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The Missing Adventures: 1994-95
The Sorceror's Apprentice
- written by Christopher Bulis
Review: I was on holiday in America at a time when horrible events
unfolded in New York and Washington. It was hard to take my eyes away from the
TV. Luckily, when I did look away, I had a good book to take my mind off of
what can only be described as cowardice and evil.
The TARDIS lands on what seems to be Earth. But burned-up medieval villages,
a crashed and disintegrating spacecraft from the 30th Century, and an attack by
a fire-breathing dragon convince the time travellers otherwise. On top of all
this, the TARDIS has engaged its defensive systems, and will not allow anyone
back inside, stranding our heroes on this strange world.
During the attack by the dragon, a group of knights on horseback arrive and
vanquish the horrid beast. All return to the local castle to meet the King and
Queen of this strange land of Elbyon, who are preparing for the imminent
wedding of their daughter, the Princess. But, the local Evil Wizard, Morton
Dhal, has other ideas. He wants the King to hand over Merlins' Artifacts, which
will allow him supreme wizard power, to be used for, undoubtedly, evil purposes.
To precipitate the King's decision, Dhal kidnaps the Princess, along with Susan,
and imprisons them in his dark tower.
And so the Doctor and an intrepid party of adventurers embark on a quest to
the Shadow Islands, to retrieve an artifact of immense power: Merlin's Helm!
This item will allow the wearer to put an end to the evil Wizard's plans, and
restore order to the world.
This, however, is not the only problem. In orbit around this planet is a
military expedition, sent to discover why so many ships have disappeared in
this area of space. All probes sent into the atmosphere seem to lose power,
and cannot be retrieved. In fact, no technology of any kind functions on this
world. It appears that only magic works here, despite the Doctor's belief that
this is just not possible.
These separate events intermingle when a manned scout ship is sent to
investigate strange energy fluctuations in the same location as the mysterious
Helm, loses power, and crashes near the Shadow Islands, just as the group of
adventurers are passing by in their noble sailing ship. These
"outworlders," as they are called, hear about this Helm and realise
that it must be the cause of the disappearing ships...
This was a remarkable book, full of wonderful ideas, fanciful situations,
and perfectly written characters. It was as if old Bill Hartnell were alive
again, stubbornly taking on any challenge with a fixed stare, and a firm grip
on his lapels. This is what a Missing Adventure should be like. Not full of
sex, drugs, and swearing - but fitting in to the era from which it would have
come. In a world full of uncertainty, we should be able to count on something,
or somebody, to take us away from troubles, and from danger. To hopefully make
us feel that not all injustices are left unpunished. 9 out of 10.
Timeline: between Marco
Polo and The Keys of Marinus
reviewed by Jeremy Benner
Invasion of the Cat People
Review: The Euterpians - a super-powerful, semi-immortal race of
creatures roaming the Universe, splitting planets open in order to release the
geo-magnetic energy, which they will harness, and use to return them to their
homeworld. A group of them arrive at the Earth millions of years in the past,
and seeing its potential energy, send a party to set the beacons which will
split the crust wide open, releasing the power within. But, something goes
terribly wrong, and the ship in which they arrived is destroyed, stranding five
of these creatures on a primitive Earth. Knowing their duty, the group completes
their mission, and lay the beacons out as planned. Millions of years pass,
civilizations rise and fall, and in the confusion, the group lose contact with
one another. A couple of them realize that, if they can get the attention of
another alien race with spacecraft, then they could finally utilize the beacons,
releasing the energy, and go home. Finally, in 1994, the Cat-people show up and
form an un easy alliance with a Euterpian, who bargains away rights to the
Earth, in exchange for transport home.
Of course, this is the signal for the Doctor to arrive on the scene. He is still
recovering from his recent Regeneration, and suffering the company of Ben and
Polly to boot. They land smack-dab in the middle of this weakly written plot,
and seem more than a little out of place wandering around amidst a group of
bipedal cats with spacesuits on. Polly becomes separated from the Doctor (go
figure) and joins up with one of these long-lived Euterpians, believing all the
while that he is trying to help the Humans. The problem is, we know all the
while that he is one of the bad ones, and are forced to watch him make a fool
of Polly (not a difficult task, I know) over and over again. He drags her from
Carnaby Street to Australia, all the while playing on her emotions, and letting
her think that everything's going to be all right. The problem is, we know,
thanks to the transparent concept, that everything is not all right at all!
The Doctor and company take a brief jaunt to Bhagdad 2000 years in the past,
but that was about as dry as reading a dry goods catalogue. I don't know
what kind of catnip Gary Russell was smoking when he came up with this idea, but
it must have been strong stuff.
All in all, this book was a total catastrophe. I don't think I've read a
book quite this lame since The Ghosts of
N-Space. It almost put me into a catatonic state, as if I'd been lost
for weeks in a maze of catacombs. I don't even know what category
to put it in: bad, awful, or stupid. I wanted to, at many points, put it in a
catapult and fire it into the garbage. I am sure it was the
catalyst to my severe attack of catarrh which almost caused me to
need a catheter!
Well, enough of the bad puns, and enough of this book. I'm only giving it five
out of ten, accompanied by a few cat-calls. On the other hand, my cat Chevy
thought it was a brilliant masterpiece. He said that it was the best Doctor Who since Survival, and gave it 8 lives out of 9!
His highest rating ever!
Timeline: between Power of the Daleks and The Highlanders
reviewed by Jeremy Benner
Managra
- written by Stephen Marley
Review: 1613. The Globe Theatre in London has been burnt down by one
of Shakespeare's rivals, Francis Pearson. But, during Pearson's escape from the
crime scene, he encounters what he believes is the Devil himself, and is quickly
posessed.2000 years later, and the world has changed...but not much. All
the overcities are gone (see Original Sin)
but one, and it is the home of the New Vatican. The world is awash with history
- quite literally. A multitude of Englands, Frances, Germanies, all built to
reflect different periods of history, all existing together. Famous names from
bygone ages all live here together, and sometimes more than one of each! There
are three Lord Byrons, two Casanovas, Mary Shelley, a Borgia, Johann Faust,
Cardinal Richelieu, the Four Musketeers, just to name a few. These clones, or
"reprises" as they are called, roam about having adventures, generally
existing merely to provide a more realistic historic atmosphere. These reprises
all came from the same place - The Theartre of Transmogrification, which roams
the world at the controls of its ringleader, who is known only as Personna.
But what is MANAGRA? Miles Dashing of Dashwood would love to know. It was
his dying father's last word, and he has been searching for the secret of its
meaning ever since. And so, to throw the proverbial spanner in the works,
the Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith arrive. The TARDIS lands, of all places, inside
the floating Vatican itself, and it doesn't take long for them to be captured.
It also doesn't take long before one of the Byrons rescues them, whisking them
away from imminent death, and into imminent danger. The Doctor is very curious
about this world, and even more curious about this travelling Theatre he's heard
about. There are certain dimensional anomalies that have come to his attention.
Like the dimensionally trancendental Mediterannian Seas, which, from the shore,
appear as small as a lake, but once one tries to cross it, it becomes as big as
the original. This seems to be an obvious rip-off of Time Lord technology, but
who did the ripping-off? The Master? The Monk? The Doctor is not sure, but he is
damn well going to find out. Plot twist A is initiated seperating Sarah
from the Doctor, but this is for the better, as she really doesn't have much to
do. She is brought to the Theatre of Transmogrification and is put under a spell
(hypnosis) by the sinister Personna, and is made to act out scenes in his
ridiculous plays. The Doctor, along with Byron, meet up with a group of
Dominoes. No, not rectangles with white dots on them (although that would have
been more entertaining), but a group of outlaws against both the Vatican and the
Dominion States. One of these Dominoes is Miles Dashing, still wondering who, or
what MANAGRA is. The Doctor thinks he knows, and is now in full "save the
world" mode. Of course we, as the readers, don't find out the secret until
the last few pages, but that's not really a bad thing. I don't know what
to say about this book. Was it good or bad? There is so much subterfuge and
subplotting, that you almost become bogged down in it all. But then, just when
you feel like you're being led down the garden path, you get a few Vampires
thrown in to stir up the pot. It is hard to get the character of the
Fourth Doctor right, and here it almost succeeds. Almost. This is one of those
stories that maybe would have suited the Fifth Doctor better, just by his sheer
nature. I'm only giving it 7 out of 10. They can't all be winners.
Timeline: between Planet of
Evil and Pyramids of
Mars
reviewed by Jeremy Benner
Millennial Rites
Review: Just days before New Year's Eve, 1999 - presumably while his seventh
self is turning into his eighth somewhere across the
Atlantic - the sixth Doctor and Mel visit London, where the Doctor attends a
celebration of the life and career of Anne Travers, who, at a much younger age,
helped the second Doctor and his companions defeat the Yeti.
Since then she has been serving as the British government's leading scientific
advisor, but a dark cloud hangs over her - she constantly fears the return of
the Great Intelligence. In the meantime, Mel attends a college class reunion,
and though she's unable to explain away her lack of aging, the greater mystery
comes in the form of a former classmate's plea. Mel is asked to hack into
Ashley Chapel Logistics, a London-based worldwide software conglomerate, to
uncover an unspecified dark secret. As it turns out, Ashley Chapel himself,
head of the company that shares his name, has gathered dark powers in his new
software, which will be unleashed on New Year's Eve. Even though the Doctor
arrives at ACL just before midnight to thwart this deadly scheme, he is powerless
to stop Chapel from transforming the world into a place where magic is real...and
where the Doctor's worst nightmare can overtake him at any moment.
I really did like most of this book. The extremely
brief on-screen adventures of the sixth Doctor and Melanie were just enough
to convince me that they would've continued to make an appealing team. Both
personalities are captured well by Craig Hinton, and the first 2/3 of Millennial
Rites - setting aside, for the moment, the question of whether or not New
Year's Eve 1999 truly constitutes the eve of the new millennium - are extremely
interesting and suspenseful. But when midnight hits and the foreplay is over,
the sinister secret turns out to be a transformation of the Earth into a world
somewhere between Mirror, Mirror
and Magic: The Gathering...with sometimes silly results.
Just about the only glue that holds that last 1/3 of Millennial Rites
together is the constant threat that, like everyone else around him, the Doctor
will turn into some dark, twisted version of himself, and in his case that means
the Valeyard. This is an interesting development, and it's given a twist
reminiscent of Survival when it is
revealed that the Doctor has at least moderate magical potential - and even the
slightest use of that magic brings him closer to becoming the Valeyard forever.
At one point, the Doctor's self-preserving inaction comes dangerously
close to destroying everything.
The Valeyard's appearance also gives Hinton a chance to do some retcon, in
which he draws parallels between the dark psychological manipulations of the
seventh Doctor and the evil nature of the Valeyard. The sixth Doctor flatly
denies to himself that he could ever become such a manipulative player of games,
believing that this would be too much of a step into the darkness. And given
that the seventh Doctor's later adventures alienate Ace
dozens of times over, get Roz Forrester killed,
and gets dozens of innocent bystanders killed, perhaps this isn't such a far-fetched
analogy. Whether it was intended or not, Hinton also paved the way for the seventh
Doctor's epiphany in Kate Orman's New Adventures novel The
Room With No Doors.
Or perhaps I'm retconning now.
Timeline: between The Ultimate
Foe and Time and the Rani
reviewed by Earl Green
The Empire of Glass
Review: Sometimes when you read a book, you have to let yourself suspend
disbelief in order to fully enjoy it. That is what I did with Empire of Glass.
If Id've looked at it as a pseudo-historical adventure, I would have found it not
only stupid, but impossible. If I looked at it as a Doctor Who story, I wouldn't
have liked it. But instead of being so judgemental, which I usually tend to be, I
suspended disbelief and let the story pull me along, and enjoyed the ride.
This adventure takes place in 15th century Venice, where a group of seemingly
unrelated (or so you would think) characters are brought together to make the events
transpire as they do. Firstly the Doctor, along with Steven and Vicki, are invited
to Venice by an unknown person or persons. Of course, along the way there are ample
opportunities to engage in all the classic storytelling cliches. The Doctor is
mistaken for a high ranking Cardinal, visiting Venice on important business from the
Vatican. Galileo is preparing himself (mostly through excessive drinking) for an
audience at the Doge, in order to show them his new invention. And who is the
strange man who is expecting the Doctor, but upon seeing him in his first
incarnation, does not recognise him? But then again, what is Shakespeare doing
skulking in the shadows wearing a strange disguise? And all the while, in the skies
above, large, beetle-like aliens fly over the city, spying on its inhabitants.
What do all these things have in common? In reality: Nothing. But that's just
the point! It all gets woven together quite well. I was surprised it worked as good
as it did, as I was told it was a bad book. All in all it adds up to a very playful
read!
Granted, the characterisation of the First Doctor isn't that good. He seems to
spend a lot of the time looking down his nose with his thumbs hooked under his
lapels. And his verbal traits are abused to the extreme, using way too many "Hmmm"s
at the end of his sentences. But, if one decides to picture all the Italians as
having British accents, and all the sets as standard 60's BBC stock, it couldn't be
better.
There are many ways of looking at things. I put on my rose-coloured glasses to
read this book, but hey, why not! After all, being a critic doesn't always have to
mean that I have to be critical! 8.5 out of 10! So there!
Timeline:
reviewed by Jeremy Benner
<Lords of the Storm
- written by David A. McIntee
Review: Rudra: A gas giant somewhat like Jupiter, around which orbits
a multitude of planets. One of these worlds is called Rhagi, and is an idyllic
garden spot populated by colonists from a far off Earth. Rhagi gets its energy
from a power station which has been built on the neighboring moon of Agni.
However, there is a snake which has infiltrated this Eden, hiding unseen just in
the undergrowth. This ordinary system has attracted the attentions of two of the
most extraordinary, and battle-savvy life forms in the Galaxy. What interest do
the gelatinous Rutan and the stout Sontarans have in this quiet little world?
What strategic value does this remote backwater hold? Well, it all comes down to
three things: location, location, location.
The Doctor and Turlough have arrived on Rhagi after their bloody run-in with the
Daleks, the intention being to make some much needed (and long overdue) repairs
to the TARDIS. It doesn't take long before they become embroiled in intrigue.
Locals are coming down with what appers to be a bad cold, yet when they are
taken to the hospital (in ambulances with blacked-out windows...) they are never
heard from again. Of course, the Doctor can't help but investigate this
"disease," and his inquisitiveness gets him into a whole heap of
trouble.
Can the Doctor convince the powers that be that this "cold" is more
that meets the eye? And why has the power station on Agni stopped responding to
messages sent there? As usual, the humans are caught in the middle of a million
year old war, and could well end up cannon fodder on the battleground of
eternity.
I loved this book. It read like a Target novelisation, and it fits into its era
like a glove made of words. This is a Doctor/companion team that has been sadly
ignored, and I can't understand why. Turlough is such an independant character,
and doesn't get pidgeonholed into the same old "dumbfounded Earthling"
category that most others do (Peri). His nonchalant attitude to advanced
technology is a good example of this. It is really too bad that the TV show was
never able to exploit these two more thoroughly, opting to drag that plank of
wood Peri into the fold right away. Thankfully, these Missing Adventures allow
us to explore hiterto unknown aspects of the series that we never got (and
sometimes should never get) to see.
This book has a sequel called Shakedown,
which I'm going to read next, and it "linx" up with events in this
book. I certainly hope it is just as good as this one, which has earned an 8.5
out of ten on my patented, yet slightly bogus, scale of excellence.
Timeline: between Resurrection of the Daleks and Planet of Fire
reviewed by Jeremy Benner
DOCTOR WHO and all related characters and placenames
are the property of the British Broadcasting Corporation. This document is not
intended to infringe upon the BBC's copyright in any way. The author(s)
make no attempt - in using the names described herein - to supercede the
copyrights of the copyright holders, nor are these files officially sanctioned,
licensed, or endorsed by the shows' creators or producers.
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