10 Best Christmassy Doctor Who Villains

6. Dream Crabs

Doctor Who The Snowmen
BBC

Identified as the Kantrofarri, the Dream Crabs were a race of predators who could feed on brain matter and induce telepathic dream states.

In 2014's Last Christmas, the Twelfth Doctor and Clara Oswald were attacked by the creatures and forced to experience a fictional Christmas. There, they found themselves on an adventure with none other than Santa Claus himself.

Introduced as the 'real' Santa, the Doctor and Clara slowly begin to realise they were trapped within a dream. This fantastical dream had constructed a perfect adventure for them, complete with a base under siege, terrified crewmembers dancing to Christmas music, and support from Santa's elves.

Falling further into the fiction, Clara even came face-to-face with her deceased boyfriend Danny Pink as she began to experience her dream Christmas with him - the Christmas they never had.

Managing to convince the crew of the base to 'wake up' from the dream world, the Doctor struggled to wake Clara, as she wanted to stay in her new fiction with Danny. Using the sonic screwdriver, the Doctor removed the Dream Crab latched onto her and foiled their attempts to ruin everyone's Christmas.

As the Doctor and Clara departed, a lone tangerine left on a window ledge and the sound of jingle bells suggested that their meeting with Santa may not have been entirely fictional...

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Eden Luke McIntyre is a Scottish writer, editor and script consultant, with an MA in TV Fiction Writing. He writes content for TV, radio, stage, and online, and was appointed as a BBC Writers Room Scottish Voice in early 2020. Eden can usually be found rambling about Doctor Who, The Beatles, and obscure things that no one cares about.