Written By: Simon Guerrier
Directed By: Lisa Bowerman
Cast
Anneke Wills (Polly Wright/Narrator), Frazer Hines (Jamie McCrimmon/The Doctor), Elliot Chapman (Ben Jackson), Alistair Petrie (Richard Tipple), Debbie Chazen (Dr Goro), Matilda Ziegler (Chatura Sharma)
Producer David Richardson
Script Editor John Dorney
Executive Producers Jason Haigh-Ellery and Nicholas Briggs
Originally Release October 2017

If previous release The Night Witches seemed custom made to highlight the limitations and contradictions of the Early Adventures format, The Outliers is a showcase for it reaching its full potential.

The first thing to immediately strike you is how well Anneke Wills’ narration is integrated into the script. Although I’m still highly sceptical of the need for narration in a full cast audio, nary a line here is redundant or duplicates character dialogue. Instead, writer Simon Guerrier has smartly concentrated the Narrator’s role on providing atmosphere and tension – with lots of lingering verbal imagery of the dank caves, dark running water and unsettlingly empty houses that populate his tale. The opening sequence of a dead body floating downriver, unwitnessed and alone, until something under the water snatches it down, feels perfectly in tone with a typical Troughton story’s beginning, but only accomplishable with narration. It’s the same meticulous recreation of style that gives us huge estates of absolutely identical prefabricated houses – which would have been a perfect budget-saving measure on TV in 1967.The performances of the cast also strike much more truly this time out as well. Although still saddled with a dazzling number of voices each – Wills doing triple duty as Young Polly, Old Polly, and Narrator at different points, while Hines has to make the Doctor, Young Jamie and Old Jamie distinguishable from each other. In fact, hearing Wills perform as both the Narrator and a Polly that’s her own age gives a new respect for just how brilliant she is. Hines, though, impresses most here, aided by dialogue that takes pains to make the Doctor feel as Troughtoneseque as possible on the page and which takes the pressure off Hines to inject 'Troughtonness' into generic lines. The combination of Guerrier and Hines allow actor to disappear completely into the role and the gaping hole you’d expect Troughton’s absence to cause is only rarely, and momentarily, noticeable.

In fact, the characterization is top notch all round. Jamie is very effectively used, the young highlander, full of courage and naivety in equal measure but quick to imagine his companions are having a slight joke at his expense with some of their more outlandish claims of aliens and technology. And there’s a keen sense of the story’s placement in mid-Season Four, with a slight edge of jealousy between Ben and newcomer Jamie over the affections of a Polly who just rolls her eyes at their posturing.

The plot into which all this atmosphere and characterization is poured is the type of light satire which often found a home in late 1960s Doctor Who, though its targets are slightly more modern. Set in that most well worn of Troughton Era locations – a future Earth colony base coming under siege by a force that moves, insidious and largely unseen as it slowly wraps its lethal tentacles around and through the settlement until the danger is realized too late. Even for that trope The Outliers’ setting is a colony on the edge. A cave system buried deep not even into a planet, but an asteroid hurtling through space, it’s both a mine extracting a highly toxic material for use in Weapons of Mass Destruction, and a construction site for a city of exiles from an overcrowded Earth. The only indigenous life is a type of barnacle; a tiny, simple shellfish which clings as precariously to the rocks as the human settlement does to viability. But they do have one strange mystery – nobody has ever seen their young. A kind of mix between Star Trek’s The Devil in the Dark and Doctor Who’s own The Macra Terror, where the colony’s leader, or “Cohesion Interface Manager”, Tipple (Alistair Petrie), uses statistical trickery to try and disguise the scale of a problem or the ever increasingly rate of mysterious disappearances, this is the situation into which the Doctor and friends find themselves falling.

Fortunately, the Doctor still has his “Earth Examiner” badge on him so swiftly takes charge of the situation. Actually, part of the fun of the play is the segment where, having successfully, and almost accidentally, overthrown the asteroid’s leadership the Doctor has to grapple with the headaches of being the one in charge, instead of tutting from the sidelines (an idea which, between Ruler of the Universe, Time in Office and this, seems riding a be a bit of a zeitgeist at Big Finish at the moment.) More humour is mined from Tipple’s over-reliance for buzzwords and management speak. Even the title “The Outliers” refers not to the name of the monsters or the purpose of the base, but to the term dismissing the ever increasingly number of victims as no cause for concern. But the humour never threatens to suffocate the elements of horror or moral questioning. In the manner more typical of newer Doctor Who episodes, the conflict is, in part, fuelled by a misunderstanding but the idea of creatures whose perception of time and reality is so different they can’t at first quite detect that the humans are sentient beings is interesting stuff. While sequences of isolated boats stalked by the giant creature beneath the surface or, worse, people overboard treading in the knowledge that they’re not alone are never less than thrilling.The story is buoyed by a great guest cast too. Petrie hits the right balance between bland corporate nothingness, and the real human being underneath, and gives probably one of the most credible ‘Base Commander Cracking Up’ performances decades of Bases Under Siege have thrown up, while Debbie Chazen and Matilda Ziegler both sidestep the ‘sitcom’ expectations some listeners may have had of them to turn in skilled, dramatic performances.

An Early Adventure which manages the rare tightrope walk of being a perfect evocation of the original era without sacrificing any modern standard of characterization or storytelling, The Outliers succeeds in justifying the whole concept of re-casting. For it would be a sadder Doctor Who cosmos in which this wonderfully, spooky little tale didn’t exist.

The Twelfth Doctor Complete Year One
Writers: Robbie Morrison, George Mann & Cavan Scott
Artists: Dave Taylor, Brian Williamson, Mariano Laclaustra, Daniel Indro & Ronilson Friere
Publisher: Titan Comics
Published: December 5, 2017

Titan Comics first year of adventures featuring the Twelfth Doctor (and Clara) are collected together in a lovely book with an admittedly daunting page count.  At around 400 pages, it is almost intimidating.  And when the first story is rather humdrum it looks even more daunting.  But luckily, from the second story on, it is firing on all cylinders, and becomes quite the enjoyable read which is rather hard to put down. 

Like I said, the opening story is mediocre, with a standard Doctor Who story mixed with mediocre (sometimes downright bad) artwork, and it had me a tad concerned about what I was in for.  But the second story had better artwork and a more interesting story.  The likenesses, as well as the voices, of our characters shined a little brighter.  And by the time we get to the third story, The Fractures, it has hit it's stride. 

I won't pretend the entire book is without flaws after that, "Gangland" only sort of works, but what Doctor Who series is ever without a dud or two.  And that is really key to this books success, it feels like a season of the current show. Much as the Third Doctor's mini-series felt like a story plucked out of his era...this Twelfth Doctor ongoing series feels very much like the modern show. There are some wonderfully creative stories, monsters, and sci-fi concepts...and some of the art is just downright tremendous. 

The ongoing arc throughout the book is seeded in the opening story, and is teased throughout each story, and comes back to bite the Doctor and Clara in the big four-part conclusion. The Hyperions that play the role of the big baddie of the book are a really cool alien concept.  Beings that are basically walking suns that went mad...only in Doctor Who can you come up with something that unusual and have it feel at home in this universe.

Despite a rocky start, "The Twelfth Doctor - Complete Year One" is a triumph.  It's a good read, one that I think even casual fans could find enjoyment in.  It doesn't feel full of references, and it doesn't require that you've seen any specific episodes. Obviously being familiar wit hthe Twelfth Doctor, and probably a bit of background from his first series at least might help you understand the characters voices a bit better, but I would say this is an entertaing collection of comics. Certainly recommended if you, like me, hadn't yet had a chance to jump into Titan's ongoing Twelfth Doctor stories, or just prefer the omnibus collections.  

The Web of Fear
Written by Terrance Dicks
Read by David Troughton
Released by BBC Audio August 2017
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So I suppose I should be honest and up-front, The Web of Fear is one of my all-time favourite stories. The bizarre mix of cosmic horror, the underground setting and a likeable and amusing cast of characters completely work for me. I was utterly delighted when the story was discovered in 2013, but I first experienced it, like many others, through this novelisation by Terrence Dicks. My father had a friend at work who being a doctor who fan and discovering I was one, would occasionally give me old magazines and books. One day he returned with an almost complete set of target novelizations. Naturally I first went for the missing episodes and this story in particular. However having since had all but a single episode discovered, does this new reading still retain the stories original power?

First off we have David Troughton reading the novel, familiar to viewers from his performances in several stories including The Curse of Peladon and Midnight. David’s voice has a very low, eerie quality to it that works well with the subject matter. The most effective moments include a sequence in which our characters return to base, to find the bodies of soldiers covered in web. David’s description of these events genuinely is terrifying, slowing down his dictation so that every horrific detail is inched out bit by bit. His impersonations of the regulars are not too bad either, even if his Lethbridge Stewart sounds more like a general from any number of 60’s war films than Nicholas Courtney. His impression of his father, whilst not up to the level of Frazer Hines’s, is unmistakably the second doctor and he gets the comic timing just right. His impression of Jamie however is the one that steals the show is and at points it did sound exactly like Hines.

Terrence Dicks prose follows the television story almost exactly. After all by 1968 Terrence Dicks had joined the show as a Junior Editor when Web was in production. He does add a few nice little references, for example hints at the future friendship between the Doctor and Lethbridge-Stewart. He also omits the opening cliff-hanger to the previous serials Enemy of the World and (thankfully) remains the troubling Julius Silverstein to Emil Julius. One particularly nice addition is a few phrases giving an explanation of the events that take place between the reactivation of the Yeti and the Doctors arrival as London is taken over. With Troughton’s low tones, and a sumptuous score and roaring sound effects, this has a suitably apocalyptic feel.

The story is helped by a wonderful soundscape and music score. As far as I could tell (and please correct me if I’m wrong!) none of the original sound effects were used. This is actually somewhat refreshing, the new Yeti roars work wonders and help this version to stand on its own without conjuring memories of the television adaptation. The music especially seems to take more inspiration from horror movies than classic Doctor Who and it works in this versions favour. One odd omission is no version of the Doctor Who Theme, instead over the credits we get a bizarre ‘swashbuckling’ theme. Furthermore there’s no ‘wheezing and groaning’ sound played over the description. I suspect this for some odd copyright reason and I have no idea if this is the same with the other audio-book readings.

All in all if you’re a fan of the story, then you’ll find much to enjoy in this new adaptation. A splendid new version of an already established classic.

Written By: Justin Richards
Directed By: Lisa Bowerman

Cast
Anneke Wills (Polly Wright/Narrator), Frazer Hines (Jamie McCrimmon/The Doctor), Elliot Chapman (Ben Jackson), David Sibley (Josiah Morton), Kerry Gooderson (Jemma Morton), Ewan Bailey (Blazzard / Copeland), Alan Blyton (Dexter).

Producer David Richardson
Script Editor John Dorney
Executive Producers Jason Haigh-Ellery and Nicholas Briggs

Released: November 2017

The Doctor, Polly, Ben, and Jamie land in 1860s London (much to Ben and Polly's disappointment that they are not home in their own 1960s), and they soon find themselves trapped when the TARDIS is stolen. They track it down to a man named Morton, who runs a private museum in his home filled with plenty of exotic items...and while it is clear he has the TARDIS, they aren't sure how to get to the workshop where he is keeping it. The plot thickens as there are mysterious deaths around town, with Morton as the prime suspect. The Doctor and crew must somehow keep him out of jail, at least long enough for them to find the TARDIS. So they make an attempt to solve the murders, become increasingly weary of an artifact in Morton's collection, and foil a couple of crooks who attempt to steal from the collection. The story is decent, there are some nice character bits here and there, but I think it is the format of these Early Adventures that holds it back. 

I'm not sure I see the merit in moving halfway between the Companion Chronicles style of "enhanced Audiobook" and the Full Cast Dramas I am (admittedly) more familiar with.  Having narration describe things that could be easily illustrated by one of the characters via creative dialogue seems odd, particularly when the rest of the story is presented like a regular Full Cast Drama. The narration slowed the pace, and while a slower pace makes some amount of sense for a story trying to replicate the 60s era of the show...it just doesn't really flow like an episode from that era, so the whole operation doesn't really work. While I still didn't really enjoy the narration in the Third Doctor boxset, it still seemed to work better than it does here, and in general, it just managed to capture the era's feel much better. Really, when the whole concept of the Companion Chronicles was to skirt around the fact that some actors are no longer with us, it seems odd to then try and move on from that idea and replace actors yet still hold back and do that narration thing. If you're going to do it, go full throttle. 

Up until this moment, I had not yet found any time to give Big Finish's Early Adventures series a real go.  I think the concept is actually really novel.  But while Frazer Hines' vocal inflections often have that Troughton feel, sometimes I found it too hard to distinguish when exactly it was The Doctor that was supposed to be talking.  Clearly Hines is doing his best, and he certainly remembers his old friend's vocal inflections well...but it might have been less distracting or just easier to know who is who by finding a better Troughton impersonator, much as they did in replacing the late Michael Craze with Elliot Smith as Ben (or Tim Treloar's very good Pertwee impersonation from the Third Doctor sets). 

Personally, I found the story hard to engage in, and I really think it is the format of this particular Big Finish range. If the goal is to recreate the tone and feel of the 60s episodes, it doesn't really do that, nor does it feel like a modern and exciting story featuring characters from a totally different kind of era. It is just middle of the road, and there is nothing more forgettable than middle of the road. 

The Second Doctor ranks among my favorites, but it is always going to be hard for Big Finish to ever really capture that spark, when there is no possible way to bring back the man who made the part so fun and alive. 

100 Illustrated Adventures
Hardcover: 208 pages
Age Range: 7 - 12 years
Publisher: BBC Children's Books
Published 2 Nov. 2017

The latest hardcover large-format book, 100 Illustrated Adventures, published by Puffin, highlights one hundred of the Doctor’s ‘most wonderful, jaw-dropping and eye-popping escapades’ and claims to bring these episodes to life like no other episode guide.

So does it live up to this billing?  The book is bang up to date, covering the show all the way up to the end of the 2017 series.  Most stories are given a double page spread which includes a brief episode guide on one page – the incarnation of the Doctor and his companions, first transmission dates, number of episodes and the writer, along with a very brief (around 200 words) story synopsis.  The other page is typically devoted to a related piece of artwork.  It is these, as the ‘illustrated’ in the title suggests, that are the selling point of the book.  These were gathered from the publisher’s Illustrated Adventures competition which has provided art in a variety of styles ranging from detailed pencil drawings (including some stunning portraits) to abstract representations, and from comic strip styles to children’s drawings.  These are therefore original pieces of art that you won’t have seen anywhere before, and whilst the breadth of styles means that not all the art will be to everyone’s taste they all display great talent, imagination, and creativity and show a love for the show.

The inevitable question with this sort of book – is my favorite story in?  Well probably -  If we take the DWM 2014 poll as a benchmark most of the top 100 from that list are in and you have to get to 38th in the poll to find a story not included in this book (The Daemons – sorry!) and all in all only 32 of the DWM top 100 are not included here.  The choice of stories to include may also, therefore, be an interesting point of discussion for fans.

Overall, as an episode guide this book probably works better for the newer fan than for someone who has followed the show for a long time, but as a delightful, original collection of art that shows the passion and imagination of fellow fans, it works for all.

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The Eleventh Doctor Complete Year One
Writers: Al Ewing and Rob Williams
Artists: Simon Fraser and Warren Pleece
Publisher: Titan Comics
368pp
Published: November 21, 2017

The ones we love make up our world. When time claims them, nothing makes sense. Everything around us falls to pieces. It is up to us to pick up those pieces and rebuild, move forward, create a new world to live in.

That lesson can sometimes be impossible to learn. As it was for Alice Obiefune when she met The Doctor. Her mother was gone. Her job at the library was lost. Her landlord evicted her to knock down the building. Not even the thrill of time travel, the excitement of visiting alien worlds, meeting rock legends, or seeing the face of the creator could show her that the power to live, to keep going, was in her the whole time.

One could easily see the first year of The Doctor’s adventures away from his friends, the Ponds, as a collection of loosely connected, fluffy, stand-alone adventures, and they’d be right. Although there is a slight serialized arc (including a fascinating character on whom the spine of the story rests, who happens to be named Arc), practically every issue has its own beginning, middle, and end. The stories are energetic, crazy, and occasionally hilarious, perfectly mirroring the Eleventh Doctor’s persona. However, themes are touched on repeatedly, evolving from trip to trip as opposed to resolving and resetting for the next story. The continuous look at these themes from various angles is what makes the first year of Titan’s ongoing Eleventh Doctor series feel so monumental and epic.

Sure there’s a ravenous, and adorable, rainbow-colored dog devouring all the sadness and negativity of London. Yeah, there’s a run in with a false God wielding a black hole bomb and the Tardis continues to jump backward in time every few minutes. Sure The Eternal Dogfight shows up over Earth and someone gets a parasite by eating a space donut. All of that, plus Romans and an amusement park planet controlled by an evil organization, make for some truly dazzling spectacle, but what makes it epic are the people.

The stories told by Al Ewing and Rob Williams are funny, scary, exhilarating, and devastating because The Doctor and his new Tardis crew are the focus. The dividing chasm between what they want and what they need is the real quest. Alice needs to accept that the end of her mother’s life doesn’t equal the end of hers. John Jones (a Bowie-esque glam rocker in the early days of his career) needs to be patient with his identity. Arc needs to let go of fear. The Doctor needs to forgive himself for not being able to save everyone all the time. He needs to forgive himself for Gallifrey.

All the while a sinister being known only as the Talent Scout constantly tempts them with images of what they want. He can take away the pain by giving them what they think will fix them, essentially robbing them of what makes them people, taking away their stories.

Artists and colorists Simon Fraser, Boo Cook, Gary Caldwell, Warren Pleece, and Hi-Fi depict giant battles, goofy slapstick, and heart-breaking sadness with equal splendor. There are times when The Eleventh Doctor could step right off the page, or pull you into his marvelous space/time machine. Where they really shine however is in the expressions. You know precisely what these people are thinking and feeling without a single line of dialogue or narration.

The Eleventh Doctor Year One is one of the most moving Doctor Who stories ever told. It isn’t simply about a madman with a box who flies around fighting monsters. It is about us.

We are Arks, Time Machines transporting stories. Everyone we’ve ever met, all the things we’ve done, wished we’d done, wish we’d done differently, these memories make up the story of us. Our stories inform us, define us, drive us to do better. Perhaps we don’t always get it right, but we try. Even the last surviving member of an obliterated ancient alien race with a literal time machine remembers. It keeps him going. Keeps him trying. But it never ever stops him.

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