In the Den Of Geek TV Time Machine's final trip (for now) we arrive at Christmas Day 2005. A truly vintage year for Whovians of all ages...

In the news: The bombing of the London Tube and the subsequent mistaken shooting of Jean Charles De Menezes, happened within days of the news that London had secured the 2012 Olympic Games. Alan Sugar, then just a humble knight, 'fired' his first Apprentice in January, as BBC Two gave reality TV an upmarket shot in the arm. Meanwhile, the world of comedy mourned the passing of the great Ronnie Barker.

In Sport: In Cricket, England won The Ashes and Andrew 'Freddy' Flintoff was BBC Sports Personality of 2005. Chelsea won both the League Cup and the Premiership, Norwich City, Crystal Palace and Southampton were relegated. The FA Cup went to Arsenal. Hedgehunter won The Grand National and at Wimbledon, Roger Federer and Venus Williams took the top prizes.

Top of the charts: Christmas 2005 saw the first of many X Factor-related singles (the details escape me). We'd endured the 'comedy stylings' of the Crazy Frog during the summer so, in chart terms at least, 2005 was hardly a vintage year. But then I'm getting old!

At the box office: The top three films at Christmas 2005 all had a welcome Geek feel. In third place was Harry Potter and The Goblet Of Fire, in second was King Kong and the Christmas number one film was The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe. The all conquering Star Wars: Revenge Of The Sith was the biggest film of the year. The big Boxing Day premiere this year was... Cheaper By The Dozen 2, proving you can't have everything!

On TV Christmas Day (Sunday December 25th 2005)

2005 was the year the geeks finally inherited the earth! Regenerated by Russell T Davies, the incredibly popular Doctor Who became the centrepiece of BBC1's Christmas Day for the first time since 1965. Back then, in a programme transmitted at 6.35pm (just before The Black and White Minstrel Show), the original Doctor, William Hartnell, carrying a tray of drinks broke the 'fourth wall': "Here's a toast. A Happy Christmas to all of us... and incidentally, a Happy Christmas to all you at home!"

In truth, it was probably only because Christmas Day fell on a Saturday, that the Timelord appeared in the schedule at all!  It's a wonder the show wasn't relegated to Boxing Day, given the episode title was The Feast of Steven. The programme was atypical of its parent serial, the mammoth 12-episode Daleks Masterplan (commissioned apparently, because the then Director of Television. Huw Wheldon, was a big fan of Daleks). Centering on a Christmas night in a Liverpudlian police station there had been plans for the cast of Z Cars to feature, but the producers of Z Cars felt this would undermine their show too much...

40 years later almost to the minute, The Christmas Invasion saw a brand new Doctor (played by a then-relative unknown) arriving in time for turkey and trimmings. David Tennant and Billie Piper recorded a 'cut away' scene for Children in Need but this was the first chance proper to see what Tennant could do with the Timelord. In a stunningly fresh continuity development, the Doctor regrew his hand after appearing to lose it in a sword fight with the leader of the Sycorax.

CHRISTMAS DAY 2005:

BBC ONE
6am Breakfast
9am CBBC: The Snow Queen
10am Stranger in The Manger
11am Songs Of Praise
11.45am CBBC: Blue Peter Christmas Presents
12.20pm News
12.30pm FILM: The Santa Clause
2pm Top Of The Pops Christmas Special
3pm The Queen
3.10pm FILM: Shrek
4.30pm FILM: Toy Story 2
6pm My Family
6.50pm News
7pm Doctor Who: The Christmas Invasion
8pm The Green Green Grass
8.50pm News
9pm EastEnders
10pm TheTwo Ronnies Christmas Sketchbook
11.05pm Before They Were Famous
11.45pm FILM: Working Girl

ITV1
6am GMTV
9.25am CITV: Rugrats
9.55am Help! It's Christmas
10.55am FILM: Alice In Wonderland
12.15pm News
12.20pm Tarrant in the land of... the Polar Bear
1.05pm FILM: The Railway Children
3pm The Queen
3.10pm Creature Comforts
3.25pm FILM: The Grinch
5.15pm News
5.30pm Christmas Creature Comforts
6pm Emmerdale
7pm Celebrity Who Wants To Be A Millionaire
8pm Coronation Street
9pm The Booze Cruise II
10.50pm News
11.05 The South Bank Show: Little Britain
12.05am FILM: The Untouchables

Doctor Who aside, Christmas Day on BBC One featured Songs Of Praise, reflecting the fact it was a Sunday. 2005 saw the last Top Of The Pops Christmas Special before the show was dumped. 'The Pops would now only make an annual appearance just for Christmas!

Toy Story 2 was BBC One's big film of the day and after My Family and Doctor Who came the strangely popular Only Fools... spin-off, The Green Green Grass. Following the inevitable Christmas Day visit to Walford, a proper treat: The Two Ronnies Christmas Sketchbook. A selection of top notch sketches were book-ended by the Ronnies, at their newsdesks for "...some late items of Christmas news". Sadly, the show was tinged with poignancy as Ronnie Barker had passed away just two months earlier.

ITV1 highlights included Creature Comforts, the inevitable visits to Emmerdale and Weatherfield, Celebrity Millionaire, The Booze Cruise II and a South Bank Show unusually profiling BBC show Little Britain. ITV1 rounded-off the night with the Oscar-winning film The Untouchables.

Over on BBC Two, the dancer Darcy Bussell was profiled before a performance of the Royal Ballet's Sylvia. Later Hancock and Steptoe and Son writers Galton and Simpson were interviewed for Arena, with a classic episode of Steptoe and Son screened at 9.30pm. A selection of Dave Allen sketches and monologues appeared at 11pm (just as BBC One ceased to care it was Christmas night!). Dead Ringers featured a classic sketch as new Doctor Who star 'David Tennant' met his previous Timelord 'selves' for a Christmas get-together.

On Channel 4, animated favourite The Snowman made its traditional appearance, this time just before Jamie Oliver delivered the (no doubt 'pukka') Alternative Christmas Message. Later, in a distinctly un-seasonal mood, Channel 4  gave us a two-hour documentary about the previous year's tragic Tsunami. Channel Five served up five movies: The Big Sleep, Casablanca and Dances With Wolves were followed (after countdown clips show Greatest TV Comedy Moments) by National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and Jack Higgins' Midnight Man. However, true geeks had to wait until 2am for the premiere of sci-fi prison film drama Cuba!...

And in Radio Times...
A brilliant 'snow globe TARDIS' illustration by Mark Thomas, heralded a ten-page Doctor Who feature which incuded interviews with both David Tennant and Billie Piper. Russell T Davies set the scene for the Christmas special and there was a chance to win 'a real Dalek'. Best of all, a brilliant spread/poster depicted the epic battle between the Doctor and the Sycorax.

CHRISTMAS 2005 GEEK RATING:  

And finally...
Since 2005, Doctor Who has become the epitome of must-see family event television. Each Christmas special is bigger, better and arguably, even more popular each year.

Interestingly, the 2006 special The Runaway Bride was very nearly transmitted on Boxing Day, only swapping with the film Pirates Of The Caribbean at the eleventh hour, just as the Christmas TV listings went to press. Will this year's concluding episode of The End Of Time manage to surpass the 13 million-plus ratings for the Kylie Minogue 2007 spectacular Voyage Of the Damned? The BBC has pulled out all the stops this time, the Doctor even features in the BBC1 Christmas ident! This could be the biggest Who-themed Christmas since Dalekmania took hold in the mid-60s, leading to the Gojos 1964 single I'm Going To Spend My Christmas With A Dalek... Last year nearly 10 million saw 'The Two Davids' (Tennant and Morrissey, that is!) tackle the Cybermen in The Next Doctor.

In a few days, a new Doctor will once again arrive during the festive season. Will that give Christmas 2009 the elusive five-star Geek rating? As the Doctor himself would say, time will tell...