Catastrophea by: Terrance Dicks

Frontier in Space is a story most famous for being the final story to feature Roger Delgado’s Master, but was remembered by Jon Pertwee for being the only televised story to feature the Draconians, his favorite alien.  It is fitting that Terrance Dicks first contribution to the Past Doctor Adventures range serves as a well deserved tribute to Jon Pertwee and his era on television.  Catastropheia takes place after the two story arc Frontier in Space and Planet of the Daleks, and serves as a prequel to the Earth-Draconian conflict seen in the former story.  While it features a Draconian prominently on the cover to entice fans to read, the majority of Catastrophea plays out like a tense political thriller with the Draconian Empire in the background.  The planet Kastopheria, like many planets, is an Earth colony with an authoritarian regime.  Currently at a time of peace, there are protests against the government waiting for rebellion leader ‘el Llama’ to start things off.  Of course, the Doctor and Jo Grant get involved through cases of mistaken identity and throughout the novel are captured and released several times before being placed in a position where they can help the inhabitants of the planet from the authoritarian General Walton and corrupt politician Councilor Rekar.  Walton is your stereotypical buffoon military politician character (think Mr. Chinn in The Claws of Axos) who is easily fooled by young and ineffective rebels while Rekar is the scheming bigoted character who abuses his power.



Terrance Dicks uses Catastorphea almost as a make up novel for the disaster that was The Eight Doctors.  Instead of trailing back through the Doctor’s timeline, Dicks uses this novel to celebrate an era of the show that he loves while not letting the celebration overtake the central plot of the novel.  Yes there are plenty of tropes here common in the Pertwee era, but they are all present in the background and do not impede much of the enjoyment of the novel.  There is a minor trap where Dicks perhaps has too many subplots going which makes wrapping them up nicely in the end of the novel takes a bit of work, but as always the easy to read prose quickly gets the reader to the point Dicks is attempting to make.  There’s a plot about an indigenous cult who has the Doctor as their Messiah figure, commentary on indigenous rights, and the standard political drama as tensions rise.  Each of these subplots are in full swing before the Draconians even appear in the novel.  Dick’s writing style makes pages fly by and having short chapters keeps the pace up as there are tributes to every cliffhanger making the book difficult to put down.  The epilogue of the novel is a chilling final note, not including the Doctor or Jo, but giving insight into the side characters various fates.  The Third Doctor is masterfully characterized here from the word go: he’s as suave as ever, puts Jo’s life above his own, and is willing to charm the authorities to get them out of trouble.  Dicks also highlights just how many steps ahead the Third Doctor would be as he is correcting for outside influences of other characters.



The Draconian subplot, while always a presence as there is a blockade against them from the beginning of the novel, only comes to a head in the final third of the novel.  That final third is perhaps the novel’s most exciting as we see tensions between Draconia and humanity rise up to begin the war which was explored in Frontier in Space.  The war itself is one which comes because of the personal interests of the parties involved, a theme Dicks weaves throughout the book.  The interest of the young rebels, genuinely wanting a better life for themselves but falling to naiveite of being unable to mobilize.  Or the interests of the natives who believe the Doctor is there to save their plight and even the interest of the politicians who only want power.  Dicks uses the setting of a jungle planet to full effect with the sweltering heat representing the rising tensions.  He can consider himself on his way to redemption from the travesty of The Eight Doctors by writing a celebratory novel full of tropes that still manage to make an excellent read. 8/10.