal. They head to the First Doctor's TARDIS, swiftly entering. As she does so, Bill comments on how much smaller it is, causing the Twelfth Doctor to briefly observe the windows before insisting his younger self take off "deep space, anywhere".



While in flight, the First Doctor insists Bill clean the TARDIS only for the Twelfth Doctor to distract him by pointing out the astral map. The Twelfth Doctor uses the sonic sunglasses to access the data banks noting what his predeccessor said earlier before placing the shades on the First Doctor. Befuddlfed, the Doctor asks why he must wear them only for his successor to remark on how much he loves it before taking them back. The Twelfth Doctor quickly realsies the databanks are rather scarce, given the TARDIS is still young. To compensate, he sets the to land at the centre of the universe, Villengard, impressing his younger self at how easily he did such. While searching the area, the Captain is attacked by a creature with multiple little green legs but they save him, both Doctors recognising the creature as a Kaled mutant. The Twelfth Doctor insists Bill wait in the First Doctor's TARDIS to look after the Captain, but Bill blasts him by calling him a "stupid bloody arse", leading to the First Doctor to threaten her with a "jolly good smacked bottom", much to the Twelfth Doctor's embarassment. Bill tells the Twelfth Doctor to come back alive, to which he replies: "Be here when I do."

The First Doctor fetches the Captain another brandy, realising that was why his successors was missing some. He soon leaves to join his older self, while Bill looks after the Captain, but when she grabs the brandy, her hand is revealed to be glass. While outside on Villengard, the two Doctors rest, discussing their respective regenerations. The Twelfth Doctor remarks they have yet to change because they are in a "state of grace", though he himself finds his body starting to deteriorate. He asks why his younger self halted the regenerative process, unable to remember himself. The First Doctor admits he is "afraid" about regenerating. Before the Twelfth Doctor can answer the question himself, they suddenly come under attack from a creature in a nearby tower, and only stops when the Twelfth Doctor asks the creature to scan him, announcing: "I'm dying!", before going into the tower. He tells his younger self to wait outside to which he begrudgingly agrees.

The First Doctor observes the area, finding the remains of a Dalek casing. He inspects it though Bill sneaks up on him and begins asking why he ran away. The Doctor insists she return to the Captain but Bill insists, asking what he was running to. Interested by the question, The First Doctor responds that he left to discover why good always defeats evil. Bill suggests it might be because of "some bloke" though the First Doctor doubts such. Bill hugs him, thanking him for his efforts. However, when she pulls away, the First Doctor realises she is a glass avatar.

Alone, the Twelfth Doctor meets with the rogue Dalek Rusty, who has taken refuge from the other Daleks hunting it. He remarks on how he is a "good Dalek" though Rusty continues to fire at the Doctor. The Twelfth Doctor decides to come to a truce to which Rusty agrees by disarming his gunstick. Given access to the Dalek Hivemind, the Doctor learns that the pilot and its ship, known as Testimony, were created on New Earth, designed to extract people from their timelines at the moment of their death, and archive their memories into glass avatars. "Bill" is one such avatar, created from her memories. Time suddenly freezes again, the First Doctor and Bill entering the room. Although disappointed at seeing no evil to fight, the Doctors agree to return the Captain to his timeline.

Upon doing so, the Captain asks the Doctors to keep an eye on his family, introducing himself as Archibald Hamish Lethbridge-Stewart, an ancestor of the Doctor's close friend the Brigadier. The First Doctor assures he will do so, the Twelfth Doctor confirming they did. The Testinmony remarks the Captain will not remember the incident and a perception filter will ensure the Doctors are not noticed once time restarts. As time resumes, the Doctors watch as soldiers on both sides begin singing "Silent Night". Soon, each side disarms their weapons and enters the battle field, leading the Captain and the German soldier to withdraw their weapons and make peace. The Twelfth Doctor explains to the First that he deliberately shifted the Captain's timeline to the start of the Christmas truce, to ensure his life would be spared.

With the Captain saved, the First Doctor informs the Twelfth that he is prepared to regenerate and bids him good-bye before returning to his TARDIS. As the soldiers play football, draw and spend the day together, the Twelfth Doctor watches on, saluting the Captain - who briefly bypasses the perception filter, but dismisses him and returns to his trench. Now alone with Bill's avatar, the Doctor adamantly contends she is not the genuine Bill, only for her avatar to explain that memories are what define a person. To help him understand, the avatar restores the Doctor's memories of Clara Oswald while allowing him to briefly see a vision of his former companion, bringing him joy, before they are joined by Nardole's avatar who joins Bill in asking the Doctor not to allow himself to die. The Doctor refuses to give the avatars testimony of his life, stating he must be left alone to face his end. They respect his wish and leave after he embraces them both.

The Doctor returns to the TARDIS and, after arguing with the TARDIS, decides to regenerate, saying "One more lifetime won't kill anyone, except me", but not before relaying advice to his next incarnation. He collapses as he does so but manages to return to his feet. Finally ready, the Twelfth Doctor utters his last words "Doctor, I let you go". With that, he regenerates, igniting the console room as his face changes.



Smoke fills the console room, the Twelfth Doctor's ring falling from his hand. Once it clears, the new Thirteenth Doctor, now a female, examines her reflection, before saying: "Oh, brilliant". She presses a button. Suddenly, the TARDIS suffers multiple failures and, hanging thousands of feet above the Earth, sharply jerks causing the doors to face the ground. The Doctor tries to hang on but the doors open threatening to suck her out. As the Doctor grabs the console, the time rotor explodes sending her falling out of the ship. As the flames completely consume the console room, the Doctor can only watch as the TARDIS dematerialises leaving her plummeting towards the Earth below....

Cast

 * The Doctor - Peter Capaldi
 * The Doctor - David Bradley
 * Bill - Pearl Mackie
 * The Captain - Mark Gatiss
 * Clara - Jenna Coleman
 * Nardole - Matt Lucas
 * Helen Clay - Nikki Amuka-Bird
 * German Soldier - Toby Whithouse
 * Polly - Lily Travers
 * Ben - Jared Garfield
 * Voice of the Daleks - Nicholas Briggs

The Tenth Planet

 * The First Doctor - William Hartnell
 * Polly - Anneke Wills
 * Ben - Michael Craze


 * And introducing Jodie Whittaker as the Doctor

Culture

 * British soldiers are fighting German soldiers.

Technology

 * The soldiers in World War I uses guns and rifles.
 * The Captain finds a VHS cassette inside the Twelfth Doctor's TARDIS.
 * The First Doctor finds the Twelfth Doctor's electric guitar.
 * The Testimony Foundation owns a spaceship which they used to capture the Twelfth Doctor's TARDIS.
 * The Twelfth Doctor says that Bill Potts was turned into a Cyberman.
 * The First Doctor is confused about the sonic screwdriver.
 * The First Doctor doesn't approve of the sonic sunglasses.
 * The First Doctor doesn't know what browser history is.
 * The Twelfth Doctor attempts to connect the glass woman via the sonic shades and TARDIS scanner to the TARDIS databanks. He however finds that due to it being the First Doctor's TARDIS, there's hardly anything there, and needs a bigger one, and suggests the Matrix on Gallifrey.
 * Rusty scans the Twelfth Doctor.
 * The First Doctor picks up a Dalek eyestalk.
 * Rusty "gets naked" for the Twelfth Doctor by ejecting his gunstick.
 * The Twelfth Doctor mentions the Dalek hive mind.
 * The glass woman says that a perception filter will render her and the Doctors invisible.

Biology

 * Rusty scans the Twelfth Doctor, noticing his life signs are failing.
 * When the First and Twelfth Doctors shake hands, regeneration energy glows intensely from them.

Food and beverages

 * A soldier is seen drinking tea.
 * Both Doctors have Aldebaran brandy in a compartment behind one of the roundels in each of their TARDISes.
 * The soldiers are drinking beer.
 * The Twelfth Doctor tells his future self to never eat pears.

Art

 * A soldier is seen drawing a picture.

Sport

 * The World War I soldiers are playing football.

People

 * Captain Lethbridge-Stewart and a German soldier both have no desire to kill the other, wishing the other spoke English and German, respectively.
 * Everyone except the Doctors, the Captain and the glass avatars freeze on the spot when time freezes.
 * The First Doctor remarks that it's a shame Polly Wright isn't around, saying that the Twelfth Doctor's TARDIS is in dire need of dusting.
 * Bill Potts returns to the Doctor's side.
 * Bill tells the Doctor about Heather, the sentient oil girl, coming back for her, to which the Twelfth Doctor notes "how romantic".
 * Bill asks the First Doctor about his reason for running away from Gallifrey.
 * The Doctor finds Rusty inside a tower in Villengard.
 * Rusty projects a video of a Professor Helen Clay.
 * Clara Oswald appears to the Twelfth Doctor, and his memories of her return.
 * Nardole returns to say goodbye to the Doctor.
 * Nardole reveals that he had nipples made of glass, and that he has invisible hair.

Species

 * The First Doctor asks the Twelfth Doctor if he is a Time Lord.
 * The Twelfth Doctor says the First Doctor was "weak as a kitten".
 * A bird freezes mid-air.
 * Glass avatars, part of the Testimony, are creatures with ability to freeze time and extract memories and personality of a dying person so they will remain forever.
 * The TARDIS team encounters Kaled mutants which have mutated even further. The Captain first thinks they are rats, saying he is used to those.

Locations

 * The First Doctor has just left the Snowcap base in search for his TARDIS.
 * The Doctors meet each other at the South Pole.
 * Captain Lethbridge-Stewart is fighting during World War I in Ypres, in 1914.
 * The First Doctor says to the glass avatar that it is on Earth, a "level 5 civilisation".
 * The Doctors and the Captain are taken to the Chamber of the Dead inside a Testimony spaceship.
 * Gallifrey is mentioned.
 * The TARDIS team travels to the centre of the universe.
 * The TARDIS team visits Villengard. The moon is in the process of destruction.
 * The Twelfth Doctor calls Villengard's Weapon Forges "The Nightmare of the Seven Galaxies".
 * The Captain says that his death would be a big shock for everyone back in Cromer.
 * Rusty projects a video of Professor Helen Clay from the University of New Earth on New Earth in the year 5,000,000,012.

Events

 * The aurora australis appears in the sky above the South Pole.
 * The glass avatars freeze time at the South Pole in 1986 only minutes after the battle at Snowcap base.
 * The glass avatars freeze time during World War I in Ypres 1914 just before the Christmas truce.
 * When the glass avatars misplace the Captain they call it a timeline error.
 * A Christmas truce, the only one of its kind, is held on the World War I battlefield of Ypres on 25 December, 1914.
 * The Captain says he told his wife he'd be home for Christmas.

The Doctor

 * Due to the timelines being out-of-sync, the First Doctor forgets trying not to regenerate and so the Twelfth Doctor does not remember it.
 * The First Doctor's face is, according to Twelve, "all over the place" as a result of him trying to hold off his regeneration. This also results in him regaining the strength he had lost during his fight with the Cybermen on Snowcap.
 * The First Doctor doesn't know who his future self is, and keeps denying it even after the Twelfth Doctor reveals himself to him. Only after the Testimony shows him snippets of his future does he finally give in and accept it.
 * The First Doctor first thinks the Twelfth Doctor is another Time Lord trying to capture him for running away with a TARDIS.
 * The First Doctor later attempts to make the Captain understand better, saying that the Twelfth Doctor is his nurse, however improbable due to him being a man.
 * The First Doctor tells the Twelfth Doctor that he assumed he would get a younger appearance after regenerating.
 * The Twelfth Doctor tells the First Doctor that between those two there are "a few false starts".
 * The Twelfth Doctor calls the First Doctor Mister Pastry.
 * The Doctor is called "The Destroyer of Worlds", "The Imp of the Pandorica", "The Oncoming Storm", "The Shadow of the Valeyard", "The Beast of Trenzalore", "The Butcher of Skull Moon", "The Last Tree of Garsennon", "The Destroyer of Skaro" and "the Doctor of War".
 * The Twelfth Doctor calls the First Doctor Mary Berry.
 * The Twelfth Doctor attempts to distract the First Doctor with the blinking lights on his astral map after his unfavourable remark to Bill about Twelve needing her for cleaning his TARDIS.
 * The First Doctor admits to being afraid of regeneration.
 * The Twelfth Doctor calls himself Corporal Jones.
 * The First Doctor says he travel around to get a question answered about why there is good and evil in the universe and how the balance is held between the two.
 * The Twelfth Doctor admits to only pretending to like Bill's rug.
 * The First Doctor regenerates into the Second Doctor.
 * The jacket that he wore on his trip to Spiridon as the Third Doctor is hanging in the Twelfth Doctor's TARDIS.
 * The Twelfth Doctor regenerates into the Thirteenth Doctor.
 * The Twelfth Doctor's ring falls off of the Thirteenth Doctor's hand, as it doesn't fit on her finger.

TARDIS

 * The First Doctor calls the TARDIS "the Ship".
 * The First Doctor remarks on the exterior changes; the windows being the wrong size, the blue colouring having changed and its size having expanded.
 * The Twelfth Doctor says its size is from having been "bigger on the inside" for many years, implying it is suffering from a size leak.
 * The First Doctor disaproves of the Twelfth Doctor's TARDIS, saying about the console room that it is "the flight deck of the most powerful space time machine in the known universe, not a restaurant for the French".
 * The Twelfth Doctor still has blackboards in his TARDIS.
 * Bill remarks the windows are the wrong size.
 * The First Doctor's TARDIS has a name tag on the console that says Bernard Wilkie.
 * The Cloister Bell rings in the Twelfth Doctor's TARDIS, before he regenerates.
 * The Twelfth Doctor's TARDIS interior ends up exploding due to "Multiple Operations Failures" after the Thirteenth Doctor causes a "Systems Crisis" by clicking a red button on the console. The exploding TARDIS throws out the Doctor as it dematerialises.

Music

 * The soldiers sing "Silent Night", or "Stille Nacht".

Story notes

 * The cinematic release featured two documentaries: The End of an Era, a retrospective and behind-the-scenes look, before the showing, and Twice Upon a Time at the end, an in-depth look into the making of this Christmas special.
 * Twice Upon a Time features a "Previously on Doctor Who..." sequence saying "709 Episodes ago" and showing footage from TV: The Tenth Planet with William Hartnell, Anneke Wills and Michael Craze as the First Doctor, Polly Wright and Ben Jackson respectively. The footage slowly morphs Hartnell into David Bradley, and Lily Travers and Jared Garfield then appear as Polly and Ben, who then proceed to reenact the missing bits on Snowcap from said episode.
 * This story features a rare instance in which actors that only appeared through use of archive footage were also credited. Another notable instance of this happening is TV: The Day of the Doctor.
 * Rachel Talalay had actually shot a number of scenes from The Tenth Planet, with a complete set reconstruction, recast characters, and the series 10 Mondasian Cybermen. She said in an interview that she tried to make both the set, and the cinematography, as accurate to the original scenes, and original production values, as much as possible. She did admit to having fun with some parts of the set in particular, and embellishing with a "60s feel", and noted that some details of the action had to be invented. These scene recreations were not used in the final edit of Twice Upon a Time; the original footage was used in its place. However, these specially shot re-tellings were shown in the cinema feature DOC: Twice Upon a Time.
 * The First and Twelfth Doctors meeting also features the scene acted out differently in TV: The Doctor Falls and Twice Upon a Time, similar to how episodes in the 60s reshooting the prior scene’s cliffhanger, often resulting in little differences. The same situation also occured when TV: The Runaway Bride followed the TV: Doomsday cliffhanger 11 years prior.
 * The recreated Hartnell TARDIS interior set actually included props from the original set in the 1960s. As told by Mark Gatiss, these included the brass pillars, which are indeed the brass pillars from way back in 1963. Other aspects of the set were recreated.
 * The Twelfth Doctor's regeneration has a new visual effect, and even sound effect, to those used previously in the BBC Wales series. Resembling slow travelling, elongated golden lightning. It is the first regeneration for the Doctor, since the Seventh Doctor's in 1996, to use an effect which is visually distinct from that seen in The Parting of the Ways, with the Ninth Doctor up to The Doctor Falls.
 * Toby Whithouse, with his performance here as the German soldier, is the second person to be involved in the BBC Wales series as both actor and writer, following Mark Gatiss.
 * The First Doctor's amazement and confusion about the Twelfth Doctor's sonic screwdriver would appear to contradict PROSE: Venusian Lullaby, which features the screwdriver used by the First Doctor.
 * This is the third consecutive regeneration story to include the word "time" in the title, following The End of Time and The Time of the Doctor.
 * This is the second multi-Doctor story to feature a regeneration, and the first in which it is the current incarnation of the Doctor who is shown to regenerate.
 * Nikki Amuka-Bird is credited as "Helen Clay" on-screen, and as "The Glass Woman" in Radio Times.
 * When Bill's glass avatar and the Doctor talk and she restores his memories of Clara Oswald, the music from The Husbands of River Song when the Doctor and River were on a date before the Singing Towers of Darillium plays.
 * On the last day of filming, Mark Gatiss brought in the jacket that Jon Pertwee wore in TV: Planet of the Daleks. It was featured hanging from a stand in the background in the Twelfth Doctor's TARDIS during the regeneration scene. He also published a Behind the scenes picture of Capaldi wearing the jacket.
 * Nardole having invisible hair was already jokingly stated by Steven Moffat in a BBC post episode interview. There he also stated that Nardole was the only one able to see it through his glasses and that it was purple. Matt Lucas had been aware of the invisible hair, but not the glass nipples.
 * The Twelfth Doctor's final lines about his name and how humans would understand it are directly taken from a theory Capaldi stated at a press screening interview of The Pilot.
 * The Twelfth Doctor's line "never, ever eat pears" is a tweaked version of the one in a hidden scene in TV: Human Nature by the Tenth Doctor. It was also said in TV: Hell Bent by the Twelfth Doctor.
 * This is the first regeneration story in the revived series without any direct connections to the Last Great Time War.
 * The idea of the First Doctor looking wrong midregeneration can be paralleled to the Second-and-a-Halfth Doctor during the events of NOTVALID: Devious
 * This is the third televised multi-Doctor story, after TV: The Two Doctors and Time Crash, that is not an anniversary special. It's also the first televised Christmas special to also be a multi-Doctor story.
 * Time Crash was also written by Steven Moffat.
 * The Twelfth Doctor's regeneration is the second on-screen regeneration in which the participant changes gender as a result, following that of the General in TV: Hell Bent.
 * During the title sequence, the actor credits zoom further up the screen before fading out than in previous episodes.

Ratings

 * 7.92 million (UK final)
 * 5.70 million (UK overnight)
 * 1.15 million (BBC America)

Filming locations
to be added

Production errors

 * Bill's shirt changes constantly throughout the entire episode, from the rainbow shirt that was seen in Smile, to a new shirt which we have not seen before.
 * However, this could be attributed to the fact that this version of Bill is a collection of her memories and not her physical self.
 * After the Captain requests a favour from the Doctors, the First Doctor can be heard saying "Oh, anything. Name it," but his mouth is not actually moving after the word "oh."
 * During the scene in which the soldiers are playing football, the shot is flipped. This is visible due to the soldier's uniforms.
 * The Twelfth Doctor begins regeneration with his back to the stairs, but immediately following regeneration, the Thirteenth Doctor is standing at a different angle and is further away from the stairs.
 * When the Doctor catches herself from falling through the TARDIS doors with her foot, her boot briefly changes to a different shoe.
 * In the shot where the Doctor falls through the TARDIS doors, the bottom-right section of wall has clearly been digitally extended on the last frame.

Continuity

 * The Twelfth Doctor mentions Bill's Cyber-conversion and apparent death, (TV: World Enough and Time / The Doctor Falls) and Bill explains how Heather saved her. (TV: The Doctor Falls)
 * The Twelfth Doctor declares everyone is important. The Eleventh Doctor thought so too. (TV: A Christmas Carol) The Ninth Doctor previously claimed an "ordinary man" was the most important thing in creation, and expressed shock when someone said they weren't important. (TV: Father's Day)
 * The Twelfth Doctor indirectly references that the TARDIS, as time passes, inevitably suffers from a size leak. (TV: The Name of the Doctor)
 * Bill reminds the Twelfth Doctor about Heather and the sentient oil. (TV: The Pilot)
 * Despite remembering that Heather saved her, Bill does not know where Heather is, implying her own transformation from human to sentient oil is considered her 'death' by the Testimony, as this is the point at which her memories run out. (TV: The Doctor Falls)
 * The Twelfth Doctor tells the Testimony that the Earth is defended and comments on how "that almost never works" when the Testimony retreats briefly. (TV: The Eleventh Hour et. al) The First Doctor is surprised by this, causing the Twelfth Doctor to remember that he is "early days". (PROSE: Doctor Who and the Horror of Coal Hill)
 * The Twelfth Doctor informs the First Doctor he must remember where he parked, having got in the wrong TARDIS. The Eleventh Doctor would later repeat this sentiment to himself when on a date with River Song. (TV: Last Night)
 * The Twelfth Doctor is well aware of the consequences that would arise from the premature death of his predecessor and the resulting erasure of his deeds. (TV: Turn Left, The Name of the Doctor)
 * The First Doctor remarks on his successor playing the electric guitar. (TV: The Magician's Apprentice, Hell Bent, The Pilot)
 * The First Doctor declares he will not change. The Twelfth Doctor said the same thing. (TV: The Doctor Falls)
 * The Twelfth Doctor visits the South Pole as he nears regeneration. He was there, also near regeneration, in his first incarnation. (TV: The Tenth Planet)
 * The Doctor was present for the Christmas truce of 1914 earlier in his first incarnation (PROSE: The Little Drummer Boy) as well as during his fifth (PROSE: Never Seen Cairo) and ninth incarnations. (COMIC: The Forgotten)
 * The First Doctor is unfamiliar with the sonic screwdriver. (TV: Fury from the Deep, et. al)
 * The Twelfth Doctor goes to the abandoned weapon forges of Villengard, to find an old ally. The Ninth Doctor previously told Jack Harkness that he had once visited Villengard, when the main reactor went critical, and vapourised everything. Jack's sonic blaster was made here. (TV: The Doctor Dances)
 * Villengard was once called the nightmare of the Seven Galaxies, a Kaled concept that believed only Skaro could have intelligent life forms in the seven galaxies. (TV: Genesis of the Daleks)
 * Villengard is at the centre of the universe, where Terminus was when the Fifth Doctor visited the area. (TV: Terminus)
 * The First Doctor recognises what the Twelfth Doctor knows to be a Kaled mutant on Villengard, having encountered such mutations on his first visit to Skaro. (TV: The Daleks)
 * The First Doctor explains why he ran away from Gallifrey, (TV: Heaven Sent) mentioning many "pressing reasons" as the Fourth Doctor did to Adric. (TV: Logopolis)
 * The Twelfth Doctor meets Rusty again. (TV: Into the Dalek)
 * Rusty calls the Twelfth Doctor a "good Dalek". He did so before. (TV: Into the Dalek, Death in Heaven) Another Dalek once called the Ninth Doctor a "good Dalek". (TV: Dalek)
 * The Doctor mentions that Earth is a "level 5 civilisation". (TV: City of Death, Voyage of the Damned, The Eleventh Hour)
 * Helen Clay is from New Earth. She founded the Testimony Foundation in 5,000,000,012, just a few years before the Tenth Doctor and Rose first visited. (TV: New Earth, Gridlock)
 * The Doctor holds a Dalek eyestalk. (TV: The Wedding of River Song, The Time of the Doctor)
 * The Doctor is referred to as "the Doctor of War". (TV: A Good Man Goes to War, The Name of the Doctor, The Day of the Doctor, Hell Bent) The Testimony also calls the Doctor by other titles associated with conflict, as did the Daleks, (TV: The Parting of the Ways, Asylum of the Daleks, PROSE: Engines of War) and the Great Intelligence. (TV: The Name of the Doctor)
 * The Doctor meets his first incarnation. He has met him before and also struggles to remember the encounter. (TV: The Three Doctors, The Five Doctors, The Day of the Doctor)
 * The Twelfth Doctor tells the First Doctor they have an advantage as "this time there's two of us". The Eleventh Doctor made a similar remark when talking to his Tenth and War incarnations. (TV: The Day of the Doctor)
 * The Doctor once more pilots a previous incarnation's TARDIS. (TV: The Day of the Doctor)
 * The Doctors banter about their differences. (TV: Time Crash, The Day of the Doctor)
 * The First Doctor still calls the TARDIS "the Ship". (TV: The Daleks, The Sensorites, PROSE: Time and Relative)
 * The Twelfth Doctor favourably remarks about the desktop theme of the First Doctor's TARDIS. The Tenth and Eleventh Doctors did the same regarding the War Doctor's TARDIS. Likewise, the First Doctor criticises the Twelfth Doctor's desktop theme just as the Tenth did the Eleventh's. (TV: The Day of the Doctor) The Fifth Doctor also once voiced his dislike of the Tenth Doctor's desktop theme. (TV: Time Crash)
 * The First Doctor remarks on how dusty and dirty the Twelfth Doctor's TARDIS is. Wilf once said similar regarding the Tenth Doctor's TARDIS, specifically that he felt it would be cleaner. (TV: The End of Time)
 * The events of The Tenth Planet are referred to.
 * The Testimony shows the Doctors the amount of times they have become associated with wars. (TV: TV: The Day of the Doctor, Journey's End, The Name of the Doctor)
 * The Testimony show snippets of the First Doctor's future incarnations: the Third Doctor, (TV: Invasion of the Dinosaurs) the Fourth Doctor, (TV: Genesis of the Daleks) the Fifth Doctor, (TV: Arc of Infinity) the Seventh Doctor, (TV: The Happiness Patrol) the Eighth Doctor, (TV: The Night of the Doctor) the War Doctor, (TV: The Day of the Doctor) the Ninth Doctor, (TV: The Parting of the Ways) the Tenth Doctor, (TV: The Waters of Mars, The Day of the Doctor) the Eleventh Doctor, (TV: The Day of the Doctor) and the Twelfth Doctor. (TV: The Doctor Falls)
 * The Testimony also shows Davros. (TV: Journey's End)
 * The Eleventh Doctor's conflict at Trenzalore is mentioned by the Testimony, (TV: The Time of the Doctor) as is the Pandorica, (TV: The Pandorica Opens) the Last Great Time War, (TV: Dalek, et al.) and the destruction of Skaro. (TV: Remembrance of the Daleks)
 * The Testimony tells the Doctor that he is in the shadow of the Valeyard. (TV: The Mysterious Planet, Mindwarp, Terror of the Vervoids, The Ultimate Foe) The Valeyard had previously caused the Sixth Doctor to regenerate. (AUDIO: The End of the Line, The Red House, Stage Fright, The Brink of Death)
 * The Twelfth Doctor repeats River Song's favourite phrase of "spoilers" to the Captain and his predecessor. The Tenth and Eleventh Doctors also employed this phrase. (TV: Silence in the Library, Let's Kill Hitler, The Day of the Doctor) After the First Doctor is surprised to learn that Earth is defended, he calls the First Doctor "early days," the same phrase used by River to refer to the Tenth Doctor. (TV: Silence in the Library)
 * The Twelfth Doctor remembers his promise to "never be cruel or cowardly. Never give up, never give in." (TV: The Day of the Doctor, Hell Bent)
 * The Twelfth Doctor uses his astral map (TV: The Web Planet) and the TARDIS databank. (TV: Castrovalva)
 * The Twelfth Doctor mentions the Daleks' Pathweb. (TV: Asylum of the Daleks, The Time of the Doctor)
 * The Twelfth Doctor once more references River's words from her diary. (TV: Extremis, The Doctor Falls)
 * The Doctors promise to check up on the family of Lethbridge-Stewart. (TV: The Web of Fear, et al.)
 * The Twelfth Doctor regains his memories of Clara. (TV: Hell Bent, For Tonight We Might Die, The Pilot)
 * Regeneration energy has previously dealt severe damage to the Doctor's TARDIS, leaving it in disarray for the successor. (TV: The End of Time)
 * The Twelfth Doctor mentions Bill's Christmas gift of a rug. (TV: The Pilot)
 * The final shot of the Twelfth Doctor is a shot of his eyes and eyebrows, echoing his first appearance. (TV: The Day of the Doctor) His ring also falls to the ground shortly after regenerating, mirroring when his predecessor's bow tie fell to the ground as he regenerated, (TV: The Time of the Doctor) and recalls how the First Doctor's ring no longer fitted the Second Doctor's finger, leading him to discard it. (TV: The Power of the Daleks)
 * The Twelfth Doctor says "Doctor, I let you go" before regenerating. Before he blew up the Cybermen on the Mondas Colony Ship, he previously told himself to "let it go". (TV: The Doctor Falls) In contrast, as his tenth incarnation regenerated, he had said "I don't want to go". (TV: The End of Time, The Day of the Doctor)
 * The First Doctor chides Bill for swearing, echoing how he did the same with his own granddaughter Susan when she made crude remarks. (TV: An Unearthly Child)
 * The Twelfth Doctor recalls where the alcohol is stored in the TARDIS, having seen River access it. (TV: The Husbands of River Song)
 * The Twelfth Doctor tells his successor not to eat pears. The Seventh and Twelfth Doctors previously expressed a distaste for pears. (PROSE: Human Nature, TV: Hell Bent) Though the human John Smith was seen eating a pear in TV: Human Nature, footage which is used, sped up, in that same episode, included the Tenth Doctor himself warning Martha not to let his human counterpart eat pears.
 * The Thirteenth Doctor expresses delight when she sees her new reflection in the TARDIS view screen. The Twelfth Doctor previously expressed approval when Clara suggested he could become female. (TV: Death in Heaven) The Eleventh Doctor also expressed enjoyment at being a woman when he switched bodies with Amy Pond. The Doctor noted that "Time Lords don't really worry that much about what sex they are." (COMIC: Body Snatched) He also mistakenly thought he had regenerated into a woman shortly after his own regeneration. (TV: The End of Time)
 * The TARDIS doors fly open after the Doctor has regenerated and the TARDIS is malfunctioning. (TV: The End of Time, The Eleventh Hour)
 * Captain Archibald Hamish Lethbridge-Stewart mentions Cromer, a place that seemed familiar to the Brigadier. (TV: The Three Doctors)
 * Shortly before regenerating, the Twelfth Doctor salutes Captain Archibald Hamish Lethbridge-Stewart, something that the Brigadier always wanted the Doctor to do. (TV: Death in Heaven)
 * The glass avatar of Bill Potts mentions that the Doctor "serves at the pleasure of the human race". (TV: Thin Ice)
 * Nardole telling the Doctor that "if he dies then everyone in the universe would go cold", resembles the Eleventh Doctor telling his old companions Sarah Jane and Jo Grant that "if he died then he thinks the whole universe might just shiver". (TV: Death of the Doctor)
 * The Twelfth Doctor says "Snap" to the First Doctor when revealing that he's his future self, in a similar fashion to when the Sixth and Second Doctors met. (TV: The Two Doctors) The Tenth Doctor also did the same when comparing how similar he was to the Fifth Doctor. (TV: Time Crash) "Snap" was also a phrase River Song told the Tenth Doctor after showing him her screwdriver. (TV: Silence in the Library)
 * The First Doctor threatens Bill with a "jolly good smacked bottom". He told Susan Foreman she also deserved "a jolly good smacked bottom". (TV: The Dalek Invasion of Earth)
 * The Twelfth Doctor wears his sonic sunglasses again. (TV: The Magician's Apprentice, et al.)
 * The Twelfth Doctor gets concerned when the First Doctor asks what browser history is. He previously warned Osgood and Bill not to look at his browsing history. (TV: The Zygon Inversion, Smile)
 * The Testimony storing the memories of the dead is similar to the APC Net. (TV: The Deadly Assassin)
 * The Doctor has met time travellers who came at the very last moment of people's lives, although they made it their business to punish them for their crimes in life. (TV: Let's Kill Hitler, The Wedding of River Song) He has also encountered certain technology that could store the dead's memories, claiming to be a heaven. (TV: Dark Water)

Myths

 * The Twelfth Doctor would be killed, The Twelfth Doctor was killed in the previous story, he just refused to regenerate then.
 * Because the start was set in the events of The Tenth Planet, Cybermen would appear. Although this was technically true, they only appeared through the use of archival footage from said story.
 * Carole Ann Ford would return as Susan Foreman. This was proven false.
 * The Captain would turn out to be Gilbert MacKenzie Trench, the man who created the iconic police box design. The Captain was revealed to be Archibald Hamish Lethbridge-Stewart, an ancestor of the Brigadier's.

DVD releases
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Digital releases
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