Not our name, but our passion
TARDISbound by Piers D. Britton was published in 2009 and contains seven in-depth essays on various aspects of Doctor Who.
Unlike many of these critical analyses of Doctor Who this volume considers the extended media in its essays. This allows for a much fuller analysis of each topic. The essays are very academic in their approach and cover such diverse topics as aesthetics, ethics, running strands and broken threads, masculinities and companion dynamics. 8 out of 10.
Operation H.A.T.E. by Richard Franklin is an adaption of the unpublished novel that with the cancelation of the Companions of Doctor Who series by Target never saw print. Dur to BBC copyright issues the novella was unable to use the licensed Doctor Who characters. There was an abridged audio recording of the original story produced under the original tile as The Killing Stone.
The novella features the very familiar Doctor Who characters albeit with different names due to licensing restrictions. Instead of Yates, The Master, The Doctor, Benton and The Brigadier we get M. Franklin, The General, Professor Cosmos, Moriarty and Warrant Officer Briggs. The abridged audio reading of the original script does use the original character names and is much easier to get into the story.
This book version does not flow well and does take you out of the narrative with the side-step of characters. 5.5 out of 10.
This volume of collected short stories from Doctor Who Magazine was available by print on order from Lulu Publishing. This may be an unofficial non-authorized edition as I cannot find anything online about it. All of the stories are from the magazine or yearbooks.
Buyer beware when purchasing this type of item from Lulu as it may very well be a pirated volume where the original authors do not get their due royalties. The stories in the volume are quite short with the longer stories broken down into two or three part installments. There are 31 stories included in the rather thick volume (408 pages). As with most anthologies the quality of the stories vary but the mix of authors is quite impressive including such luminaries as Gareth Roberts, Andrew Cartmel, Mark Gatiss, Dan Abnett, Terrance Dicks, John Lucarotti, David Whitaker, Marc Platt, Paul Cornell and others. 8 out of 10.
The 12th Doctor Edition of the Essential Guide written by the stalwart Justin Richards was published in 2016 updating the 2013 edition.
This is another example of the numerous historical guides made for the new fans to the series. This lavishly illustrated edition has text describing many aspect of the televised series. Unfortunately like many of these guides there is zero mention of any of the extended media portions of the Whoniverse. Good for what it is but superficial for the serious fan. 7 out of 10.
Doctor Who The Complete History was a series of hardback volumes which came out every two weeks and covered 3-4 stories each. These were in-depth volumes covering the production of each episode from the first in 1963 to the end of the Peter Capaldi era of the show. In addition to the extensive production notes there were also merchandise and publicity updates and actor profiles. The quality of each volume was exceptional overseen by several different editors. The volumes were only available in the UK and Ireland so were difficult to obtain in other locations. I am more of a Watsonian fan but if you are a Doyalist you will greatly appreciate these books. Even so I give the entire series a solid 8 out of 10. I will rate each episode covered below.
The 10th series was one of the least interesting of the new series in my opinion although this episode Oxygen is one of the strongest of the batch. The story featuring The Doctor with Bill Potts and Nardole find themselves entangled in a capitalist nightmare scenario where you must purchase oxygen in order to survive onboard a space station. Nardole has a bigger role in this episode than in most and it greatly enhances the story. 8 out of 10.
Extremis was the first of the trilogy of stories featuring the monks. I found this series of stories one of the weakest sets of stories of the program. I just didn’t appreciate the storyline much at all. The Missy subplot was OK but the main storyline was pedestrian. I have not revisited these stories since their first broadcast 7 out of 10.
The Pyramid at the End of the World sees the continuation of the monks storyline. This is a slightly better story with the three superpowers involved with the aliens and the Twelfth Doctor‘s fake out with his is he or isn’t he performance. 7.5 out of 10.
