The Complete Eighth Doctor
Comic Strips Volume Four
24: Where Nobody Knows Your Name
1 part (DWM 329) 30th April 2003
Writer: Scott Gray, Pencils: Roger Langridge, Inks: David A. Roach
Following Izzy's departure, the Doctor has something of an existential crisis in a bar on an alien world, and chats to the bar’s owner, “Bish,” telling him that he’s recently been making mistakes, losing his temper and getting other people hurt.
He's interrupted when a female robot named Zalda bursts into the bar to confront her lover Renaldo; he’s been having affairs with other robots behind her back, and she’s set her mesonic reactor to overload and destroy the whole bar.
The Doctor manages to talk her down, sympathising with her pain, and as she collapses in tears he switches off her reactor and has her sent to the Carstairs Cybernetics Institute for treatment.
Cheered by the patrons’ gratitude, the Doctor accepts Bish’s advice to stop taking things so seriously and decides to take a holiday.
As the Doctor leaves, we find out that “Bish” is none other than his former travelling companion Frobisher, who closes up for the night, morphs back to his penguin shape and goes home with his wife Caralla...
After three successive story arcs, the 8th doctor strips entered a period of standalone tales pairing the drifting Doctor with one-off companions, very much in the mould of 2009's "gap year" of "Specials".
This then, the first of this run of such tales, finds Scott Gray in observance of the strength and depth of character development that we've come to expect in the DWM strip. The Doctor is in post-Oblivion comedown, reflecting on his place in the universe after parting ways with his friend Izzy Sinclair, and needs somebody to lean on, in this case, and old friend he - and of course, we - fail to recognise. The Tony Soprano-looking "Bish" is in fact much-loved shapechanging Whifferdill, Frobisher, and it's he who helps the buccaneering 8th Doctor rediscover that he has buckles to swash. While it's perhaps questionable whether we even really need the interlude of the bomb-toting Zalda, it probably stops this erstwhile two hander from going the wrong side of moping, and it does illustrate or at least underline Bish's argument.
On the artwork front we have the inimitable Roger Langridge, perhaps the king of the comic one-shots in the DWM strip, and whilst his character work is never less than luxuriously exuberant, sometimes you do get a creeping feeling that you've seen it all before. Not so this time out, due in part to a better than usual McGann likeness, the aforementioned "Tony Soprano", some cheeky cameos from some "Other Doctors" (The Muppets' Dr. Teeth, and Futurama's Dr. Zoidberg), and a rich, warm, almost sepia-like colour palette. It doesn't pack the emotional wallop of Beautiful Freak, the superspy cool of Me and My Shadow or the urgent superheroism of Unnatural Born Killers, but this is something unique and valuable in its own right, the bittersweet reassurance of an old friend's shoulder to cry on. Maybe not a vital entry, but a neglected gem all the same.
7/10
25: Doctor Who and the Nightmare Game
3 parts (DWM 330-332) 28th May to 23rd June 2003
Writer: Gareth Roberts, Pencils: Mike Collins, Inks: David A. Roach
The TARDIS arrives in the middle of a football match in 1977, and young fan Billy Wilkins tells him that Delchester United have been performing poorly since the Shakespeare brothers, Milo and Frank, bought out the team.
Taking the bus away from the match, the Doctor is attacked by two monstrous Morgs...
...but he escapes, returning to the stadium at night, where he disgruntled player Ray Stobbs, and discovers the hypnotised players are being used as slaves to tend to a vast alien being embedded in the ground beneath the stadium; the team’s performance has suffered because they’ve been too tired to play.
Billy Wilkins breaks into the stadium to help the Doctor because there’s nothing good on TV, and helps Stobbs to distract the Morg killer-unit which the Shakespeare brothers have sent to kill the Doctor.
The Doctor confronts the Shakespeare brothers, who are revealed to be components of a single biological entity, the Prime Morg, which absorbed all life on its homeworld and has spread out to consume the universe. A seed of the Morg’s being, a Nukaryote, was planted on Earth centuries ago and has been absorbing life energy from the planet ever since; the Prime Morg has now returned to absorb it into itself.
Believing that the Galactic Police have hunted them down, the Shakespeare brothers activate the Nukaryote and launch the football stadium into orbit to join the waiting Prime Morg. It tries to absorb the Doctor’s knowledge into itself, but he resists its probing and learns that the entire organism is still dependent upon the original Morg cell.
The Doctor, Stobbs and Billy get hold of one of the Morg’s seed pods, and kick it like a football into the original cell, delivering a fatal blow to the Morg.
The team’s play promptly improves, and though the Doctor later returns to offer Billy a ride in the TARDIS, Billy is too caught up watching the game to notice.
Probably a part too long, this tale of the Doctor in a late 70s England of Saturday afternoon football, red buses and Spangles doesn't quite know what it wants to pastiche most, the early Mills/Wagner & Gibbons DWM strips, Roy of the Rovers. It's a successful blending of both, via the run of the mill script from Gareth Roberts and the flat, relatively undynamic, artwork from Mike Collins.
There is enjoyment to be had here; Dylan Teague spots something naggingly familiar in Collins' compositions and colours this as if it's the title sequence to Grange Hill and there's just enough in the script to give an echo of the aforementioned Doctor Who Weekly work, with Billy an obvious surrogate for the likes of Sharon and Fudge. There's something of an awkward backward step for the character of the 8th Doctor, though, here a lighter, more shallow figure. It's good to see him without the weight of the universe on his shoulders, but the Doctor in holiday mode is hard to master, and it's done much better elsewhere just next week. Overall, a curate's egg, but one that, despite it's fatal flaws repays repeated readings. Pleasingly warmhearted in places, banal in others, maybe you really had to grow up in the time to feel a connection to this one. If, like me, you didn't, you're likely to find this story a bit of a trudge, more akin to a muddy nil-nil bore draw than a sparkling cup final. Still, Roberts would later perfect the blend of Doctor Who and Jumpers for Goalposts with the 10th Doctor strip (later 11th Doctor TV episode) The Lodger, so maybe this is a necessary quagmire of a first run for better things to come. As an 8th Doctor strip, it's something of a let down.
6/10
26: The Power of Thoueris!
1 part (DWM 333) 20th August 2003
Writer: Scott Gray Artist: Adrian Salmon
The Doctor and his Egyptian friend Ediphis are in a sailing boat going down the river Nile. They notice a bubbling in the water and Thoueris emerges.
Thoueris demands tribute of the pair but Ediphic tells her he has none. Thoueris forces him to return up the Nile.
Soon a large group of Egyptians are worshiping Thoueris. To demonstrate her power, Thoueris throws an Egyptian into the Nile and uses her ring to summon the crocodiles and make them attack the Egyptian. The Egyptians hurridly bow to Thoueris.
The Doctor and Ediphis are hiding in a bush on a cliff above Thoueris. Ediphis is worried that going against Thoueris is blasphemy as he believes her a god, The Doctor convinces him otherwise.
The Doctor stands on the cliff and insults Thoueris, who promply throws her knife at him. It misses, though, and she begins to climb the cliff.
The Doctor and Ediphis pour oil on her hands and light it, making her fall back into the water. Before she falls, the Doctor takes her ring.
He uses the ring to summon the crocodiles, who kill Thoueris.
The Doctor and Ediphis then continue down the Nile in the boat.
Another one-off story of the holidaying 8th Doctor, and an unexpected sequel to Pyramids of Mars, with an Osirian in giant Hippopotamus form! It's a frothy little romp, with action that's muscular in more ways than one, with a shirtless and be-shorted 8th Doctor leaping from the pen of Adrian Salmon and into stylish action. Whilst vastly superior to the previous Nightmare Game this is a "Special" that shares the hollow feeling of Planet of the Dead, partly due to its' odd mish-mash of tones, and partly just due to its brevity. It's probably best that way, though, as it's hard to see this really stretching beyond one part in a satisfying way, just as it's hard to take Thoueris seriously at times. She brings a harder edged threat than your typical one-shot villain, and doesn't sit comfortably alongside more comedic antagonists like the Meep, but is still a giant Hippopotamus when all's said and done. It's another strip that benefits from strong and sympathetic colouring, this time with Adrian Salmon colouring his own work with some hazy sunset hues that evoke the swelter of the Nile Delta, and some striking reds for the blood and thunder of Thoueris. It's not a strip that makes much of a lasting impression but as a one-off it's harmless enough fun, with a punchline that's both as old as the pyramids and a guilty pleasure.
6.5/10
27: The Curious Case of Spring-Heeled Jack
3 parts (DWM 334-336) 17th September to 12th November 2003
Writer: Scott Gray Pencils: Anthony Williams Inks: David A. Roach
The Doctor encounters a sleepwalking young woman, Penny Chapman, in 1840 London when she's attacked by an insane, demonic alien who has been assaulting young women, but the Doctor intervenes, and “Spring-Heeled Jack” retreats when the police arrive.
The Doctor walks Penny home, but she can’t remember what she was dreaming about while sleepwalking.
Jack attacks the Doctor and tries to read his mind, but the Doctor turns the psychic attack back on Jack and sees images of war in his mind.
Penny drives Jack off with her landlady’s shotgun, and insists upon helping the Doctor to investigate further.
The Doctor takes Penny to the TARDIS and traces an anachronistic electrical discharge to the Blackthorne Gasworks, Penny’s workplace.
There, they find a door which opens only to Penny’s touch, and behind the door, they find a storage facility for a bioplasmic entity. The sight breaks Penny’s conditioning, and she turns her gun on the Doctor, revealing that she is really an alien named Morjanus.
Her people are at war with Jack’s, and Morjanus came to Earth to build and test a new weapon. “Penny Chapman” was a false persona she constructed in order to hide her psychic scent from Jack, and he’s been trying to trace her for years.
The essence is now ready, and Morjanus activates it, releasing the Pyrodines, creatures of living flame that burst out of gas lamps all around the city and attack the terrified population. To test her weapon, Morjanus will burn London to the ground.
However, the Doctor reveals that he removed the bullets from the gun earlier, since he suspected that Penny was under some form of alien influence. The Pyrodines attack the Doctor, but Jack arrives and holds them off while the Doctor uses the pilfered bullets to destroy the essence’s container.
Destroying the essence causes the Pyrodines to dissipate, and Jack then attacks Morjanus, erasing her mind but leaving the innocent Penny Chapman persona intact.
The Doctor advises the bewildered Penny to return to the countryside where it’s safe, while Jack, who’s been driven somewhat mad by his years amongst the primitives of Earth, decides to remain in London as a protector of the innocent.
A superior tale of an otherworldly Victorian vigilante who's part Batman, part Hobgoblin, and all DWM strip superstar, that's sadly let down by artwork that, whilst strong on character, is strangely lacking in background detail, giving a half-finished and blank effect whenever the plot takes a breather, and characters stand and face each other squarely. Thankfully, that's not often, because our holidaying Doctor is very quickly thrust into a rip-roaring full-throttle gas-lit rollercoaster-ride courtesy of the eponymous creature and his unexpected quarry. The 8th Doctor continues to recapture the breathless adventuring of his early strips, and the Pyrodines make for a suitable threat, but from start to finish it's Spring-Heeled Jack himself who's the star of this one. It sustains it's length well, which is a rare strength sometimes, so worthy of note, and there's a nice atmosphere to the whole thing that means this echoes the stronger stories of the more consistent arcs of the last five years or so, but it doesn't quite measure up to similarly solid entries like Flesh and Blood or The Road to Hell, losing marks for the sparse backdrops.
7/10
28: The Land of Happy Endings
1 part (DWM 337) 10th December 2003
Writer: Scott Gray Pencils: Martin Geraghty Inks: Faz Choudhury / David A. Roach Colour: Daryl Joyce
The Tardis brings Dr Who and his grandchildren, John and Gillian, to a dull alien city whose natives don’t react to their presence. Dr Who tries to stir the aliens’ imagination using fireworks from his amazing black bag, and manages to awaken a sense of wonder in some.
But the fireworks also attract the attention of hostile robots which kidnap Gillian.
Dr Who uses a spotlight from his bag to drive away the remaining robots, and one of the natives, Pobla, leads Dr Who and John to the Darbonian parliamentary building to rescue Gillian. There, they fall into a dastardly trap, but Dr Who cuts his way free with an acetylene torch from his black bag. They then confront the sinister scientist Wargonn...
...who has captured the Figments, creatures of pure thought that inspire the Darbonians’ imagination and creativity.
Wargonn believes that new ideas are dangerous and that only he should control the planet’s creativity. He orders Dr Who to surrender his black bag, but John tricks him and pushes him inside the bag - which, like the Tardis, is bigger on the inside than the outside. Dr Who threatens to leave Wargonn trapped inside forever unless he releases the Figments, and the scientist does so, restoring imagination to the people of Darbonia. Dr Who and his grandchildren depart...
...whereupon the real Doctor awakens, cheered and inspired by his dreams of a world where evil is easily defeated and there are always happy endings.
Magical and touching, this is quite simply one of the best DWM strips ever, (albeit the best is still to come in this run) a 40th anniversary one-off that avoids the well-worn multi-Doctor route, avoids a by now predictable Langridge-drawn larf-athon, and instead gives us something beyond special. It's a meticulously observed homage to the Neville Main comic strips of the 1960s that saw William Hartnell's 1st Doctor travel with his grandchildren John and Gillian to do battle with the likes of the villainous Kleptons in TV Comic Magazine. Scott Gray spoils us with a tale of innocence, charm and warmth that's brought to magical hairs-on-the-back-your-neck life by Martin Geraghty's peerless recreation of Main's style, aided and abetted by truly astounding hand-painted colouring from Daryl Joyce. Joyce deserves as much of a credit as Gray and Geraghty for giving this the appearance and feel of a precious historical artefact in whose presence 'hushed awe with a tear in your eye' is the only appropriate response, much in the same way that An Unearthly Child should be experienced. The coda, seguing into the more familiar Geraghty-style 8th Doctor wistfully is at once heartbreaking and life-affirming, and as worthy a mission statement as "never cruel or cowardly." .
10/10
29: Bad Blood
5 parts (DWM 338-342) 7th January to 28th April 2004
Writer: Scott Gray Pencils: Martin Geraghty Inks: David A. Roach Issues
The TARDIS materialises in the Dakota Hills in 1875, near a village of Lakota Sioux led by Chief Sitting Bull.
Sitting Bull, who was told of the Doctor’s coming in a vision, informs him that the miners from the town of Lincoln have woken something ancient and evil, and when the Doctor and the Sioux investigate, they find the town deserted apart from the mutilated body of a priest.
General George Armstrong Custer and his men then ride into town, but the impending confrontation between the Sioux and the cavalry is interrupted when they are all attacked by monstrous man-wolf creatures that the Sioux believe to be the legendary windigo.
The Sioux and the cavalry retreat to Saunders Plateau, where an injured soldier transforms into a windigo while his wounds are being treated.
As the windigo approach the survivors, however, a familiar vessel appears overhead and cuts down the attacking creatures with a laser barrage - and the Doctor is thus reunited with Count Jodafra and his niece Destrii.
Sitting Bull convinces the Doctor to accompany him on an astral journey to seek help, and they narrowly escape an encounter with the spirit of the Windigo.
Custer is becoming suspicious of Jodafra’s motives, but he acts too late; as soon as his men have taken the Lakota children into the mines, Jodafra uses a machine to trigger the Windigo transformation in the cavalry. The individual windigo then merge into one giant physical vessel for the evil spirit.
Jodafra made contact with the Windigo after the miners woke it, and offered to grant it corporeality in exchange for its help navigating the time-stream. In order to fuel its new body, however, it needs to eat untainted human flesh - and only now does Destrii realise that her uncle intends to feed the Lakota children to it.
The Doctor calls out to the spark of decency within her, and when her uncle ignores her plea to stop, she shoots the machinery he’s using to support the Windigo’s cry.
Freed, the Lakota shoot flaming arrows into the Windigo’s alcohol-soaked body, destroying it. As they free their children and prepare to bury the mine, trapping the evil spirit forever, the Doctor pursues Jodafra, only to find that he’s beaten his niece nearly to death in a fit of rage and left her dying in the snow.
As Jodafra departs, the Doctor carries the grievously wounded Destrii to the TARDIS...
After a patchy, broken-up and (for me) somewhat unsatisfying run of the Doctor "letting the plates spin on their own", this is a welcome return to the high end for the 8th Doctor strips, a celebrity historical with a legendary monster, a distinctive and previously untapped period and environment, and the surprise reappearance of Destrii and her villainous uncle Jodafra.
With Martin Geraghty back on pencils, rich and characterful colouring from Adrian Salmon and Scott Gray seemingly having rediscovered his mojo, we've got a multi-plotlined story here with strong characterisation for our historical celebrities and a clever mid-point change of gear that sees the story justify its' 5 parts.
Here's a fantastic example of the 8th Doctor strips providing something that probably even now surpasses what the TV show is capable of, not necessarily in characterisation - though that is undeniably a strength here, Gray clearly revelling in the chance to have Destrii ride again - but certainly in world-building, depth and richness of environment and breadth of imagination.
There's also a shock ending that sees the story finish on a segueing cliffhanger that means that the urgency and pace that pulse through this razor sharp take on the 'base under siege' motif of an isolated setting under threat from horrifying monsters never let up. One of the highlights of the era, probably overshadowed by the arcs that preceded it and the finale to come.
8.5/10
30: Sins of the Fathers
3 parts (DWM 343 - 345) 26th May to 21st July 2004
Writer: Scott Gray Artist: John Ross
The Doctor takes the injured Destrii to Hippocrates Base, a hospital space station where she is tended to by Dr Partho of the Kulkan Collective. Once he’s sure Destrii is healing, Partho gives the Doctor a tour of the station, which is regulated by an artificial intelligence named Bob; gravity enhancers regulate the pull of the local star, providing different levels of gravity in different areas of the station.
Unfortunately, Destrii’s nurse turns out to be a mercenary named Lythia, who has killed the real Nurse Walters and taken her place using a holographic disguise.
Lythia creates a distraction by giving Destrii a stimulant and sending her on a psychotic rampage through the arboretum, and while the station’s security guards are dealing with Destrii, Lythia gets into Bob’s computer core and destroys the gravity enhancers and communications system.
The Doctor manages to calm Destrii down, and they investigate the failure of the station’s artificial gravity.
Destrii knocks Lythia out before she can do any more damage, but the station is then attacked by her employers, ape-like Zeronites led by Commander Tollios.
The Zeronites are a genetically engineered kamikaze race created by the Kulkan Empire before they became the peaceful Collective to conduct maintenance in their long-range interstellar missiles and the few survivors have returned to Hippocrates Base, where their species was created, seeking revenge.
Tollios kills Parthos and orders his men to blow up the station, but Destrii uses Lythia’s holographic generator to disguise herself and get close enough to take Tollios hostage.
When it becomes clear that the Zeronites will not listen to reason, the Doctor challenges Tollios to prove his worthiness as a warrior by fighting Destrii one-on-one; if he wins, the Doctor promises not to interfere in the Zeronites’ revenge attempt. Tollios accepts the challenge, but while he and Destrii fight, the Doctor connects the TARDIS to the station’s gravity enhancers and inverts its dimensions, restoring the station’s artificial gravity.
The Doctor takes this lesson to heart, and instead of returning Destrii to Oblivion, he offers to let her travel with him...
Thanks largely to the welcome return of the angular and energetic artwork of John Ross, combined with the great news of Destrii climbing aboard the TARDIS, complete with holographic disguise, this is a story that is somewhat greater than its parts. Maybe the plight of the piratical Xeronites is just too hard to sympathize with due to what a nasty piece of work their leader is, but there's an enjoyable plot for the Doctor to figure out, sci-fi jeopardy aplenty, and a station computer called Bob who's curiously endearing, a Handles of sorts in his dependable loyalty. Added to that the rehabilitation of Destrii, still a gung-ho pop-culture obssessed hothead continues on an exponential upward curve in a way that's both pleasing and believable. It's familiar enough fare without us feeling that we've seen it all before, but it doesn't quite do enough to hide that it's quite a functional entry, with the plot just a framework within which our leads can do some believable bonding. Gray deserves credit for making the Doctor's willingness to see the best in Destrii easy to accept, and her repentance avoid triteness. Not as strong as the stories either side of it, but no slouch on its own terms.
7.5/10
31: The Flood
8 parts (DWM 346-353) 18th August 2004 to 2nd March 2005
Writer: Scott Gray Pencils: Martin Geraghty Inks: David A. Roach
The Doctor and Destrii, using the holographic generator she acquired at Hippocrates Base to appear human, arrive in Camden Market, in London, on Earth, in 2005, where 2 MI6 agents investigate the TARDIS.
The Doctor and Destrii separate, and while the Doctor sets about browsing and examining the stores, Destrii (with her lack of common interaction with humans) sets about offending everyone, including the owner of a Chinese food stall (called Tony), to whom she inadvertently makes a racist comment to a Chinese stall-holder.
Tony loses his temper and goes after her with a knife, and the Doctor and Destrii soon re-unite, just in time for the Doctor to see the vengeful stall owner being rendered unconscious by Destrii.
The two MI6 agents find the TARDIS, and proceed to tell their superior that all is well...
...just as a pair of Cybermen emerge from thin air behind them.
The Doctor, who has noticed that Tony isn’t the only one to be overreacting (several other people in the market seem to be having trouble controlling their emotions) and he invites the recovering Tony and his wife, Linda, out to the "World's End" pub to apologize for the incident. He also realises that he’s being followed, and he and Destrii nab their shadow, an MI6 agent named North who works for Leighton Woodrow.
Before the Doctor can find out what North is doing here, Destrii - who can perceive a wider range of the electromagnetic spectrum than humans - spots two silver figures enter the bar.
She shoots them with North’s taser, shorting out their light refraction shield and revealing to the Doctor that Camden Market has been invaded by the Cybermen...
The Doctor uses his sonic screwdriver to scramble the pursuing Cybermen’s recognition signals, rendering them unable to tell one another apart.
The Cybermen are waiting at the Doctor’s TARDIS, and the Doctor thus contacts Woodrow and asks for help.
Woodrow sends a helicopter to Primrose Hill to evacuate the Doctor and his friends, but the Cybermen pursue them and shoot their van off the road.
The Doctor, Tony and Linda are knocked out in the crash, but North gets the Doctor to the helicopter - and takes off, leaving the others behind. Destrii tries to defend Tony and Linda, but she is eventually overpowered by the Cybermen.
The Cybermen are unable to convert Destrii, as she is not human, but they stun her for later study, and she is unable to prevent the Cybermen from taking Tony and Linda away.
The Doctor is enraged when he awakens at MI6 to learn that his friends were left behind, but he has no choice but to help Woodrow find a way to fight the Cybermen.
However, he fears that these Cybermen, the most advanced he’s ever seen, are time-travellers from the future - and that his arrival will have forced them to advance their schedule.
The Minister of Defense contacts Woodrow and informs him that the country’s nuclear codes have been erased, and the Cybermen’s mothership then materialises above London, causing panic in the streets.
The Cybermen descend upon Camden Market and collect their “test subjects,” while another squad traces the Doctor to MI6.
The Doctor’s attempt to drive them off fails...
...and the Cyber Leader melts away the roof of the building and unleashes a localised rainstorm...
...which drives the humans mad with extreme emotional attacks.
When the rain cuts off, the Cyber Leader offers the humans freedom from their emotions, and, traumatised by the intensity of their experiences, they willingly turn to the Cybermen for conversion.
The Doctor and Destrii are taken aboard the Cybermen’s mothership to meet the Cyber Controller, who confirms the Doctor’s suspicions that the Cybermen have been using the multicultural Cambden Market as a testing ground for a biological agent that affects the emotional centre of the brain, driving the human nervous system into complete emotional collapse.
They have shut down the planet’s nuclear capabilities, and now intend to flood the world, saturating the atmosphere and driving the human race mad enough to accept their offer of conversion.
It’s too late for the Doctor to save the people from MI6 and Camden Market, but to save the rest of the human race, he offers to allow the Cybermen to kill him and observe his subsequent regeneration on condition that they return to their own time.
The cyber-conversion process is still keyed to the human and Mondasian genetic structure, but the data from the Doctor’s regeneration will enable the Cybermen to convert other species into their kind. The Cyber Controller accepts the Doctor’s offer, and prepares to expose him to their ship’s power source - which, as the Doctor had sensed when he boarded, turns out to be a fragment of the Time/Space Vortex.
However, the Controller then reveals that they will test the conversion process on Destrii and subsequently proceed with the conquest of Earth. The Doctor had suspected this, which is why he released Destrii from her handcuffs earlier. While Destrii attacks the Cybermen...
...the Doctor frees himself...
...opens up the window to the Vortex, and leaps through, apparently destroying himself.
But just as the Cybermen are about to kill Destrii, the Doctor rises from the Vortex, imbued with its power; as a Time Lord, he has the ability to tap directly into the power the Cybermen tried to harness for their own ends.
The Doctor initiates a controlled temporal meltdown, and the Cybermen and their ship literally begin to melt away.
Realising that Destrii is trapped aboard the disintegrating ship, the Doctor returns to his corporeal state, giving up the chance of becoming at one with all things in order to save Destrii’s life.
He and Destrii return to the TARDIS and escape as the Cybermen’s ship explodes.
The world has been saved, and the Doctor and Destrii go on together to see what the future holds in store.
If Bad Blood could be a TV episode, The Flood could be a whole series, or a movie, all on its own. Epic not just in length but depth and scale, this is quite possibly the finest Doctor Who comic strip ever made; it's actually one of the finest Doctor Who stories in any medium, and I'm not even convinced we've seen a series finale or Special that can touch it. It's that good. It's easily the peer of The Tides of Time, Voyager, all the epic classics of Doctor Who strips gone by, even dwarfing anything that went before it in what has without doubt been one of the strongest and most consistently brilliant eras for the DWM strip.
The 8th Doctor is as heroic, steely and vital as he's ever been, here as strong as his been-through-the-grinder Glorious Dead self, his Fire and Brimstone battle-ready defender and his take-no-shit avenging self of Uroboros; Destrii is a rounded companion with the bit between her teeth giving us real meat to get our teeth into, from her inadvertant Bonanza-copying racist faux-pas to her grit in the face of overwhelming odds. The MI6 set from the Fallen return (minus Grace, though she appears in the companion cameos at the story's conclusion which reveal that our unseen narrator has been Izzy all along) to great effect, adding the "Doctor fan" character of Emily Rice, a slightly more Liz Shaw-ized version of the Osgood character that first appeared in The Day of the Doctor to their line-up.
Best of all, though, are the Cybermen. Firstly, Gray absolutely nails everything that they are about and delivers what is, for me at least, the best Cybermen story bar none. Yes, even including Spare Parts. If that sounds like high praise, it should. Spare Parts is rightly lionized. This is that bit better. That whole BIG bit better. It's not just the characterisation of the Cybermen that's improved, though, just get a load that design. Very much as intended, this could not be a man in a suit on TV. Could CGI even do this design justice? They're so tall, slender, and yet robust. Not too robotic or Iron Man looking, but exuding power, threat and that wraith-like mummy-feel that typifies all the best elements of Cyber design.
To say that this is a story that delivers plenty of bang for your buck is an understatement and a half, and as a finale to finish off the comic strip era of the 8th Doctor you couldn't ask for more. Sadly it's proving hard to get hold of these days, though I believe there's been a recent glimmer of hope that a reprint may not be as impossible as was once thought. If you don't own this already, and a reprint is announced, treat yourself, pre-order it straight away and then sit by your letter box until it arrives. Even at the time when this was unfolding month by month it was clearly something special, and now that it's ten years since this tale originally began it's plain to see that it's stood the test of time and is every inch the jewel in the glittering crown of the 8th Doctor DWM strips. Indispensable, and some of the finest Doctor Who in any medium ever, an absolute must have.
10/10
TTFN! K.
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