I came here to post something about last night’s Doctor Who, only to find that my previous post had disappeared. Entirely. It wasn’t in the trash, it was nowhere. It was as if it had been sucked through that crack in the known universe people keep spreading rumours about.

I don’t know what I can read into this, other than that it might be some kind of retribution for the fact that I didn’t much care for The Time of the Doctor. For having the sneaking feeling, in fact, that it was a lazy piece of fan-service, something that was cobbled together in a hurry while everyone was still high on the success of the 50th anniversary episode The Day of the Doctor.

Yes, Doctor Who is a show that has come to be defined by its mythos and its season-long story arcs, and as a fan of intricate narratives I don’t have a problem with that, at all. But when an individual episode has no intrinsic worth as story, indeed when it makes no sense as story when taken in isolation, then what we have is lazy, lazy writing, and that’s what we were dished up with yesterday. The only ‘present tense’ narrative strand in The Time of the Doctor had to do with time travel as a novel method for getting your turkey roasted and I know it’s Christmas, but for goodness’ sake, surely there are better story ideas out there?

A sorry end to Matt Smith’s term as the Doctor, in my opinion, and further proof if any were needed that the programme is badly in need of some new blood in the showrunning department.

Still, all was not lost. Mark Gatiss’s documentary on M. R. James was a delight, as was his adaptation of ‘The Tractate Middoth’ immediately before it. A simple story, but effective, and beautifully retold. Perhaps Moffat needs to reacquaint himself with the masters…

I’ve now reinstated my post on what I read in 2013 – let’s hope it stays in place this time. I’ll be watching with interest to see if anything odd happens with this one.

In the meantime, I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas. Heartfelt thanks and good wishes to all those who stop by this blog every once in a while, and looking forward to more musings, rants and meanderings in the coming twelve months.