Call the Midwife season 13 Christmas special spoilers follow.
Fred Buckle (Cliff Parisi) bounding down the street of Poplar dressed in a Santa costume can only mean one thing. It's Christmas!
Without taking a beat, Call the Midwife's Christmas special already has the hallmarks of a warming festive watch, signposted by the familiar jaunty overture, complete with Vanessa Redgrave's voiceover reminding us of the wonder of the season.
Is it laid on a little thick? Yes, but when it comes to Call the Midwife, 'thick' is like that snuggly throw you nuzzle into as you watch: it just works.
Sadly what didn't sync quite so effortlessly with the rhythm of the episode was Sister Monica Joan's bleak declaration.
"This forthcoming Christmas will be my last upon this Earth," she announced to the room and just like that she became the grim reaper – or perhaps ghost of Christmas future is more accurate.
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Sister Monica Joan was quick to make clear to the stunned Nonnatus inhabitants (and viewers alike) that it was more than just a prediction, adding: "God has assured me of this grace. I shall not see another festive season this side of heaven and I accept his will."
Her assuredness gave us pause, until we remembered we were watching the Yuletide special episode.
Call the Midwife may be known for its gut-punching deaths – nurse Barbara Hereward (Charlotte Ritchie) among them – but the creators are not so monstrous as to rip a fan-favourite character away during the holidays.
This became clearer and clearer as the episode progressed, despite Sister Monica Joan's insistence otherwise.
Dr Turner (Stephen McGann) declared her fit as a fiddle and instead diagnosed her with depression, the treatment for which involved steering her to things that made her feel happier.
Sister Julienne (Jenny Agutter) and the crew got straight to work at recreating Sister Monica Joan's happiest Christmas yet, a memory from childhood she had not too long ago shared with nurse Nancy's youngster Collette (Francesca Fullilove).
This kernel of Christmas magic involved an elaborate Victorian Christmas tableau with live animals put on at her village church – and so unfolded the storyline for the episodes.
Sister Monica Joan's friends rallied around to deliver her the perfect Christmas, one that would lift her spirits. There was something delightfully whimsical about watching them pull this off in secret, bumps in the road and all.
However while the show managed to achieve something heartwarming both in their world and sensationally for the audience, it felt very much as though Sister Monica Joan had been used as a plot device through which to channel some Christmas magic in a rather disingenuous way.
Her health scare towards the end of season 12 was a well-developed storyline that engaged viewers. It felt as though there was a real possibility she might not survive her illness and so when she arrived at the church for Trixie's wedding, that moment had a huge pay-off.
Subsequently throwing around ideations of death during a Christmas special when we know seasonal core-character deaths are unlikely deflates the tension. Furthermore, tagging on her diagnosis of depression also felt empty.
Sure, there's an argument to say that her recent brush with death may have impacted her mental health, especially since she suffered from low spirits during her recovery. But the show draws no parallels between both events, something it is usually good at doing.
Instead, it was treated (like this standalone episode) in isolation, with Dr Turner chalking her depression up to a common occurrence among the elderly, one that often goes undiagnosed.
In any case, Sister Monica Joan's Christmas surprise appeared to be curative. In fact by the end of the episode "[she'd] dismissed all her talk of this being her last Christmas and embraced it as one of her happiest and best," or so Redgrave stated just as boldly (but not quite as bluntly) as Sister Monica Joan had done earlier that episode with all that talk of death.
Her spirits were soaring and she was elated, yet somehow this felt equally as disingenuous. as though something as serious as depression could be easily fixed (not soothed but fixed) by a little holiday kindness.
It almost doesn't work, except that Call the Midwife is so exceptional in its execution of emotive storytelling that it does.
Sister Monica Joan seeing her younger self through the eyes of an innocent, hopeful Collette was a treasured moment. You can forgive them toying with the idea of her death and for the fact that her sole storyline existed just to manufacture a need for some kind of tokenistic Christmas miracle, because the miracle is awe-inspiring.
Additionally, the many overlapping storylines have that classic Call the Midwife feel: Sheila (Laura Main) wrestling with the intricacies of being an adoptive mother, the two labouring mums – former classmate adversaries – overcoming their childhood differences to lend each other long-lasting support.
This all seems like an impossible feat to jam into a standalone special and so it's unimaginable that there would be room for more – but there was.
Reggie (Daniel Laurie) getting to shine as an angel in the nativity while his pseudo-mum Violet (Annabelle Apsion) found joy at seeing someone with Down Syndrome unexpectedly reflected in the painting from which the nativity was based upon is a nod to the importance of disability inclusion.
It's pretty hard to not love what the creative team have done with Call the Midwife this Christmas even, if we're not overjoyed with how they arrived there.
Call the Midwife's Christmas special is available to stream now on BBC iPlayer. Call the Midwife season 13 is due to air in the new year.
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TV writer, Digital Spy Janet completed her Masters degree in Magazine Journalism in 2013 and has continued to grow professionally within the industry ever since. For six years she honed her analytical reviewing skills at the Good Housekeeping institute eventually becoming Acting Head of Food testing. She also freelanced in the field of film and TV journalism from 2013-2020, when she interviewed A-List stars such as Samuel L Jackson, Colin Firth and Scarlett Johansson. In 2021 she joined Digital Spy as TV writer where she gets to delve into more of what she loves, watching copious amounts of telly all in the name of work. Since taking on the role she has conducted red carpet interviews with the cast of Bridgerton, covered the BAFTAs and been interviewed by BBC Radio and London Live. In her spare time she also moonlights as a published author, the book Gothic Angel.
