Doctor Who and the Curse of Peladon by: Brian Hayles

 

Doctor Who and the Curse of Peladon was written by Brian Hayles, based on his story The Curse of Peladon.  It was the 11^th story to be novelized by Target Books.

 

The early and late Target novelizations have an interesting trend in common, mainly the fact that television writers and production teams were the ones primarily adapting their serials.  While Terrance Dicks would become the one most prominently adapting books, Malcolm Hulke, Gerry Davis, Barry Letts, and important for today’s review, Brian Hayles, took the time to adapt at least some of their stories.  Hulke paved the way with Doctor Who and the Cave-Monsters and Doctor Who and the Doomsday Weapon, and Barry Letts followed with Doctor Who and the Daemons in the second year with Brian Hayles’ Doctor Who and the Curse of Peladon.  Upon its release, of the eleven novelizations Doctor Who and the Curse of Peladon was the most recent serial to be adapted, only being two years old, tied with The Sea Devils.  Brian Hayles would have also recently revisited Peladon in The Monster of Peladon which would not be adapted for another five years by Terrance Dicks.

 

Doctor Who and the Curse of Peladon is an interesting novelization, simply because Brian Hayles was given a chance to fully take his scripts outside of the studio bound television production of The Curse of Peladon along with the costumed budgetary descriptions.  Hayles fills the novel with vivid imagery giving the reader a chance to understand the culture of Peladon and a lot of the fear.  The plot is a beat for beat recreation of the television story with the alterations made to be adding a depth of character which was missing from the television story.  For instance, King Peladon on television has this romance with Jo Grant throughout, but you never get an explanation as to why, but here Hayles expands adding this element that she reminds him of his mother and the fact that Jo is a human being is what brings the attraction.  There are also descriptors in the prose that do an excellent job of translating the performances of David Troughton and Katy Manning.  The imagery doesn’t end there, with Alpha Centauri and Arcturus having more lively descriptors than what their costumes.  Centauri as a character changes color like a mood ring throughout the novel which is used to help build up tension and fear while Arcturus comes across much slimier than on television.  If there was one alien that doesn’t work as well in this example of prose, it would be the Ice Warriors, who while the plotline with the Doctor judging them is there, that red herring feels accented which worked better in a visual medium than the novel form, especially since neither of the previous Ice Warrior stories had been adapted at this point.

 

Overall, Doctor Who and the Curse of Peladon doesn’t change the quality of the television story, offering an alternative take with some different, more vivid imagery making it work with some almost lyrical prose from Hayles in the first of two novelizations he would provide to the Target books range.  9/10.