The competition between retailers over their Christmas adverts has been described as an “arms race”. This year John Lewis has taken the analogy a step further by setting its Christmas advert in outer space.

The £1 million production was, admittedly, filmed mostly in Warner Brothers studios in Hertfordshire, rather than in the exosphere. But John Lewis, which has gained a reputation for producing the most memorable Christmas adverts in recent years, has proved it has lost none of its ambition.

‘Man on the Moon’ features the story of a girl called Lily who spends much of her time staring through a telescope (yes, it is available to buy at the department store). In the run up to Christmas, she spots an old man, wearing scruffy clothes and living alone in a little shed on the moon. She tries to contact the man, by waving, firing messages via an arrow. With no joy.

Then on Christmas Day we see a parcel – attached to some helium balloons – land at the feet of the old, and rather lonely, man. It is a present from the girl: a telescope, which he then uses to spot her back on earth.