Who Reviews Prisoner of the Daleks by DJ Forrest

Written by Trevor Baxendale

For BBC Books

Published 2010

10^th Doctor novel

‘The Daleks are advancing, their empire constantly expanding into Earth’s space. The Earth forces are resisting the Daleks in every way they can. But the battles rage on across countless solar systems. And now the future of our galaxy hangs in the balance…’

Move aside folks, this is the book to cap them all.

I love a good Dalek story, and let’s face it, among all other alien creatures, monsters, robots, droids, you name it – if you had to ask anyone what their favourite Doctor Who enemy was – most would say Dalek – because, most of us remember, growing up watching Doctor Who from behind the sofa, scared of the man in the lower skirt of the Dalek, who to me had always reminded me of one of the elderly patients in my Grandmother’s nursing home. Yeah, sorry folks!

Davros isn’t in this story – but a devious, strong, dominant Dalek by the name of X is – one that is even feared by lesser Daleks in the ranks. He is so devious that you wonder if the Doctor will ever manage to outfox him. In fact, if it wasn’t for the fact, that the 10^th in the series lived on throughout till the actual regeneration as we all remember – I’d say he was cutting it pretty bloody close to not making it back alive in this novel. Talk about being on the edge of your seat, for a novel – jeez!

There are human characters in this story that I have loved from the very first chapter I read them in. I found one of them exceptionally awesome and he never disappointed anywhere in the story, and when his ‘story’ came out, wow, I was enthralled.

Baxendale can write a bloody good novel – and in all the novels I have of his, he keeps the pace steady – never slows, never dips. You have to run to keep up with him, you can’t leave it midway in a chapter, but then you’ve really got to map out your chapters when you’ve only a half hour lunch break.

The Daleks are gaining ground, and the human and alien crew of the Wayfarer – a converted naval patrol ship, have to stop the Daleks from changing the history of the human race, right across the entire Universe. Yes, the old story of Dalek domination, but it never grows old – because there’s always a new story of heroes and heroines prepared to do their damnedest to stop them.

These characters, Cuttin’ Edge, Stella, Bowman and Scrum, and Koral, felt so real, I could really picture them, Bowman perhaps more. Bowman I was drawn to. Bowman I was rooting for. I can still see him now. I only wish he was real.

If you had to choose one Dalek novel, out of all the Daleks novels out there in the Whoniverse – I’d highly recommend that you read Prisoner of the Daleks first.

    

Who Reviews The Slitheen Excursion by DJ Forrest

Written by Simon Guerrier

For BBC Books

Published 2009

Starring 10^th Doctor

‘1500BC – King Actaeus and his subjects live in mortal fear of the awesome gods who have come to visit their kingdom in ancient Greece. Except the Doctor, visiting with university student June, knows they’re not gods at all. They’re aliens.’

The Slitheen Excursion has been one of the better Simon Guerrier novels starring the 10^th Doctor – mostly because The Pirate Loop, in my opinion, was catered towards a much younger audience. It was sweet and enjoyable, but it lent towards a far younger age group than the Slitheen novel.

It took me a while to get my head around the ancient Greek background, given that during school history lessons, we covered barely, nothing of that era, and I had to pull in what I’d seen of slaves versus masters in films, from Ben Hur, Spartacus and Gladiator to get a feel of the actual era and the arena with which the Doctor and June found themselves in, in the novel. Once this was visualised, the story played really well, and I only wish, June had been a regular character travelling with the Doctor. She had none of the clingy love interest, but she did depend upon the Doctor during the novel, if only for the sake of him helping her get back to her own time.

Of all the eras to find yourself in, it was perhaps not facing other Gladiators in a ring, entertaining the lords and masters high above in the balconies. Then I was reminded of The Hunger Games, when Katniss was entertaining in the arena and harpooned the apple from the pig’s mouth, so that was another visual.

I thoroughly enjoyed this story. I’m not totally a fan of the Slitheen but they do make such interesting enemies. They do enjoy a good hunt.

There were several elements to this story. You had the Doctor, who was doing his usual ‘not getting involved’, but getting involved anyway. There was June, who saw something unusual before she was heading back home after her holiday, and spotting the Doctor, equally another unusual sight. There are the Slitheen. There’s the multitude of alien species, like happy snappy tourists, with tales to tell and see humans displaying behaviour in the arena as if this is typical human behaviour throughout the eras.

Then you have the human element, the ancient Greeks which the Slitheen are manipulating in order to alter human history, forever.

There are different alien characters, some you’re sure you’ve heard of in other worlds and realms, and some you know you’ve read about in other novels. They’re an interesting bunch of creatures, whose feelings move back and forth like a ball in a tennis match. They’re always swayed by the bigger argument – or who shouts the loudest!

This story is an interesting read, and one that kept me hooked while I worked through several lunch times, sat in my car, for ultimate peace and quiet.

The 10^th Doctor stories, of which I only have a few more to read, have been an enjoyable journey so far, and I’m going to miss reading about his adventures.

Who Reviews Beautiful Chaos by DJ Forrest

Written by Gary Russell

For BBC Books

Published 2008

Beautiful Chaos is up there for me, with Forever Autumn and Ghosts of India, three books that have so much going on that you have to pause every now and then, for your brain to catch up, ferment the contents and enjoy the flavour of the moment.

This is the 10^th, back with Donna, but bringing the Noble family back to Who, with Wilfred and Sylvia, and the family still dealing with the grief, the void left by the Dad who had died a year before, and still not forgotten. Knowing Sylvia’s gruff exterior, we see why she’s so abrupt in her approach to her daughter – having to keep going, in the knowledge that after her husband being in relative charge, she’s now keeping an eye on her aged Dad, and now in tow with a woman she fears is replacing her Mum.

Donna, on the other hand, knows that that’s far from the case, but putting these two strong headed women together is bound to cause friction – and you can understand why Wilf heads to the allotment – for that bit of peace. I would too!

This story is after the Dalek Invasion and the Sontaran plot and after Journey’s End but obviously before the final 10^th episode which saw him regenerate.

Donna is back with the Doctor, and a new threat seems set on controlling the whole of planet Earth by the unlikeliest of possibilities – the Internet. What a cool idea – controlling the masses by the purchase of a computer – who’d have thunk it?

It’s such a brilliant idea – and the way it’s thought out is almost too terrifying to imagine – but the brilliance of writer Gary Russell, spins such a web of intrigue that he could make anything possible.

Wilfred Mott is being awarded at a social gathering after spotting a Chaos star and putting his name to it. He’s taking his new girlfriend with him, who is often ‘away with the fairies’ due to her condition, and Wilfred knows it will be only a matter of time, before she forgets him altogether. I did think this was June Whitfield character from an old episode, but it appears not to be. Of course, when the Doctor spies the Chaos cluster, he sees something that Wilf hasn’t. Another. A purple form, that wasn’t there earlier.  

This doesn’t bode well and all manner of chaos ensues.

It’s a brilliant story, and I hated the fact that I only had half an hour for lunch but the chapters could range from 32 pages to more. The story starts on a Friday, and continues to the impact of control that’s due to take place on the Monday.

There are background histories of the main characters, of the villains of the piece, and a startling, shocking almost, discovery of Caitlin, which surprised even me, and how she enacts her revenge on the very man you thought she loved. Wow!

I loved every minute of the novel, and only wish it had been a visual story, as this would have been wonderful, actually seeing the action on the screen, instead of just imagining it in my head.

Who Reviews The Doctor Trap by DJ Forrest

Written by Simon Messingham

For BBC Books

Published 2008

If you want a story that you could follow without having to think too hard about what’s going on, then this book is not for you.

Or, if you want a story where the Doctor is being chased over hill and dale by a bunch of hungry hunters wishing to claim the ultimate trophy, but again don’t wish to think too hard, then this book may not be for you.

If, however, you want a book that taxes your brain, causes you to look back to the previous page, or to several pages back, or wonder why you’ve failed to notice that you’re currently wearing your dinner down your work shirt – then this might be the very book for you.

The Doctor Trap is a confuse-the-very-pants-off-you kind of story, where the 10^th Doctor is being chased by trophy hunting hunters of various denominations from the group known as The Endangered Dangerous Species Society, headed up by Sebastiene, the sole owner of Planet 1, who is a Level 20 rogue, charmer, collector and in control of more meat pies than you’ve had, erm…hot dinners!

It starts out as the usual Doctor and Donna story with the pair landing on snowy ground, ahead of them a Snowcap base, where metres below an alien creature is encased in ice and will undoubtedly be thawed out for further inspection. And while both Donna and the Doctor get involved, the Doctor, steals the TARDIS and disappears with it.

My first startled question, just before the plum tomatoes slid from my cheese sandwich and splattered onto my lap, was ‘Huh?’

I read back. Perhaps I’d missed something. Then I realised, this is Time Travel. This bit will be explained much later. Perhaps this would be the End of the story, played at the beginning.

No.

As the Doctor involves himself in the Snowcap Base and the unthawing of the creature is revealed – and as Donna and the Doctor make for safety – he hands her a gadget to escape with, and she vanishes. Then there’s a level of confusion. Then the Doctor stares at a shiny blue light, and suddenly I have no idea what is happening, but it involves a lot of running, a different plain altogether, and no snow.

Usually, when I’m faced with confusion, I ditch the book and go for something else – but this book, despite throwing all manners of overlaid confusion my way, also intrigued me. Donna was locked away in the Exquisite Traveller hotel that looked like Bracknell but wasn’t – and all the Doctor had to do, was save his own skin and get back to Donna and escape this insanity. However, it seemed impossible to achieve this, and then I realised, if he did escape, and if he did meet Donna, would she know him to be the correct Doctor, and not an impersonator?

Yes, Simon Messingham was indeed Messing with my head. In fact, he was messing with it so much, that even I was curious as to which Doctor, Donna was speaking to, and which was running about the Chateau on Planet 1, and who was indeed running for his life, pursued by all manner of trophy hunters.

As much as it’s a frustrating novel, stick with it. It all makes sense in the end, well sort of. In a Wibbly Wobbly Timey Wimey sort of way.

Who Reviews Shining Darkness by DJ Forrest

Written by Mark Michalowski

For BBC Books

Published in 2010 

Shining Darkness is very much a ‘cat and mouse’ story. It’s the Doctor with Donna, who for the most part is without Donna. A piece of art is suddenly transmatted away with Donna, and the Doctor for the most part of the story, is trying his hardest to catch up with her, then when he catches up with her, he trades places with her, and so Donna spends the other half of the time chasing after him.

The story is about two teams of creatures, one hell bent on stopping the other, finding pieces of another mechanical, that could unleash all kinds of madness and mayhem, and it’s an ingenious idea and I’m still reading the novel to discover how the Doctor is going to fix the problem, now that both he and Donna are without the Tardis, and that Donna has the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver, and the Doctor is travelling with three mad men hell bent on destruction of all robots. And here is where the problem lies, which I’m sure the Doctor has already thought about.

It’s very difficult to work without the use of mechanicals. Robots. Droids, etc. As Donna discovered, that it’s also difficult to explain to another creature, that she feels more for the robot with the human face, that was attacked in the tunnels of a planet, than she feels about Mesanth, the lizard with multiple limbs who kicked at a mechanical door. Although she vehemently refuses to believe she can be a racist, it’s difficult for her come up with a reason why. Can you be racist over different types of mechanicals?

The Doctor as usual worries for the safety of his companion, who rarely travels with him when they’re out of the Tardis. That’s what makes the story all the more interesting. That’s how we find out so much more about the characters of the story. If they travelled together, how much enjoyment would we get from the pair? Would they be bickering towards the end of the story? Would the Doctor wish Donna had been transmatted to another ship, to give his head some breathing space?

Donna is not my favourite travelling companion, I’d much rather have Martha Jones travelling with the 10^th, but what I’ve come to realise, is that, when a character doesn’t really ‘do it for me’ in a television episode, the books certainly help bring the companion into their own, and I’m sure, just like Ianto Jones came into his own in The Undertaker’s Gift, that I’ll feel a little more sympathy towards Donna Noble, when I once again delve into the series with her and the 10^th.

There are some interesting quotes within the novel, some which are relevant to the world today, with the varying differences of cultures and genders, and most coming from the Doctor to another. When you look at it like that, it takes it away from being just a children’s novel, to being a message for the whole of mankind.

When Donna asks the Doctor about the Cult of the Shining Darkness, wondering if that’s the end of them, he replies, “It’s a state of mind, more than an organisation. There’ll be millions more like them out there. Thinking the same, mean-spirited, tiny-minded thoughts. Scared of anything that’s different, that they don’t understand. And they’ll always be there, ready to blame someone else for the state of the universe.”

Who Reviews 42 by Tony J Fyler

Tony’s about to fall into the sun.

Don’t all rush at once, will you?

Every now and again, and surprisingly often in the David Tennant era, Doctor Who does ‘concept album.’

Midnight was the concept album of ‘invisible monster.’ Human Nature/The Family of Blood was the concept album of ‘The Doctor’s actually human,’ (inspired of course by Paul Cornell’s Seventh Doctor novel). 42, the first Doctor Who script by Chris ‘The Man Who Would Be Showrunner’ Chibnall, is the concept of ‘real-time Doctor Who.’ It’s the closest we would ever get to Russell T Davies’ recurring nightmare – LIVE Doctor Who.

If you’re going to tell a whole Doctor Who story in real time, the 41 minutes of the episodes corresponding to the 41 in-story minutes, you’re going to want to do a couple of things. You’re going to want the countdown to represent a clear and present danger that you don’t have to spend too much time explaining. And then, perversely enough, you’re going to want something to fill up the minutes between you and the solution.

Chibnall gives us a straightforward premise - the SS Pentallian is caught in the gravitational pull of a sun. In 42 minutes its shields will fail and its dry roasting time for the crew of hapless humans. Job #1, done. What do we do for the other 41 minutes?

Chibnall, aware of his responsibilities, chooses to make the SS Pentallian true to the rough, grimy sci-fi that we’d seen in The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit. He makes the ship’s computer freak out and lock all the doors. Result: shedload of doors to unlock – that’ll keep us occupied for 40 minutes. Put the kettle on, Chris, this is too easy.

Of course, in Doctor Who, one thing is perennially true – problems are as easy or difficult to solve as the runtime demands. The SS Perntallian’s doorfest, in another setting, wouldn’t be deadlocked, and a weave of the sonic would open the lot of them, taking, at most, a minute of runtime. But this is a Chibnally gritfest, so beggar that for a game of sonics. These are proper complicated doors, which take two people and a pub quiz to open, so that takes care of a crew member and a companion for the length of the episode.

So…

Biscuit, anyone?

That’s the thing about 42. Subject it to the slightest critical appraisal and its plot-planning shows through. To keep every other cast member busy while Martha and ‘Cynical Crewman Number 1’ – or Riley Vashtee as he’s called here – spend the episode opening doors, there’s The Thing. It’s never given a name as such, it’s just a Thing, that ‘infects’ one crew member and then another, turning them into heat-ray-eyeballing killing machines, to hunt down the rest of the crew, and to make them ‘burn with me.’

In some ways, 42’s a vampire-thriller, the heat-people having the ability simply to kill or to make more of themselves, depending what they deem to be necessary at the time. It also takes the typical ‘base under siege’ concept – frightened people with something hunting them and no escape route -and slaps a big ticking clock on it, in a way that there always is, but which is rarely foregrounded.

Along the way, to give Chibnall his credit, he deals with a number of issues – how come the Pentallian’s drifted close enough to the sun to be trapped by its gravity in the first place? How honest are the crew?  - while also giving us at least a stab at some characterisation and character-dynamics, for all most of them never really come across as especially believable. In fact, shortly after you watch it, you’re having to look them up online to remember any of their names, which is particularly unfortunate as Chibnall invest the solution of his ‘falling into a fiery ball of death’ plotline in the emotional love-connection between two of them, and the gesture of self-sacrificing redemption of Captain Kath…(looks briefly up online) McDonnell.

Here’s the thing though. You can be as cynical as you like about the plotting-by-numbers or the button-pressing characterisation, but 42 works. It punches you in the pre-credits sequence and runs away, and from there right to the end, you’re running after it, from one deck of the Pentallian to the next, through one slowly-opening door to the next, avoiding the Monster-of-the-week with their heatstroke-eyes and their identifiable welder’s-mask of death (because, be fair, the action figure would have been rubbish otherwise), to the love story and McDonnell’s redemption, because it has enough fundamental Who in its DNA to more or less drag you along. The setup is explained quickly, there are obstacles and killer creatures and the Doctor gets to be both dweeby-clever and action-heroic. Meanwhile the still fairly new companion gets to be locked up and shot towards the sun, to consider her actions in running away with a total stranger, to express an already-formed crush-faith in our Time Lord Extraordinaire, and, for the most part, to ‘save him back.’ There’s running, there’s shouting, there’s recreational maths and a pop quiz. Going right back to The Dead Planet, there’s a bloke who gets a crush on the companion, and she has to let him down before stepping back in the box. People scream, people die, the Doctor saves the day in (in this case) the very nick of time.

It's interesting to rewatch 42 as we progress through Series 10, because it epitomises and reminds us of the thing that’s lacking in that languid (not to say turgid) series – pace. Yes, if it’s ONLY pace you’re relying on to get you through the 42 minutes of the episode, it would be exhausting, and no, there’s nothing inherently wrong with the slower route that Series 10 is taking. But rewatch 42 today and you’ll be amazed how much adrenaline it splatters across your screen, at the end of which you feel like you could go for a jog or eat a salad or do your own recreational maths or stranger-snogging. 42 is base-under-siege, bog-basic Doctor Who that makes you feel good. You might not care when any of the crew die, but you feel like you’ve had an adventure, and seen a hero and his friend save the day. And that’s pure Doctor Who, through and through. 

Who Reviews Wishing Well by DJ Forrest

Written by Trevor Baxendale

For BBC Books

Wishing Wells date back to a time before colour TVs, automobiles and electronic gadgets. They were a means of making wishes come true, with a toss of a coin, and with eyes tightly shut, but in most cases, they were a glorified hole in the ground where spring water could be found, and with a bucket attached, could get a good drink on a hot day, or for whatever other purpose. However, Baxendale doesn’t write about a good well with a good dose of water at the bottom, or where wishes may be granted.

Down in the depths of the deep chasm are the sounds of a cat, calling to its owner, raggedy old tramp Barnaby, and deeper still, lies the treasure from a highwayman. And again, as we know Baxendale’s work, there won’t be a random cat roaming the levels desperate to reach freedom, and the treasure won’t just be highwayman loot, will it, Trevor?

Down in the tunnels is something far more terrifying, something that has been waiting and growing, and impressing on the very person that holds a part of it, to return and return soon. The raw power of the thing can be felt in whom-so-ever possesses it.

On the surface however, the Well is as harmless as a cricket ground on a cold, wet afternoon. The well itself is in a state of disrepair, and it falls to stalwarts of the little village to save it. Stacy and Angela, who I can only picture as two characters from a cross between Miss Marple (of the Joan Hickson era) and To The Manor Born, with Tweed, Land Rovers and Hunter wellies.

Gaskin from the Manor, who Angela blames for the death of her husband many years previous, is angered by their interference and tries to put a stop to it. Unbeknownst to them, Gaskin has an interest beneath the Well, plus the discovery of the loot would patch up the weary state of his abode, and put coffers back in the kitty. Obviously not the kitty currently mewing for all its worth in the deep dark well.

There are some interesting key characters within this story. You have the three uni students who are in search of Gaskins treasure, Nigel, Ben and Trevor, following a map and plan of dig by Nigel, head of the group, who doesn’t like getting his hands dirty, you’ll find out why, when you read the novel. The two ladies who I have already spoken about. Stacy does remind me of Angela Thorne from To the Manor Born come to think of it. But the Angela with the Land Rover is far from Penelope Keith, but has the outspoken attitude of the character she plays – anyway, as you read the story, you’ll probably know who she reminds you of.

Gaskin is an idiot, as most of them are, in their big estates, born into money, squandered most of it on things of little relevance to the real world, or is it my own dislike for the gentry? Gaskin however is a key figure in the story, and not in the direction you’d like to believe. Towards the second half of the story you kind of understand a little of his behaviour, warm to him slightly because of it, but still regard him as an idiot for his lack of belief.

Oh, I’m almost forgetting, this is a Doctor Who story, with 10^th and Martha riding the storm. Martha the gentle human and the Doctor, in like Flynn, again, but this time, he has his work cut out, and you often wonder if he will conquer the threat in the story. It certainly doesn’t look like it as you’re turning the pages – but rather than skim to the end of the book to find out if he does succeed, read the novel intently, because, what I’ve noticed in all the books I’ve read, from any range of genres, is that, unless you read Every. Single. Word, you’ll miss out on tiny nuggets of information. And as to prove this, upon reading the novel again, I found portions I’d missed, I’d forgotten, about Gaskin, the manor, the ladies, the danger and indeed the boys in the tunnel.

This is a cracking adventure, great bedtime reading, and one for keeps.

Who Reviews The Last Dodo Book Review by DJ Forrest

Written by Jacqueline Rayner

For BBC Books

Imagine visiting a museum with over three billion exhibits, and realising you’re going to need a bigger butty box and flask! It puts the Natural History Museum to shame, that’s for sure.

Jacqueline Rayner’s imagination certainly suggests she knows her natural history, especially the creatures and animals in the I-Spyder guide, and it’s great to read about the Now or Soon to be extinct creatures that roamed planet Earth. However, it’s not just planet Earth, MOTLO collects, or the Museum for the Lost Ones, it collects creatures from all over the universe. Eve, the curator knows when each animal is about to become extinct, and quickly sends out her bands of men and women to collect the specimens and store them in suspended animation for, well, forever.

When the Doctor and Martha arrive at the museum, several of the larger animals have been taken from their suspended animated states, and of course, it doesn’t take a genius to know that they’ll be blamed for it. Of course, the Doctor offers his assistance in finding the creatures and bringing them back to the museum, despite his reservations of captive animals.

The Doctor and Martha are issued with blue pendants which enables them to teleport to various locations on Earth where the creatures were last reported. Meanwhile, Eve discovers that the Last One she’s been searching for, for an entirety is flashing on the switchboard, signalling her opportunity of completing her life’s work. Of course, when Martha discovers this, she causes catastrophic mayhem by using the sonic screwdriver and a blue pendant. Then it’s back to Earth once more to locate the missing creatures.

Of course, there’s a lot more in this story than Eve’s desire to collect the Last of Everything across the Universe, and then just when you think it couldn’t possibly get any worse, along comes Eve with the answer to all her stress and worry, at her fingertips.

Eve, is a surprising figure, and it’s only at the end do we find out her sole purpose, and who can make good her bad decisions. Great bedtime reading.   

Who Reviews Sting of the Zygons Book Review by DJ Forrest

Written by Stephen Cole

BBC Books

Published 2007

There’s something so deliciously enjoyable about a Zygon story, that far outweighs anything written about Cybermen, or indeed the Daleks. Even though, all the dastardly of beings, creatures, monsters all have one thing in mind – world domination.

What I love about the Zygons, is their shapeshifting abilities. I mean, who’d have thought, that out of all the creatures on this Earth, that they would adopt the template of a mere bovine – a grazer of the fields. So, while the Doctor is busy prattling away to what he thinks is a harmless milk machine, he isn’t, and that’s what makes it fun.

This is the third time I’ve read Sting of the Zygons, and I knew the cows meant something important after the first read, but I couldn’t remember which one in the story bore any significance. I’m not giving you the plot, although with many these are fairly obvious after the first few pages of the first chapter.

The Doctor and Martha Jones have arrived in the Lake District in 1909, where the Beast of Westmorland is terrorising the local villages, dealing a hefty blow to the buildings, and a ghostly image of a little girl called Molly Melton, is seen across the land, just before terror strikes.

King Edward VII offers a knighthood for the capture of the Beast.

The Beast itself reminds me of the Doctor’s earlier encounter with the Zygons, with Tom Baker and that hideous creature that towered above a house, and for the best part of when the Beast is roaming the countryside, making a hell of a racket with its screaming, that’s all I can picture. Given that my initial thinking of the Beast of Westmorland was akin to the Puma sightings on Bodmin Moor, but this Beast is somewhat bigger than this – much, much bigger.

The cast are superb in this story. You have the rich, with their invested interests in capturing the beast, with hunting parties and motor cars which are real bone shakers, and never let the 10^th Doctor drive. Although we know he can drive, it’s clear he took lessons from The Stig!

There are horse drawn carriages, and the Zygons are really keen to grab whatever is inside them. There are some Zygons you feel sorry for, in fact there’s quite a few, plus the usual nasty ones which you really hope don’t make it to the end, or if they do, they meet either the wrath of the Time Lord or the mighty big beast.

There are some surprises too in the story. Mrs Unsworth, who sounds like a jolly B&B owner who cooks mighty big breakfasts, and likes watching moving pictures, and is quite handy with a frying pan, as a weapon. I’d forgotten about her. Not forgotten about the prim Nanny, most definitely not Nanny McPhee but I could imagine her quite well as a strict school teacher used to dishing out castor oil by the tablespoon!

All in all, Sting of the Zygons is a bloody good read and I’d recommend it to anyone who fancies a change from the usual tin pot enemies who we all love but often need a change from the norm.

Who Reviews The Art of Destruction Book Review by DJ Forrest

Written by Stephen Cole

For BBC Books

First published 2006

10^th Doctor with Rose Tyler

The story is set in 22^nd century Africa, in the shadow of a dormant volcano. There are a group of agricultural scientists growing new foodstuffs to feed the starving millions in the basking heat. The Doctor and Rose land on the planet after picking up an alien signal close by.  But, as the Doctor and Rose enter the field where the new crops are, they encounter men with guns and it takes a lot of fast talking to persuade the riflemen that they’re not stealing crops, or from any camp.

There’s also something quite wrong inside the dormant volcano. Deep inside one of the chambers lies something alien, and when it’s threatened, begins taking the wildlife hostage and manipulates it for its own use – and not just the wildlife, either.

This novel could work quite easily without the intervention of the Doctor and quite a few times I almost wished it hadn’t been a Who story. There were often times where I became a little frustrated with how easy the Doctor handled situations and there’s often too many times when the sonic screwdriver saves the day – as if it explained a moment when the author couldn’t.    

I’ve read a lot of Stephen Cole’s novels now and this one was possibly the hardest to get into at first, because it didn’t feel like a Who story at all. Of course, when you picture the two warring alien factions, then it does begin to feel Who like, and I don’t think I can ever look at another earthworm in quite the same way ever again. Thanks Stephen!

That said, I really enjoyed the characters, the good guys and the bad guy come good. It was also great to read a story based on Earth but in another part of the world, rather than the UK. The action was there. I could smell the earth and could picture the scene as the earthworm characters began to fire back at the escaping humans.

I did get a little lost in one part of the story near the end, where the team with the Doctor, or with Rose, had to retrieve something, which was I think later taken back by the earthworm creatures with weapons on their shoulders. Cool piece of kit – hence why I can never look at an earthworm in quite the same fashion.

A lot of Who stories are fairly easy to follow from the first chapter, indeed some from the first page, but this took a bit of time to suss the characters and draw any kind of attachment to them. Towards the middle and near the end, the story picked up pace and everything began to make a lot of sense, and you had to feel for the female member of the agricultural team. You can tell from the writing that Stephen spent time building strong characters in the scientists at the base, and how their lives had changed since working to grow foodstuffs to feed the starving. My favourite character would have to be Solomon.

Rose and the Doctor tired me out however, from their moments of capture to their ultimate release. I wondered if they would ever find the peace required to send the worms packing and save the planet, and with too few pages left, it did seem as if a Part Two was needed, but as all good stories go, the author managed to wrap it up well – it wasn’t rushed – it all came good in the end.

Who Reviews Forest of the Dead by DJ Forrest

Written by Steven Moffat

Broadcast 7^th June 2008

As you would expect from a Steven Moffat script, and let’s face it, from 2005 onwards when Moffat turned out some damned good Who stories, we were once again terrified. This time by the creatures that lived in the books in the library, that added extra shadows to the unsuspected victim in the space suit and that had a voracious appetite for chicken!

The second part of Silence in the Library saw a lot more action than in the first – the first episode establishing the cast, such as the little girl watching the goings on in her library from her own television screen. The apparent sinister behaviour of Dr Moon, and the secrets of CAL, along with the disappearance of Donna Noble that left the Doctor running out of clues on how to bring her back and Save the library, and of course, SPOILERS.

Professor River Song back in 2008 was a new character with a hell of a back story which unravelled during the tenure of the Eleventh and Twelfth Doctor. She demanded a return visit if only to uncover the Spoilers in her diary. Perhaps that had been Moffat’s idea from the start.

What was dramatically sad was that being the first ever story of River Song, it was sadly her last visit with the 10^th. The interesting part about Time Travel means that as far forward through the Time Lords that River went, who knows when she may appear in another 12^th story, or perhaps a 13^th Doctor???

The two-part story was a great two parter, it was impossible to condense it into only one episode. It gave some scary ass characters such as the dippy brunette who wandered off into the shadows only to be consumed in the first episode, but to come back in the second as the woman in black to scare the living daylights out of a dream state Donna Noble.

The scary slow walking space suited skeletons, (try saying that with a mouth full of marbles) now they were exceptionally creepy. Something from every child’s nightmares, and indeed a few of mine. The key phrases that would find themselves readily available whenever there was a powercut, or the regular check of shadows whilst standing in a library with ceiling lights. Oh come on, it can’t be just me that says – ‘count the shadows’ ‘hey, who turned out the lights?’ ‘Vashta Nerada’.

There are many stories involving creatures that you can see, that can scare the begees out of you, just by looking or lurching towards you, but the equally as scary creatures are the ones you cannot see. The Vashta Nerada are these. Tiny spores trapped in the pages of books stored in a library, that hatch out and attack without notice.

Imagine reading a book one minute and are completely consumed the next, without even noticing. *shudders* Ice…ice cream….ice cream….

An interesting piece of information for the end of the story meant that as River Song HAD travelled with the Doctor, she knew the TARDIS exceptionally well, and so, when the Doctor clicked his fingers right at the very end of the episode, something magical happened. What would that be?

Ahh, Spoilers!

Who Reviews Midnight by Tony J Fyler

Tony Fyler plays the Repeating Game.

Tony Fyler plays the Repeating Game.

Broadcast 14^th June 2008

When we think of stories that take a children’s game and turn it into something terrifying, we immediately think of Steven Moffat – his Empty Child was based on the game of ‘touch,’ and famously, the Weeping Angels were based on a game that has many names, including ‘Statues.’ But before Moffat took the big chair, Russell T Davies, took a look at the ‘Repeating Game’ which has driven generations of siblings and parents to the point of kiddicide, and turned it into one of the biggest, most beautiful, scary diamonds of 21^st century Who.

Midnight has a simple premise – so simple the Doctor actually uses it to sum up the adventure he’s about to have, heading into the credits: “Taking a big space-truck with a bunch of strangers across a diamond planet called Midnight? What could possibly go wrong?”

What indeed?

In the first instance, just as there has been a tradition in modern Who to include a Christmas Special episode, meaning there needs to be a ‘Doctor-Light’ episode, so there also needs to be a ‘Companion-Light’ story too, so that filming can be double-banked. By the simple expedient of Donna Noble preferring to lie by the pool than schlepp about the place in a bus ‘like a school trip,’ Davies gives us the Doctor off on his own, when, especially in the case of Donna, he’s grown to realise he needs someone with him to stop him overreacting to situations, to help him heal from emotional wounds both old and relatively new.

Nevertheless, off he goes, alone with a bunch of strangers.

A diamond fall means the ‘big space-truck’ is on a diverted route, which leads it into the absolute unknown, giving us an element of both terror and wonder. As is mentioned in the episode, no-one has ever seen the place they’re going. The Doctor, alone with strangers, in the utterly unknown.

Anyone starting to feel the hairs on the back of their neck prickle yet?

The trip to the unknown region leads the Crusader 50 to break down in the middle of nowhere.

When something which can’t be there – when something that’s alive and powerful on a world bathed in extonic sun, meaning it can’t possibly be alive and powerful – rips the front of the bus off, killing Driver Joe and Engineer Clyde, and then begins to stalk around the helpless metal box, banging on the walls in a way which is anything but random, the danger of their position comes pounding home to the passengers. They’re separated from an entirely hostile environment by just the metal walls of their bus. And Something wants to get in. Something which can’t be there, and yet is. Something intelligent, reasoning – and malignant.

Imagine going in a submersible to look at a coral reef, only to have your driver and your engine ripped out by an intelligent shark, that wants to get in. That’s the first sweaty terror that Midnight offers – being alone with strangers in that inimical environment when the unexpected and hostile happens, when a nameless, powerful Something wants to get you. That sudden full appreciation of the fragility of human life, the stupidity of our sense of superiority over our environment – that’ll get your pulse racing and your adrenaline flowing any time you dare to watch Midnight and the Something starts knocking.

When the Something finally finds its way in, the second terror lays its tendrils cold and clammy on your neck – the Something is an insidious force that ‘possesses’ a victim, and begins by mimicking those around it, then matching them, and then, eventually, anticipating them, stealing their voice for itself, taking it and twisting it to say what it wants to say, not what they want to say. It’s a surreal concept, but it’s the surreality that makes it scary – the Something seems to obey no rules of physics or biology, it just is what it is, and does what it does.

But the Something is just that – an insidious voice, a director of events. For it to work, you have to have division, suspicion and cliques. And that is the really scary monster in Midnight – the human being. Before the Something even arrives, before Driver Joe and Engineer Clyde meet their extonic fate, a tiny lie, designed to keep everybody calm, has the opposite effect when it’s discovered, and the whispering begins – if they’ve not just stopped to stabilise the engines, then what’s really wrong? What aren’t they being told? Why aren’t they being told it? Who’s hiding what? Why? Shouldn’t they be told? Are we going to die out here?!

The questions start small, but quickly, they build into bigger, darker queries, and rupturings of a trust built up between strangers. When the Something takes over the seemingly neurotic Sky Silvestry, played by Davies favourite Lesley Sharp with a creepy line in staring and a growing sense of self-possession, most of the human passengers are in favour of leaving it the hell alone until help arrives. But the Doctor can never leave something new alone, never resist the chance to understand, to learn, to maybe make a friend of a creature that’s never had any. By putting himself forward and acting on his own authority, the Doctor separates himself from the group – the most dangerous thing to do in the situation – and puts himself in danger both from the Something, which creepily begins to repeat his words and even gestures, and from his fellow passengers, despite having bonded with them on the journey out to the middle of nowhere.

It's a miniature version of Lord of the Flies, tense, sweaty and increasingly scary not only because of the advancing power and influence of the Something, Sharp becoming more and more intense and powerful as the situation destabilises, but also because of the shifting dynamics of power and suspicion, the increasing insanity of fear leading the otherwise reasonable passengers to the point of throwing the Doctor out into the extonic landscape.

Ultimately, Midnight is so many things, layered on top of each other, it’s almost impossible to imagine it’s a single episode of Who. Clammy version of the Lord of the Flies, allegory of the political process, where perfectly reasonable people can be shepherded and driven by fear to victimise the different, exploration of the Tenth Doctor’s particular strengths and, more specifically, his flaws, creepy aural horror story of some great unknowable creature taking possession of the innocent but flawed. Midnight is a diamond – a story in which the power of sound, and an unusual script and production method (the cast weren’t told where the bangs would come from, for instance, giving their shock and surprise a realism that’s palpable) and cut within an inch of its life, to achieve something as close to perfection as any of the greats of the Classic series.

There’s never a bad day to watch Midnight. Just don’t watch it just before you go to sleep. The Otherness of the threat, the tension of other people, and the rising panic leading to the reveal of the real emotional fragility of human beings and what they can be made to do might be too much for your nerves. 

Who Reviews The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit by Tony J Fyler

Tony Fyler has sympathy for the Devil.

Impossible Planet broadcast 3^rd June 2006

The Satan Pit broadcast 10^th June 2006

Religion and Doctor Who have a long and tempestuous history. The Doctor himself has never especially ascribed to a religious path, but he’s always been open to wonder, to new things and new knowledge to challenge what he already knows. That said, he’s come down like the proverbial ton of bricks on what he describes as ‘fake gods, bad gods, mad gods and would-be gods,’ possibly because they all seek to funnel wonder and worship towards themselves, and stop people seeing all the amazing things in the universe as they are, denying the genuine sources of wonder their rights. He’s been a friend to monks (like the Abbot of Det-Sen and Cho-Je/K’anpo), but had run-ins with angels like Light and Daemons like Azal. He’s at home in worlds where the gods are important (The Crusaders, The Romans, The Fires of Pompeii), and where the power of faith is what gets people through (Gridlock), but equally comfortable in situations where religion is prohibited (The End of The World). What he’s always avoided though is confirming any particular set of religious beliefs as having more to them than can be necessarily explained in scientific or socio-political terms.

Welcome to Doctor Who Versus The Devil.

Beyond the cheap shot of that reductive line though, The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit have so much to recommend them, it’s a challenge to say something new about them. When confronted by the creature behind the universal memory of a fallen creature of incredible power and ungovernable malignity, writer Matt Jones maintains the longstanding Who tradition of not giving this particular Big Bad any claim of superiority – the Doctor happily chats to it about all the devils there are, and even when it emerges that this might be the thing that inspired them all, coming face to face with the Beast, the Doctor maintains the best traditions of scepticism – ‘I don’t have to accept what you are, but your physical existence, I’ll give you that much.’ Along the way, The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit go further than has ever been gone before in terms of probing what the Doctor himself actually believes, in some kind of religious context. His answer to those questions is refined as he goes. When Ida Scott asks him what he believes, and he’s forced to think about it on an intellectual level, his answers are valid but vague – ‘I believe I haven’t seen everything. That’s why I keep travelling.’ He’s also honest enough to include himself in the totality of the universe when he says ‘If that thing had said it was from “beyond time” I’d have believed it. But “before time,” no. Doesn’t fit my pattern.’ It’s a ridiculously brave and dangerous path to take the Doctor down, and all credit is due to Jones and the Production Team for deciding to tread it, and for eventually doing it with the delicacy  that The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit display, because while his intellectual answers might be vague and considered, when the Doctor is faced with an ‘impossible’ choice, between destroying the Beast and in all likelihood destroying Rose Tyler too, his emotional response comes roaring to the forefront of his mind, and he takes the gamble that all love demands. In all the universe, if he believes in anything, he believes in her. That’s a powerful statement, and it’s both personal and what we would egotistically call humanistic. He believes in the potential of people of all species to be a positive influence on the universe, irrespective of race, creed, colour or any of the other divisions we see. He believes in people. And most specifically right now, he believes in one tiny little Earthling who’s shown him a way to heal, a way to be the Doctor he always was, before the great Time War made him something he can’t think about if he wants to be that sort of positive force himself. Rose Tyler is an avatar of the Doctor’s faith in good people, absolutely, but she’s earned that status by her own character and actions, bring the war-scarred Ninth Doctor back to a way of thinking and a way of behaving that’s in sync with the Doctors of old. Her character has redeemed him, and as much as a Time Lord can, beyond the messy nonsense of biology, he loves her for it. He believes, very distinctly, in Rose.

So…there’s that. And the thing is, that barely scratches the surface of The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit. Let’s talk design. Rewatching the stories ten years on, it’s one of the first things that strikes you that the Sanctuary base feels real, and grimy, and like a hard but honest-to-goodness, rivets-and-grease place to live. That was hardly ever a factor in the 21^st century show in its first season, that sense of grimy hard realism, which is why, though it was a look that was re-used and copied in stories from here on out, The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit look very different to everything that’s come before.

Let’s talk about facing Doctor Who’s own demons – the show has had a long history of preferring imagination to physics as we strictly know it, but Jones skilfully takes that and turns it on its head, making the very impossibility of his stories’ set-up the core of their mystery, and never wavering from the rules he both invents for himself and that physics imposes on him.

Let’s talk the literary epic status of a journey down into the pit, resolved through a leap of faith, and a difficult choice for the best of causes. This is Doctor Who in broad storytelling strokes invoking every great myth you choose to name, from Orpheus and Eurydice to Paradise Lost to Dante’s Inferno to Harry Potter.

Let’s talk realistic characters and the challenge to be the best they can be. Certainly in the 21^st century, Doctor Who had invested more in giving its characters some solid backstories and realistic motivations as people, beyond the narrative needs of the story. But Series 2’s fourth (and most intensely true to form) iteration of the base under siege format was one of the show’s first 21^st century forays into the ensemble piece where each of the characters seemed to have a genuine life outside the confines of the story (honourable hat-tip to Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways notwithstanding). Each of the Sanctuary base’s officers had signature strengths and weaknesses, and each of them played their roles with a lightness of touch that meant they were entirely believable as human beings. Danny Webb as Mr Jefferson, Claire Rushbrook as Ida Scott, Shaun Parkes as Zachary Cross Flane, Ronny Jhutti as Danny Bartock, MyAnna Buring as the beautifully underplayed Scooti Manista, and Wil Thorp as Toby Zed each bring a unique combination of those positives and negatives to bear – insecurity, arrogance, hard-headedness, fear, but also ingenuity, wonder, self-sacrifice, calm under pressure, we see them both as flawed, when the Beast mercilessly catalogues their secret shames, and impressive as the Doctor sees them, and as Rose is able to motivate them to be.

Oh, did we mention the Ood? Sure, why not, throw the Ood in too – one of New Who’s most visually striking ‘villain’ species, the story both has its cake and eats it with the Ood, making them lost signally disturbing, then turn out to be not only perfectly calm and pleasant, but actually something of the victim of humanity’s enslavement. And then of course, with a change of eye colour, a deeply unnerving uniformity of movement and speech, make them a force for evil, while still maintaining their status as helpless telepathic slaves.

And then of course there’s the Beast itself. There are many ways to go in terms of voicing Satan. You only need to look at the history of movies to see that – Al Pacino, Sam Neill, Gabriel Byrne and more have all taken different stabs at the fundamental character. But if he’s available, in terms purely of a vocal performance, you could do much, much worse than Gabriel Woolf. That combination of seduction and power, in a voice so dark and commanding, brings a real presence to The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit that turns it from merely a very good story into something that still feels special ten years on. The visual of the Beast creature itself is still impressive too, even if, ten years on, there’s a slight sense of CSO in the separation between the Doctor standing on his platform and the Beast in its ‘cage.’

Overall, if you’re looking for highlights of the Tenth Doctor’s time on screen, there are plenty to choose from. But still, ten years on, you have to go pretty darned far to beat The Impossible Planet and the Satan Pit to find stories that are more compelling or more rewarding of a rewatch.