I thought the Christmas Special was pretty good, though it was very self-referential. But...
I kinda wish they'd stop doing the regeneration story at Christmas (or New Year, in the case of DT) - by doing that, they place the entire focus of the episode on the big upcoming change, and as a result take it off the rest of the story. As it was, it felt like everything else was a prologue to the 'real' story that happened in the last minute or so, and I felt that in doing so they did a disservice to that particular bit of real-world history.
(That said, it was still better than last year's effort. Most things are.)