In With The Tide has me sold by the first page, this series is just showing itself as a love letter to Who, and what better way to bring together Three’s era than having Sarah Jane and Liz together, with the latter calling Three in to help.
Everyone has been, but Three and The Brig especially are written so well I can’t help but hear Pertwee and Courtney when I read them.
This issue just perfectly captures that UNIT era charm, jeeps driving through the rain, Three cooking up a gizmo to stop the alien threat, fistfighting aliens, messaging about the climate and nuclear weapons, THE WHOMOBILE SHOWING UP?! The only thing it’s missing is Delgado and swapping this Paul guy for Bill Filer
The art here is also great, I love the effects when Three uses his device, very much reminiscent of the sorts of effects you’d get in his era, and Three looks incredible, his dress sense is just on point.
A Rare gem was the first disappointment of the series for me. It feels like a bit of a weaker 4th doctor TV story, not the Love Letter to the era that the three preceding it were.
Seeing Leela and K9 fighting Judoon was fun, and I did like the bits with Four in the cave, figuring out what had happened with the theft, but overall, yeah this one just fell a bit flat.
No references or specific love for the era really. Like it’s not awful, but coming after three incredible stories that all felt not only like love letters to the show, but love letters to their respective eras, I was hoping for just something a bit more.
In Their Nature is back to just being solid fun, not as reference heavy as the first three, but getting to be on the front lines of a Rutan/Sontaran skirmish is great, and the TARDIS team getting caught by both sides in turn is just classic Classic Doctor Who.
Honestly the more I see of Sontarans in the expanded universe, the more I’m starting to really like them, their sense of honour shines through here, and Five comparing them to the tale of The Frog and The Scorpion is a really interesting view of them that I like a lot.
Also get to see more of what’s going on in the bigger picture of things which is fun!
Six, Peri, and Frobisher is just wonderful to see, the idea of a gentrified future antarctic is an interesting setting, and generally it just all works for this TARDIS team, bit of a shame there’s not more done with it though.
And the Ainsley Master showing up, and working with Autons too!! A reference to Houdini is also always fun. It’s a shame that The Master and Autons don’t really get all that much to do here, but their appearance is appreciated, and the twist at the end with Frobisher getting captured as per Ten’s plans, so he can sneak around and see what’s going on with the captured companions is just so so fun and brings this back up to a 7/10!
Sidenote - I’m loving the ‘Reflections on Time’ at the end of each issue, just discussing elements of the doctor’s runs, specifically in comic form, that they’ve drawn from, and their history
Just a really nice little thing that makes me want to explore more of the whoniverse
Ace wearing period clothes with the jacket over them is iconic and I need more of it right now.
This story does feel like it fits in Seven’s era quite well, the mysterious and gothic vibe especially almost reminding me of the setting of Ghost Light (or what I remember of it).
We get some more insight into what’s going on behind the scenes here with The Master saying he’s been working with one of The Doctor’s “future companions”, giving some actual reason for his appearance in the previous issue other than fan service.
The Body Politic is another story that’s a little weaker for me. Partly I think due to the companion of choice, partly because of where it sits in the overarching narrative.
Grace is a great character, but for a series that’s not only a celebration of Doctor Who, but a celebration of Doctor Who comics, it’s a bit of a shame to not have some of Eight’s comic original companions here, instead pulling in Grace, who was never really a companion in the way many others are (at the very least, she’s less a companion than Wilf), for a one-off adventure in the TARDIS so she can get kidnapped. I just don’t buy that of all Eight’s companions, someone who’s going and kidnapping them all would choose Grace.
And as for it’s place in the overarching story, here tensions are starting to ramp up, The Doctor has a man on the inside, we know the enemy is a future companion (or at least future for Seven), we know The Master’s involved… and here we just get a fairly middling story about weird alien politics where a culture is overthrown in half an issue. There’s the bit at the end where The Doctor sees the kidnapper coming, and we get a little motivation, but it’s not much, not things we couldn’t’ve already guessed.
And with Mystery Date things start to come together.
Unlike The Body Politic where the overarching story felt sort of crammed into the story, here I think it really works.
We start off with just the most magnificent establishing shot of the grave of an extremely rich person, who isn’t dead and kidnaps Rose. We see that person’s side of things, talking to Rose about how great he is and everything he’s doing while Nine makes his way down.
You get the establishment of Nine’s distrust of others and his ‘No second chances’ principle in play, you see his care of Rose, you see another figure’s obsession with Rose who’s seemingly getting on well with her until Nine reveals the sort of person he really is…
And then the mystery kidnapper is revealed to be Adam.
And everything comes back to you.
Hearing about the reveal without the context of the story, it sounds stupid. But somehow with the context of the issue leading up to it, they manage to make it actually work. The monologuing his backstory is a little silly, as is that backstory, but I don’t know, it still works surprisingly well.
Quiet on Set sees the return of The Quarks which is already lovely, but then you also get a fun look into the 50’s movie scene, and a really sweet moment of Ten showing Martha Gallifrey through a telescope (as the light from it is still reaching earth despite its destruction). I’m not sure if that should quite work given how The Time War works, but hey, it makes for a sweet moment.
The Adam appearance is sudden at the end, and he just sort of shows up and leaves, but it makes sense for his character now that The Doctor can sense his appearences. It’s also nice that it then leads into Ten’s recording of the message that Frobisher saw back in Facades.
I’m glad they get that start over with quickly in The Choice, they know you’re here to see Adam, so they get right to it.
We get a fair bit more expositing of Adam’s motivations, but here we can see how it actually affects Eleven, we can see that, well, it’s not that Adam’s right, but he does have some point. He was also a companion briefly, but he got completely left behind, never cared for, never checked up on. The Doctor can claim to not have favourites but he at least has some he cares less for (at least, you can see how Adam gets that).
And all that comes to a head with a spectacular cliffhanger. The spread of all the companions in cells is lovely, and Adam making Eleven choose one to save is just a brilliant final moment
An appropriate wrap up for a celebration of Doctor Who like this, and one that wraps up threads from earlier stories well.
The Autons from Facades come back and are now used as an attack force to take down the Eleven Doctors, making up a little for their mostly just fanservicey appearance in that story. And then serving as an army to get taken down by every doctor and every companion all at once, it’s like the scene at the end of Journey’s End on steriods
And then the person that saves the day, stopping the companions from getting blown up, and subsequently freeing them too is Frobisher. Not only a companion, but a companion that represents Doctor Who’s Comics which is perfect for this.
Adam’s change of heart is a little sudden given how on board he was for killing the doctors companions, fully aware of the ramifications it could have on time, but I do guess destroying the universe is a bit much, and I like Nine being the last one to give him the pep talk he needs to do it, and he finally understands what being a companion means at the end.
LOVE this series, and while the art styles can vary wildly in quality, it is a wonderful tribute to Doctor Who as you say. Also check out what all the covers put together looks like, it’s brilliant
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