My occasional dip into the Titan Comics collected trade paperbacks resumes after taking a break from the end of “Year 1”. The Endless Song contains three stories across five issues of the original 10th Doctor comics, and things take a while to get going, but at least manages to find its feet at the end of the volume…
The final season for Peter Capaldi’s Doctor comes to a close with a story featuring not one but two incarnations of the Master, the original Mondasian Cybermen (who I always called “Mondas Cybermen”, so I guess I’ll have to get used to that…), regeneration teases, companion exits and even a cameo from an older Doctor (sort of…) Sounds over-stuffed, right? Surprisingly, with the exception of a few little annoying bits, it’s actually a really good story from start to finish. Let’s take a closer look!
Finally caught up with the Main Range with this, the last of the trilogy of two two-part stories, this time reuniting the Seventh Doctor, Ace and Hex, the classic audio trio whose story came to an end a few years ago. This story is set somewhat early in their adventures, certainly before their story became arc heavy, which makes sense given most of Big Finish’s Who output is placed in the middle of an established Doctor Who time period, so why not plonk a new story in the middle of your own established era? Anyway, enough of all that, both stories are actually good this time, with World Apart being a standout…
Vortex Ice and Cortex Fire are an unmemorable duo, though the former is at least a fun spin on time travel, even if the rest of the story is pretty dull. Cortex Fire on the other hand is generic as generic gets, not bad, not good, just… there. Ah well, at least this is the second (and third, I guess) story to feature Flip recently, and once again she was actually an enjoyable companion, so it seems the Big Finish writers have managed to pull her back into an actually consistently good role…
We reach the yearly “experimental” trilogy in the main range, this time instead of one linking story or villain across Doctors 5 – 7, this time each of three Doctors gets a two two-parters release. This is a bit odd as I often find, at least in the Fourth Doctor range (made up mostly of two parters) this often leads to rushed stories with poor character development, where as the main range with its four episodes is often better for it. This release shows a good example of the worst and a great example of the best way to handle two part, or 1 hour, stories on audio. Let’s take a closer look at each!
The first Fifth Doctor, Adric, Nyssa and Tegan trilogy comes to a close with Zaltys, a fun story with some good twists and turns along its runtime. A very enjoyable trilogy overall, made better by the freshness of the lead cast, after nearly a decade and a half of Fifth Doctor releases, it’s good to hear this period of the show getting new stories at last!
The travels of the Doctor, Adric, Nyssa and Tegan continue as the quartet arrive in Victorian London (an original idea!) and end up in an exclusive club full of delusional people and an endless supply of people called Edward. Funnily enough, there is more too it than that…
My journey through the Emperor of the Daleks collected DWM comics comes to an end with these two low-key stories. It also marks the end of the Seventh Doctor comic strips in the magazine, as after this they just switched between Doctors as the idea of new Who on TV began to vanish. So let’s see how this era of British Who comics came to an end!
The Main Range reaches a new milestone as The Star Men kicks off a Fifth Doctor trilogy staring Matthew Waterhouse reprising his role as Adric for the first time in the long-running range. As if that wasn’t good enough, the story itself is good too! Handy. Let’s take a look…
My journey through the Emperor of the Daleks collected Doctor Who Magazine graphic novel thingie continues with the four-part alternate Earth story “Final Genesis”, and the 30th Anniversary 10-page colour special “Time and Time Again”, plus both feature the “bad ass” New Adventures version of Ace, so… hooray? Let’s find out!
Hogan Reviews 