Review by Ian Wheeler
WARNING: SOME SPOILERS
The Comic: the Fifteenth Doctor and Ruby Sunday embark on new adventures through time and space. The pair have followed a mysterious signal to a shopping mall in the last days of Earth. It’s sure to be a trap, but to find the source, The Doctor must face his greatest fears…
The Review: When any new actor takes over the role of the Doctor on television, there are always fans who are quickly won over and others who take more convincing – and Ncuti Gatwa’s Fifteenth Doctor has been no exception. By any objective analysis though, I think most would agree that he looks great. He’s a handsome man by any definition and he’s generally been costumed in clothes that suit him, especially the ‘long coat and stripy shirt’ look, which is how the Doctor is decked out in this first story from Titan Comics. This makes him, to my mind, particularly suited to the comic strip medium and, in this story, artist Kelsey Ramsay really does an excellent job of capturing the Doctor both facially and in terms of depicting his unique personality.
Ruby is also very effectively drawn and Kelsey manages to convey the energy and youthful enthusiasm that Millie Gibson channels so effectively on screen.
There’s a sort of raw energy to Kelsey’s artwork. There are other artists whose work is perhaps more ‘realistic’, in terms of being an almost photographic representation of the things they’re depicting, but there’s a fluidity to Kelsey’s illustrations that allows the stories to literally sizzle into life on the printed page. Valentina Bianconi’s skillful colouring only adds to the overall effect.
Turning to the scripting, let me start by saying that I’m not a fan of over-complex stories in Doctor Who, either on TV or on the printed page. I like stories that are intelligent but relatively easy to follow and Dan Watters certainly accomplishes this here. On the basis of this first episode, this is a story which avoids the trap of being too clever for its own good, but which is nonetheless original and imaginative. We talk about some stories being good ‘entry level’ Doctor Who and that is certainly the case with this instalment. You don’t need a degree in Doctor Who to understand it, although there’s a useful quick summary of the programme’s format on the title page for those relatively unfamiliar with Who.
The story starts with a flashback to Ruby’s past, in which she relates a childhood nightmare to the Doctor. Then we’re straight into a nice, quick TARDIS scene with some lovely dialogue between the two of them. The two friends then arrive in a shopping mall on Earth. Most of humanity has now left the planet, but the shopping mall remains. With its high ceilings and futuristic architecture, the building is nicely reminiscent of Paradise Towers, the setting of one of Sylvester McCoy’s early TV stories.
The Doctor and Ruby soon meet a man called Cotton, who hasn’t left Earth because he doesn’t believe there’s anything up in the sky. He thinks that everything he needs can be found in the mall. It’s a nice commentary both on some aspects of conspiracy theory and the social isolation that many of us feel in the modern world (a theme also touched on recently by the episode “Dot and Bubble” on TV). There’s a reference to ‘mavity’ that I could have lived without – I thought it was a fairly weak idea on TV and I’m not sure we need it continuing in the comics as well.
As the two time travellers continue to look around, the Doctor realises that the shopping mall is capable of providing anything that the remaining humans need, without them having to pay – it is basically running on automatic. It all seems a bit good to be true. As we know, in Doctor Who, if something seems too good to be true it normally is. And there’s a mystery to be solved, because they have been led to this location by a Cyber-gauntlet that they found in the 18th century. Why has it brought them here?
After trying on some of the outrageous fashions that the shopping mall has to offer (well, this is the Fifteenth Doctor and Ruby), the pair head down to the lower levels. In the darkness, they meet a little girl who seems somewhat familiar. The Doctor tells the little girl everything is going to be OK – a promise which is short-lived when some beautifully retro-looking Cybermen appear, leading into a classic cliffhanger.
In conclusion, this is an appealing instalment which is accessible to new and older readers alike and really does grab the reader’s attention. In many ways it’s a more traditional, ‘old school’ story than a lot of the recent TV series and I look forward to seeing how it develops.
Ian Wheeler
• Doctor Who #1 will be on sale from all good comic shops from this Wednesday, 3rd July 2024 | Doctor Who #1 and all available variant covers can be ordered here from Forbidden Planet (Affiliate Link) – and you can pre-order upcoming issues, too
• Doctor Who #1 will be on sale from all good comic shops from this Wednesday, 3rd July 2024 | Doctor Who #1 and all available variant covers can be ordered here from Forbidden Planet (Affiliate Link) – and you can pre-order upcoming issues, too
Former Co-ordinator of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society. Publisher and Editor of comics-related fanzines. Contributor to books on Doctor Who from Virgin and Miwk Publishing. Contributor to cult TV fanzines and periodicals.
Categories: British Comics, Comic Previews, Comics, Doctor Who, Features, Other Worlds, Reviews, Television
Sneak Peek: Doctor Who: Origins #1, out in June, starring the Fugitive Doctor
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