From the Editors

Is it too soon to talk about Christmas? Not in the world of television, where Christmas has been in the air for weeks. But finally, after the trailers, the idents and the advertisements that pass as a kind of secular advent, we can say: Christmas starts here.

On page 12 the man who in 2002 revived a tired old sci-fi show and turned it into a big beast of the Saturday-night schedules talks to RT. Russell T Davies’s obsession with Doctor Who began long before his time running the series, as Alan Yentob writes in this issue (for the full interview see Imagine…

Russell T Davies: the Doctor and Me Monday BBC1). But Davies also tells us about his determination to place his latest Doctor at the heart of the nation’s Christmas Day and his ambition to take the show global.

We also whet your appetite for a feast of Christmas cooking, firstly with a preview of a MasterChef special where the critics who deliver verdicts on contestants’ cooking have to cook for John Torode and Greg Wallace. Then, in one of the highlights of the week, Nigella Lawson returns to the BBC with her take on Christmas in Amsterdam.

Elsewhere, the author Bernard Cornwell writes about his quest to discover the real story behind King Arthur, the cast and crew of All Creatures Great and Small tell us about a wartime winter in Darrowby and the comedian formerly known as Vic Reeves – now the artist Jim Moir – marks our cards for a Christmas spent bird spotting.

Which brings us back to Christmas. With that in mind, don’t miss a plum of a programme on Radio 4 – The Story of Puddings. The highlight is, of course, the Christmas pud. Read about the rich history of this British classic on page 120.

See you next week for our legendary double issue. Did we mention it’s Christmas?