Steven Moffat and Peter Capaldi have been waiting to turn Doctor Who into a superhero movie all of their lives. Now they finally have their chance.

Moffat has created a Superman-esque hero – played by Orphan Black’s Justin Chatwin – to go toe-to-toe with the Time Lord in this year’s festive special ‘The Return of Doctor Mysterio’, a clever play on Doctor Who’s Spanish title translation.

At New York Comic-Con over the weekend, both Moffat and Capaldi drew parallels between ‘Doctor Mysterio’ and the Superman lore – most significantly the classic 1978 film starring Christopher Reeve.

“I was obsessed with superheroes when I was a kid,” Moffat told fans. “Mainly, what I liked was Superman. And mainly what I liked about Superman was Clark Kent.

“Clark Kent is awesome. He’s amazing. He goes around pretending he’s not a god and not revealing to the woman he loves that he is the man she’s in love with for her own protection. It’s the best love story ever told. I love that. It’s a love triangle with two people in it.

“And I’ve always wanted to write that story. I’ve always loved Clark Kent. Clark Kent is the best hero ever. Every hero since then has been dispensable… apart from Doctor Who and Sherlock Holmes!”

Capaldi is already pitching ‘The Return of Doctor Mysterio’ as a perennial Christmas classic, which he hopes will be repeated on telly each holiday season like Superman: The Movie.

“When I was young, they used to show on Christmas Day in Britain, they show a Christmas movie,” he explained to the New York crowd. “My most favourite one was when they played the Christopher Reeve Superman movie.

“That very first one, it had such a great feel about it. Great irony, clever, funny, witty, tongue-in-cheek, and I think that’s what we’ve sort of made here – a new, ironic, good-hearted superhero movie which hopefully they’ll want to repeat every year as long as I get a cut of it.”

In ‘The Return of Doctor Mysterio’, the Time Lord must join forces with an investigative journalist and a superhero to save New York from an alien threat. Typical Christmas, then?

(Justin Chatwin as Doctor Who’s Christmas superhero)

Along for the ride will be Nardole (Matt Lucas), the wonky cyborg who previously made mischief for The Doctor in last year’s Christmas special ‘The Husbands of River Song’.

Doctor Who is expected to return on Christmas Day (December 25) on BBC One in the UK and BBC America in the US.

A full 10th series of Doctor Who – Moffat’s last – will follow in 2017, with actress Pearl Mackie joining the show as “funny and geeky” new companion Bill.

Watch a teaser for ‘The Return of Doctor Mysterio’ below: