The return of Doctor Who in 2005 was a major TV event that generated a lot of press coverage and debate. Christopher Eccleston's damaged but charming performance remains a standout in the generations of actors who have played the role. However, the really good stories involving Eccleston's 9th Doctor and companion Rose didn't really get going until mid-way through the one series the actor appeared in. That is, with the exception of The Unquiet Dead, a finely crafted piece of Whovian Christmas chiller from a clear admirer of the form. Regular Doctor Who and Christmas ghost story writer Mark Gatiss began his work on TV Doctor Who here and (with the exception of the excellent "making of" drama An Adventure in Space and Time) he has yet to match this episode in his other writing for the show. While not actually aired at Christmas, The Unquiet Dead has all the elements of a good Dickens holiday ghost story (note how aficionado Gatiss has his Doctor tell Dickens he loves the scariness of The Signalman, memorably dramatised in A Ghost Story For Christmas, the same series for which Gatiss would later write). The episode, in which alien species the Gelth exist only in gaseous form and leap from gaslight to reanimated corpse made good use of the Victorian setting, even adding a spooky seance for good measure, and introduced the concept of the "Rift" in space and time running through Cardiff (which proved useful for explaining why so much happens there and set up a future spin-off). The star turn, though, is Simon Callow's Dickens. After all these years of one man shows and the like, Callow is basically a career Dickens and knows just how to bring the writer to life as a slightly miserable but ultimately brilliant man.
