Alden Bates' Weblog

So partway into Invasion of Time, there's these tiny green plastic chairs:

Why are they there? Can you see any self-respecting Time Lord actually sitting in one of those?

Can it be... actual physical evidence of Time Tots?

(Thanks go to Jeff for pointing those out...)

TSV 59 - the first issue of the new millennium to go up (unless you're pedantic and insist the millennium started with 2001). It has one of my favourite TSV covers - a Curse of Fatal Death piece inspired by the cover of the Five Doctors novelisation.

Peter Adamson puts in two great articles: the first on Cyber-conversion (in the new series it's just "Scoop, splat, off you go") and the second on the much maligned Greatest Show in the Galaxy, plus he and Alistair Hughes view Revenge of the Cybermen for Beyond the Sofa. There's also part one of a lengthy interview with Andrew Pixley, he who did the archives in Doctor Who Magazine, which also includes a postscript update to some of what was originally said.

On the reviews front, this is the first issue to have reviews of Big Finish audios, starting with Sirens of Time, Phantasmagoria, and Whispers of Terror. Amazing that those have been going for 8 years now - longer than the Virgin New Adventures did - although as Paul mentions in the editorial, it'd still be nice to have the TV series back anyway... Oh, wait, we do!

Also added on the site recently is an index of the comic strips we have up, in series chronological order. The latest addition, of course, being Alistair Hughes' Our Final Battlefield.

Previously: TSV 58
See also: Paul, Jamas.

You can order Time's Champion from here, although currently the first edition is sold out and they're contemplating a second...

Time's Champion, as previously mentioned is Craig Hinton's last Doctor Who book, completed by Chris McKeon and published with the proceeds going to charity. It's a direct sequel to Craig's previous sixth Doctor and Mel books, The Quantum Archangel and Millennial Rites and, as you'd expect from one of his books, is chock full of continuity references to many many television stories as well as Virgin and BBC novels. It's also a little over 400 pages, well deserving of the label 'epic', so I'm sure had it been published as part of the BBC books range, it would have been severely cut.

As a random piece of trivia - this is the first time Mel's appeared on the cover of a book (and it's one cracking cover!) since Millennial Rites and Head Games back in 1995...

Anyway, as the story starts, the Doctor and Mel are attending Benton's 70th birthday party in 2008, along with a couple of returning characters from The Quantum Archangel. In 1908, George McKenzie-Trench is attempting to work on his latest book, Time's Champion, while in 9908 another George McKenzie-Trench is working on a computer supervirus to defend his world against an impending attack by the Cybermen.

I'm going to try to avoid spoilers and keep things vague for the rest of this review, but just in case, I'm hiding it under a cut anyway.

Continue reading "Time's Champion Review"

As it turns out the article linked to in my previous post was, in fact, a pack of lies and Digital Spy have removed it. People who were actually there report no such thing as happening, and likewise The Sun's article makes no mention of it (and if anyone would pounce on such a story, it's them...)

Of course, we're lied to all the time, so this shouldn't come as a surprise. :)

Catherine Tate, who appeared in the fourth season of Doctor Who, has been appearing in a play in the West End, however it seems like a bunch of fans have decided to make a nuisance of themselves:

'Who' fans 'disrupt Tate's West End play'

Tennant showed his support for his former co-star by turning up for a performance this week, but was reportedly horrified when Who obsessives began singing the show's theme and waving sonic screwdrivers.

"Fans had heard he was going to watch former Doctor Who star Catherine, so they turned up in force, complete with props," a source told the Daily Star. "He was very charming and friendly with them during the interval, but he was rightly disgusted when they disrupted her performance by singing the show's music and waving their sonic screwdrivers."

Greaaaat, thanks for that.

Update: it's all lies!

More questions from the search engine queries: this time they read like a Doctor Who pub quiz.

Who shot off Davros's hand?

Lee Harvey Oswald

How did the Master escape from the eye of harmony?

A really big stepladder.

Which story featured a transparent or glass Dalek?

Modern Art of the Daleks

Which superweapon was used to stop the Sontaran invasion of gallifrey?

The Collapsible Plastic Chair of Rassilon.

When is Jason Donovan taking the part of dr who?

Well, he- WHAT?!

Or the actual answers: Bostock in Revelation of the Daleks; the Time Lords resurrected him; Revelation and Resurrection of the Daleks (and the novelisation of The Daleks); the Demat Gun; and I'm not even going to ask where you heard that rumour.

My average rating for episodes this series was 7.153, which is down on Series 3. Though I thought this season was better overall - the finale really dragged it down. A handful of spoilers and misuse of the dl tag:

Continue reading "Series 4 in Review"

Let me take you on a trip back in time to shortly before the millennium, which is a roundabout way of saying that TSV issue 58 went online yesterday. In the last pre-Y2K issue, there are many lovely shiny things.

Beyond the Sofa is one of my favourite TSV article series, wherein Peter Adamson and Alistair Hughes watch old Doctor Who (in this case Nightmare of Eden) in a similar vein to DWM's Time Team. Also Scott Gray gives us an article on the making of the DWM comic strip Happy Deathday!; there's A Locked Room Mystery, a comic strip featuring the first Doctor and Steven; and a look at the Sherlock Holmes continuity in the Virgin book All-Consuming Fire by Jamas.

There's nothing from me in 58, so instead I'll mention Neil Lambess' column in which he mentions having seen episodes of The Macra Terror and hearing rumours of The Highlanders, raising the possibility of more missing Doctor Who episodes existing in the hands of collectors. Since it's some nine years later and no more complete episodes have been found here, nothing came of it, but the recent discovery of a complete print of Metropolis, missing for the last 80 some years, does give me hope that more missing episodes exist out there.

Here's hoping, anyway.

Previously: TSV 57
See also: Jamas, Paul

Blah blah, continued from Doctor Who Series 4 (Part 4), spoilers, etc.

Continue reading "Doctor Who Series 4 (Part 5)"

Trailing on from Doctor Who Series 4 (Part 3), this time we get two Russell T. Davies (OBE) episodes. Marvellous!

Continue reading "Doctor Who Series 4 (Part 4)"

When Doctor Who author Craig Hinton sadly died in 2006, he was in the middle of writing a book. That book has been completed by Chris McKeon and will be published with proceeds going to the British Heart Foundation. You can read about Time's Champion here. From the sketch published on there, the Alister Pearson artwork on the cover looks like it's going to be really nice.

Since Doctor Who Series 4 Parte II, the news broke that Steven Moffat is replacing Russell T. as series producer as of the start of series 5. I swear the cheering woke me up that morning. As usual, spoilers ahead!

Continue reading "Doctor Who Series 4 (Part 3)"

While waiting for the next episode to screen (two weeks has never been such a long time), I've been musing. Spoilers ensue for The Doctor's Daughter below!

Continue reading "Doctor Who and Shipping"

Continued from last time, but obviously covering episodes 4 through 6. Spoiler warnings are, of course, in effect.

Continue reading "Doctor Who Series 4 (Part 2)"

Online today - TSV 57!

After the news of the recovery of missing episode The Lion in TSV 56, the next issue contained the full story of its recovery, as well as the more off-beat experiences of Neil Lambess in his new regular column The Life and Times of Neil Lambess.

The other major item was the printing of Pilots of the Deep. Parts 1 and 2 had been printed in TSV 12 and 14 back in 1989 before the original artist, Mark Roach, had lost interest. Ten years later, David Ronayne and Peter Adamson collaborated on a conclusion and it was printed (along with the first two parts) in TSV 57. There was even a behind the strip article about the creation of Pilots of the Deep. I wonder if Mark Roach has seen it. :)

Also in this issue, Pex anticipates The Juggernauts, and he and the Karkus team up to fight a giant headless chicken. Yes!

Next time, Beyond the Sofa!

Previously: Resurrection of the Daleks
See also: the write-ups by Jamas and Paul