“Planet
of the Dead” is written by: John Freeman
with art by: Lee Sullivan, and lettering by: Zed (a pseudonym for Richard
Starkings). It was released in Doctor Who Magazine issues 141-142 (September-October 1988) and
is reprinted in its original form in Doctor
Who: A Cold Day in Hell! by Panini Books.
There is an argument to
be made that “Planet of the Dead” is Doctor Who Magazine’s attempt at a
25th anniversary story. It
was released in two installments leading up to the anniversary, directly
attempts a tie in to Remembrance of the Daleks by mentioning the Doctor
having an appointment on Skaro, and saying something about where the Doctor is
as a character. There are certainly still
lingering issues: the Doctor doesn’t actually do anything to enter into the
plot, just stumbling into an underground tomb on a planet where he wants to
fish but John Freeman at the very least captures this happy go lucky version of
the Seventh Doctor that is recognizable as a version of the Seventh Doctor. By attempting a tie in to Remembrance of
the Daleks there’s clearly an awareness from Freeman of this being a Doctor
Who story with some idea for where the strip should go. For near the entirety of the Seventh Doctor’s
run so far there has been a great problem of writers really not wanting to
write Doctor Who, but to connect as many Marvel UK properties together. The only big exceptions to this were “A Cold
Day in Hell” and “Culture Shock”, though Freeman here does create an alien
species that he could use in these crossovers, but not without connecting it to
a story about the Doctor’s regrets. The
title “Planet of the Dead” is a reflection of the visions of dead companions
that the Doctor is shown in an attempt to free the shapeshifting alien race off
this planet. That’s the plot and by the
time we get to the conclusion of the story where the Doctor at the last minute
realizes, the strength of Freeman’s script comes to the forefront. The plot is a simple idea and sustains two
issues by switching tactics halfway through, not only do other companions
appear as celebrations for the anniversary but each of the previous Doctors
appear. Freeman is quite good at
characterizing each of the six earlier Doctors, not enough in depth as some of
them (mainly the Second, Third, and Fifth Doctors), but they’re still recognizably
them from the dialogue.
It's particularly nice to
examine the Seventh Doctor as coming from two incarnations of loss, including
comics continuity of the death of Jamie McCrimmon on top of Adric and
Peri. Frobisher is also implied to have
died by his presence here. Peri is
acknowledged to have lived, but her exit in The Trial of a Time Lord is
very much one of a spiritual death. The Doctor
is portrayed as having a continual heaviness put upon him because of the deaths. There’s almost a pseudo-revival
characterization of traveling alone being a particularly bad thing which is
interesting considering there won’t be a return to a regular companion for two
years, after the show has been cancelled on television. Now obviously some of the companion visions
are a bit weak, Katarina and Sara Kingdom seem to be from a version of The Daleks’
Master Plan where they knew each other, but Adric is particularly served well
by acknowledging his death as the death of a child. This also is the first contribution from Lee
Sullivan on art duties, his style blending realism and stylization that is
going to develop over literal decades of contributions to the strip and other Doctor
Who Magazine submissions.
Overall, “Planet of the Dead”
while a little atypical for an anniversary story works as an examination of who
the Doctor is and where he has been. It
is kind of a shame that this didn’t immediately usher in a closer continuity
with the television show because it is perhaps the second story to have the Doctor
characterized as the Seventh Doctor, but alas there’s still more to come. 7/10.
No comments:
Post a Comment