The Alternative Dr Who Christmas Special Guide

For the first time since its triumphant return to our screens in 2005, there is no new episode of Doctor Who on Christmas Day this year, with the new production team plumping for a New Year's Day special instead. But if you're desperate for a fix of festive Who before the year is out (and want to do something slightly more interesting than rewatch some of the previous years' specials), why not look to parts of the show's spin-off media instead?

TELEVISION
In the 1970s, there were Who Christmas specials, but not as we know them - omnibus editions of popular serials would be run whilst the show was on a midseason break. The Planet of the Spiders DVD includes the omnibus version shown at Christmas 1974, and the recent Blu-ray release of Season 12 includes December 1975's omnibus version of Genesis of the Daleks.

If you're in the mood for something a bit different, then the special features on The Armageddon Factor include the BBC 2 series Late Night Story from Christmas 1978 in its entirety, which featured Tom Baker reading spooky short stories (see here for an episode guide).

AUDIO
There have been a number of Christmas-themed Big Finish stories over the years (I've only listed the ones which work as standalones here):

• The One Doctor, starring Colin Baker and Bonnie Langford (£2.99 to download)
• The Chimes of Midnight, starring Paul McGann and India Fisher (£2.99 to download)
• Bang-Bang-a-Boom!, starring Sylvester McCoy and Bonnie Langford (£2.99 to download)
• Flip-Flop, starring Sylvester McCoy and Bonnie Langford (£2.99 to download)
• Damaged Goods, starring Sylvester McCoy, Travis Oliver and Yasmin Bannerman (£14.99 CD / £12.99 download)
• The Little Drummer Boy, read by Beth Chalmers (£2.25 to download)
• The Hesitation Deviation, read by Lisa Bowerman (£2.99 to download)
• O Tannenbaum, read by Peter Purves (£2.99 to download)
• Better Watch Out / Fairytale of Salzburg, starring Paul McGann, Nicola Walker and Hattie Morahan (part of the Ravenous 2 boxset - £40 CD / £35 download)

If you're looking for a ghost story for Christmas, why not try one of these?:

• The Spectre of Lanyon Moor, starring Colin Baker, Nicholas Courtney and Maggie Stables (£2.99 to download)
• Winter for the Adept, starring Peter Davison and Sarah Sutton (£2.99 to download)
• Night Thoughts, starring Sylvester McCoy, Sophie Aldred and Philip Olivier (£2.99 to download)
• Iterations of I, starring Peter Davison, Matthew Waterhouse, Janet Fielding and Sarah Sutton (part of the Fifth Doctor Boxset - £30 CD / £25 download)
• Static, starring Colin Baker, Miranda Raison and Lisa Greenwood (£14.99 CD / £12.99 download)
• Ghost Walk, starring Peter Davison, Matthew Waterhouse, Janet Fielding and Sarah Sutton (£14.99 CD / £12.99 download)
• The Dread of Night, starring Sylvester McCoy, Travis Oliver and Yasmin Bannerman (part of the Seventh Doctor: New Adventures boxset, available at £23 CD / £20 download until the end of the month)

Or you could even go for Tom Baker's reading of A Christmas Carol.

BOOKS
Unfortunately Big Finish's four anthologies of Christmas-themed short stories are all prohibitively expensive, having gone out of print when the company lost its license to publish original Who fiction in print. You could instead go for the recent novelisations of The Christmas Invasion and Twice Upon a Time, The Twelve Doctors of Christmas, or, for younger readers, Dr. Tenth: Christmas Surprise!