Time to start a look through the latest Doctor Who Magazine collected stories release, Land of the Blind, starting with this Fourth Doctor story! Yes, unlike previous DWM releases, this was during the “dark days” when Doctor Who had been off the air for so long that they switched to a rotating Doctors format instead of continuing with the Seventh Doctor exclusively. ANYWAY, Victims is a … well, it’s alright. The art is a bit weird… Let’s take a look so I can stop rambling!
Series 7 of the Fourth Doctor Adventures comes to a climax with a traditional four-part story featuring the return of Sutekh! This actually the second time Big Finish has brought the character back, but there is something special about hearing Gabriel Woolf voice the evil Osiran opposite the Fourth Doctor once again. Plus Sutekh-aside, there are some fun new characters as well! So let’s dig in, shall we?
The Bad Penny, despite having a pretty boring title and being set in London AGAIN, is actually really entertaining, a lot more than the previous story in the Fourth Doctor Adventures S7. Time paradoxes, aliens, time-displaced people, it’s a fun hour-ish ride, so let’s take a closer look!
The 7th series of Fourth Doctor Adventures kicks off its second half with The Shadow of London, and sadly it’s exactly as it seems by the synopsis: rather dull. It’s by no means bad, but it’s about as memorable as… that time… that thing happened. Still, let’s have a look at it anyway, if I don’t do it now I won’t remember enough to write the review later!
A four part Fourth Doctor story written by John Dorney? Yes please! A handy effect of the FDAs being split into two four-story boxsets is getting to hear a four-part story straight away, rather than waiting a month in between halves. This story has a lot of things similar to popular neo-noir and far future set stories like a Blade Runner or a Total Recall, but manages to be pretty unique at the same time… oh and really good too! Let’s take a look!
The second story in the seventh Fourth Doctor Adventures series is a fun take on the “character trapped in a convincing dream, can they escape back to reality?” cliché, that serves Leela well as a character, which is good as she’s so often just a generic savage in so many of these releases! Let’s take a closer look…
The seventh season of Fourth Doctor Adventures kicks off a new “Four stories in one boxset twice yearly” format for the series, and does so with a story that’s… alright. Hmmm… kind of the overall feel of most of the range at this point, Sons of Kaldor is good, but unremarkable, going to show that a change of release format (and the return of the Voc Robots) hasn’t ironed out the kinks the series has. Still, let’s take a look!
Logopolis heralds the end of arguably the most iconic and popular version of The Doctor, but as usual with these early regeneration stories, it also features a few other firsts, namely the first appearances of Tegan and Anthony Ainley’s incarnation of The Master. Obviously neither are as significant as the death of the Fourth Doctor, but still interesting to note… which is good because a lot of this story isn’t all that interesting! Let’s take a look!
In what will probably end up being the last Doctor Who comic review of the year (but far from the last Doctor Who review of the year!) I take a look at the Fourth Doctor mini-series, titled “Gaze of the Medusa”. Sadly for me I read this after the great Third Doctor mini-series from Titan Comics, making this quite a step down. It’s fine, but it feels like it’s written by someone who only has limited knowledge of Tom Baker’s Doctor, where as “The Heralds of Destruction” felt like a love letter to the Third Doctor. Anyway, let’s take a bit more of a detailed look, shall we?
*checks watch* Oh, it’s new version of Shada time already?! Seriously though, this is presumably the last time this partly filmed Douglas Adams “classic” is re-released, not just because it’s finally “complete” with the original cast, but because it’s really good! I’m sure one day I’ll do the Paul McGann/Eighth Doctor 2003 version, but this will probably be the only Fourth Doctor version I review… so let’s get too it!
Hogan Reviews 