The Shape-Shifter by: Steve Parkhouse with art by: John Ridgway and letters by: Annie Halfacree

 

The Shape-Shifter is written by Steve Parkhouse with art by John Ridgway and lettering by Annie Halfacree.  It was released in Doctor Who Magazine issues 88-89 (April-May 1984) and is reprinted in its original form in Doctor Who: Voyager by Panini Books.

 

Let’s talk for a quick moment about Colin Baker as the Sixth Doctor.  Baker would play the role from 1984 to 1986, the shortest time in the role until Paul McGann’s one television film run and Christopher Eccleston’s one year on the show.  Baker as an actor wished to play the role for longer than Tom Baker’s seven year era, but was cut short due to a combination of production troubles at the BBC, a controller who was actively trying to cancel the show, and a perceived lack of viewing figures (the 1985 season was actually healthy in the viewing figures, on par with all of Davison’s run and even higher than about half of Tom Baker’s last season).  The issues began right with Baker taking over the role with John Nathan-Turner’s decision to make the final story of Season 21 the Sixth Doctor’s introduction.  While this may be a good idea on paper, in practice it was disastrous as The Twin Dilemma is often regarded as one of, if not the worst Doctor Who stories.  It also meant that for the majority of 1984 the Doctor Who Magazine strip would have one story to base their portrayal of the Sixth Doctor upon.

 

The Shape-Shifter is the first Sixth Doctor comic strip and it reflects this fact, mainly because for the first installment the Doctor is barely present, only sitting at a restaurant, going back to the TARDIS and finding it invaded by the titular shape shifter, with the rest of the first issue being dedicated to establishing the Whifferdill as a character.  Fans will eventually come to know this character as Frobisher, but here he’s a stereotypical hard boiled detective with a mix of greed, not even named in the story.  He just decides to go off with the Doctor at the end because they make a good team of making a fool out of Josiah W. Dogbolter and they split the money which is fine, it means the plot of the two issues is thin enough that it doesn’t entirely rely on something big.  Writer Steve Parkhouse uses it for some time to understand how he’s going to be writing the Sixth Doctor before launching into a longer adventure, which is a smart decision as there’s plenty of time for things to work.  The Doctor is essentially a supporting character in this specific story which works in this way.  There’s not a lot of time to let things sit, so Parkhouse just gets right down to business and works it out quickly.  This is also the first story to feature art from John Ridgway who would be the permanent artist on the strip for the entirety of the Sixth Doctor’s run and into the Seventh Doctor’s run, a much longer run that Mick Austin or Steve Dillon, meaning that at this point there is going to be consistency in the style.  Ridgway’s style is interesting, it takes some of the dynamic poses of Dave Gibbons’ and combines it with more of the detail of Austin, without the scratchiness that permeated the Fifth Doctor’s run.

 

Overall, The Shape-Shifter is a simple beginning to a new Doctor’s era in the comic strip, but is a lot of fun with an interesting point of view character, a lighter tone, and a break from the longer epics that came before and would come after.  8/10.

Escape Velocity by: Colin Brake

 

The ending of a story arc should make those experiencing it feel something about the conclusion, be it character focused, plot focused, or even a mystery box like the ones Steven Moffat is oh so fond of.  The Eighth Doctor on Earth arc while having interconnected stories, has been driven forward by the character development of the amnesiac Eighth Doctor as he’s forced to live through 200 years sequentially on Earth and it ends in the early days of the 21^st century.  The Doctor finally has to meet Fitz in St. Louis, here it being confirmed that it was Compassion who set up the meeting meaning we get a very unexpected but welcome cameo.  Escape Velocity is the first novel by Colin Brake who had already contributed a short story to the third Decalog collection.  Having a first time writer to close out the entire arc is an interesting, if risky decision, instead of an experienced writer and Escape Velocity shows many of the issues with that.  It is very much a first time writer, with Brake penning a fairly standard alien invasion story where competing scientists are racing to reach escape velocity and get off the planet Earth, with the eventual goal of establishing space hotels.  Pierre-Yves Dudoin and Arthur Tyler III are incredibly fun upon their introduction, but by the time the reader gets to the halfway point a large issue of the book becomes apparent.  Mainly that many of the interesting ideas just find themselves running out of steam so Brake attempts to keep things moving by inserting alien characters from an ambassador to a war fleet coming to threaten the planet Earth, but none of it ends up finding enough energy to sustain a book.

 

This does not mean that Escape Velocity is terrible, it isn’t, it’s perfectly fine as a book and there are plenty of things to like.  Fitz’s reintroduction for instance is brilliant with Brake making him shine throughout the book, and the reader remembers why Fitz is such a good character and how much his presence has been missed in the range.  Brake writes him as at least partially self-aware at the weirdness and amounts of coincidences necessary for Compassion to get the Doctor and the TARDIS back together, that is the original TARDIS.  St. Louis is not the city in Missouri, but a bar that was originally science fiction themed until it was mysteriously bought out and made into an American themed bar.  It’s silly and slightly disappointing that this book isn’t set in the Untied States, but it makes for a fun setting because Fitz is aware of how weird it is.  There’s also enough time spent with Fitz while the Doctor is off doing other things (and Compassion dropping him off early).

 

Fitz could be our main character as he gets embroiled in an alien mystery and the kidnapping in Belgium of Dave Young, boyfriend of Anji Kapoor.  Anji is setup as the new companion, but honestly isn’t that interesting of a character here.  It’s nice to see a person of color as a companion, yet there isn’t a lot of characterization here.  She’s essentially an everywoman character, not too nerdy, driven, but not a whole lot of interesting characterization.  It feels like she just needs to be here because the editors of the range have determined there needs to be a new companion who is a girl from modern day Earth.  There could be something interesting with grief and the character going forward, but nothing is done in Escape Velocity to explore this.  The Doctor, Fitz, and the TARDIS reuniting is also a lot of fun, with the Doctor not getting his memories back completely but knowing enough to understand who he is at the core and what the TARDIS is.  This means that he becomes exuberant at Fitz coming back and coming to travel again with him at the end and he is allowed to be a romantic.  Interestingly, Brake sidelines the Doctor for much of the first half of the novel which is fine, but when he does show up it feels like Brake didn’t quite know how to characterize the Eighth Doctor, just making him vaguely a hopeless romantic.

 

Overall, Escape Velocity is a fine, if slightly disappointing ending to the Eighth Doctor on Earth arc.  There are several missed opportunities which could have made the novel something great but quite a lot of it is just standard Doctor Who, especially the characterization of the Doctor himself.  A new companion is introduced but there is a slightly worrying lack of characterization here giving some fear of a similarity to Sam Jones.  It’s just a perfectly average book about an alien invasion and some misunderstandings and just a little bit of hubris from humanity but not much else.  5/10.

The Dragon Reborn by: Robert Jordan: Wolf Dreams (Chapters 7 to 9)

 

“Noam lifted his head and stared at them silently, without expression.  There was nothing at all about him to suggest he was Simion’s brother – he had a chin, for one thing, and he was a big man, with heavy shoulders – but that was not what staggered Perrin.  Noam stared at them with burnished golden eyes.  “He’d been talking crazy almost a year, good mistress, saying he could . . . could talk with wolves.  And his eyes. . . .” Simion darted a glance at Perrin.  “Well, he’d talk about it when he’d drunk too much.  Everybody laughed at him.  Then a month ago, he didn’t come to town.  I went out to see what was the matter and I found him – like this.”” – The Dragon Reborn, p. 117-118.

 

Today’s section of The Dragon Reborn gives us the final chapters in the first grouping of Perrin’s perspective as well as the first of only four chapters to feature anything from Rand’s perspective.  As Rand’s perspective is more a tease of things to come (he channels a mysterious beam of light at a Darkhound and acts determined to end things with the Dark One in Tear which is where he’s headed).  It’s Perrin’s internal conflict, the danger of being a Wolfbrother, and a further dive into some of the world’s magic system that drives the world.  Noam isn’t really a fully fleshed out character, but a parallel to what Perrin could become.  It’s quite clever of Jordan to give the reader and Perrin a glimpse into a possible future without invoking any channeling.  Noam represents all of Perrin’s fears realized, being unable to latch onto his humanity and being condemned to the mind of a wolf.  Moiraine can’t heal him, but Perrin makes this specific plea for the man to let him go because “He will die in here or out there…Our there, at least, he’ll be free, and as happy as he can be.  He is not your brother anymore, but you’re the one who has to decide…You cannot cage a wolf, Simion, not and expect it to be happy.  Or live long.” – The Dragon Reborn, p. 120.  While this works, the writing is on the wall, Noam is going to die, but it’s at least going to be calming for him as he won’t be in the cage.  There’s also the important distinction of Perrin here that he is motivated by causing the least amount of harm.  It’s something we’ve seen before, in The Eye of the World, where he briefly considers killing Egwene and then himself while wandering the wilderness.  He is willing to go that far when things are that dark, something that going forward will only grow.

 

Another aspect of his character growing is the fear of not being his own man.  Obviously there is the issue with him being afraid of becoming like Noam, but there is also the shared fear of being used by the Aes Sedai.  He suggests to Moiraine use the power to shield the connection to the wolves, something which can and does invade his dreams as he does soon after, but that could only be done between Aes Sedai and Warder.  Moiraine, interestingly, despite caring for all of the Emond’s Field Five, wouldn’t bond him, partially because she’s of the Blue Ajah and they only have one Warder, but also because it’s something she wouldn’t do to anyone in these circumstances.  We’ll eventually cover what led to Lan and Moiraine being bonded, but at this point it’s already been laid out as something they mutually agreed to it.  She does promise this “If I can keep you whole, I will.  I promise you that, Perrin.  But I will not endanger the struggle against the Shadow.  You must know that, too.” – The Dragon Reborn, p. 124.  She genuinely cares, even if she can be blindsided by her fight against the Dark One, she will keep them safe and whole.  Immediately after this, Perrin finds himself in a wolf dream where he has his first real interaction with Hopper, the wolf he was closest to who died in The Eye of the World, who tells him to run.

 

There’s also an appearance from a woman in white, Lanfear aka Selene from The Great Hunt, but the important thing here is Perrin’s abilities developing, like Rand’s, without a mentor.  Perrin has a potential mentor in Elyas, the Wolfbrother from The Eye of the World, who won’t reappear in the books for several more installments, but like Rand being drawn into channeling, Perrin is being drawn towards the wolves seemingly by the Pattern itself.  This is perhaps best explained by Perrin, Rand, and Mat all being ta’veren, the Pattern warping itself around them.  The town they arrive in, Jarra, is one they know Rand has passed through because not only have Whitecloaks come through looking for Perrin (whom was established in the prologue to be a Darkfriend in their eyes), but also several happy events happening in the village, mainly several weddings and marriage proposals.  Moiraine hasn’t seen effects this Pattern warping itself around the characters, which is essentially Robert Jordan doing an interesting job as to why the plot happens in the way that it does.  The world literally warps itself around the characters which will lead to some interesting implications: Rand up to this point having his motivation not being manipulated by others although the world itself wishes to manipulate him comes to mind especially.  It’s also interesting that only Rand, Perrin, and Mat are ta’veren, meaning that every other character is less fixed in the Pattern, implying they have more free will to do things differently.  The next chapters put the reader in the heads of non-ta’veren characters, mainly Egwene, putting the reader in a time where they know the Pattern won’t warp around them.

The Quantum Archangel by: Craig Hinton

 

Craig Hinton is the author most often credited with originating the term ‘fanwank,’ and while there are reviews of his three published novels in the VNAs and VMAs as well as the unpublished Time’s Champion from me, it is The Quantum Archangel which defines the term in the most negative of sense.  It is one of those Doctor Who novels which on every page puts multiple references to television stories, novels, and even some of the early Big Finish audio dramas which would have been released at the time and Hinton’s prose becomes dense because of the references.  A good reference should be something that the reader can quickly move over and not something that bogs down the story in the minutia of details, and the later is what The Quantum Archangel exemplifies.  The first half is Craig Hinton writing a sequel to The Time Monster, a Jon Pertwee story which in the eyes of the fandom is one of the weakest of an otherwise brilliant run (though an opinion I do not entirely share).  The idea of a sequel to The Time Monster is intriguing and is almost setup well with Stuart Hyde, the younger scientist from that story, now in his fifties has been continuing the experiments into interstitial time without the oversight of UNIT or even the Master.  Stuart is a bit fun when he reappears, but there is the weird tendency to keep having him and the Doctor eat together, like a lot.

 

The problem comes in that Hinton doesn’t actually do anything with the fact that this is a sequel to The Time Monster for the first half of the story except to repeat events from The Time Monster.  Most of the moments of that story is remembered for are done word for word here with little twist, from the first appearance of a Chronovore, to the Doctor making up a piece of advanced technology to slow the Master down out of bits of kitchenware, to the Master pretending to be a European professor whose name means Master (this time it’s Serbian), and even some of the dialogue is just taken directly from The Time Monster.  The only difference would be putting the Sixth Doctor and Mel in the middle of that story, but Hinton who characterized them brilliantly in Millennial Rites, massively drops the ball.  Mel is no longer the plucky, optimistic, computer programmer, but a woman jaded from travel and the Doctor acting like both a child and a mass murderer.  The book opens with the Doctor finishing a genocide against a race of aliens that the audience never gets to see.

 

There eventually is an explanation as to why this is, but it’s meant to be our inciting incident for why Mel wants to go home and has become fed up with travel, but the only other story with Mel in the Past Doctor Adventures range to this point was Business Unusual which is her first story chronologically.  Hinton doesn’t really justify this, and even lampshades the fact that this isn’t the first genocide the Doctor has committed with Mel present, and to add insult to injury, explicitly states that this is post-The Ultimate Foe for the both of them.  Hinton attempts to make the Doctor seem to be spiraling into becoming the Valeyard, but he already explored that perfectly in Millennial Rites.  Here it feels like something put in because that’s what the editors wanted.  The second half involves the Quantum Archangel, basically God in the form of a human woman whom Mel went to college with.  Anjeliqua is a perfect example of where Hinton goes wrong with characterization, mainly that there isn’t any.  As the Archangel reality is almost immediately warped and the eventual climax revolves around a false prophecy a la The Armageddon Factor where a genocide has been implanted in the Doctor’s head for something that never actually happened.  The entire plot is just an excuse for Hinton to rehash Millennial Rites which worked because it was set up so well through the first half and had incredibly likable characters to follow in the warped world.  And it only focused on a single alternate reality while The Quantum Archangel focuses on like six at the same time.  It means that there isn’t anything that gets enough focus to develop in the second half of the book.

 

Overall, there are a few things to enjoy about The Quantum Archangel, the Master is characterized nicely and the stuff that comes from The Time Monster is at least something that you might get something out of if you really like The Time Monster, but the book on the whole is one which hangs two flimsy plots in an outline of a novel which feels more preoccupied with shoving in as many references as possible into a novel.  3/10.