Chapter One; Death of a Supernaturalist The Doctor and his companions are placed in a zoo - but what’s the price of entry? I once played a practical joke on someone using the phrase, “smbdy’s stln ll th vwls!” so I’m no stranger to sentences comprised solely of consonants. Still, there’s a right way and a wrong way to do it. The Collector unfortunately does it the wrong way. The story is written in various different styles, with excerpts from various sources - glimpses into the characters’ minds, Nick’s journal, and a book written about one of the leads, all alongside normal prose. It’s a nice idea to try something like this (even if we get three “The Past” sections in a row - as well as an earlier “The Then” section, which is presumably different?), as there is a much more diverse range of techniques to interest the reader, which should lead to the story being less boring. However, it takes a writer of considerable talent to pull something like this off, making it seem like each piece is assembled as an authentic historical document, each apparently the product of a different mind; and Adam Perks can’t quite pull it off. Make no mistake: despite attempts, he’s no Douglas Adams. The Prologue features the wonderful supposition that if someone unprepared like Nick were to talk telepathically, their thoughts would not be organised enough to say anything of any great sense - hence the lack of vowels. This is fine, and would work wonderfully, but for the choice of words used by Perks. When not using vowels, the longer the word, coupled with the less vowels it contained originally, then the more easily we recognise it from that particular combination of consonants: hence, the better it works. °Y thnk i care?° works. °Wh dd ths?° works. ° I tld y nt t nvt sch dngrs ppl!° doesn’t. It reads like “ I told you not to nivet such dangers, people!” The phrase, °Snds dngrs. Nd cmplctd.° honestly took me about five tries before I realised it wasn’t, “Sands dongers. Need complicated.” Language is a tool of communication, and if we can’t understand what is being said, then what’s the point of writing it? It’s like the written equivalent of The Tomb of the Cybermen Cyber-voices. This awful dialogue is further compounded by the sequences in which we see into the Doctor’s thoughts. Here’s a couple of extracts: “anguish pain anguish pain pain pain hatred fear terror fear paaiiiiiiiiin awake lost nowhere pain can’t find anguish who am i pain paaaaiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin” “lost can’t find look memories anguish pain pain pain pain pain pain pain pain pain pain pain pain pain pain pain pain pain I am the Doctor! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah” Now these sections might be nice to put together, but they’re often horrible to read (sob??) - these things only work if you are a really accomplished author. Anybody can string a load of disconnected words together to achieve confusion (I know, I’ve done it myself in the past!), but they need to be superbly done with something really special to say for these to stand out. Of course, the biggest shame of the Chapter is that much of Perks’ real prose is actually quite good. The sequence in which a supernaturalist contacts the dark and cavernous spirit world is bloody great: genuinely scary and gorgeously written, the image of a gaping mouth sinking its needle-like teeth into her mind is terrifying. It’s easily the best sequence so far seen in this season of stories - so why not try to do the insights into the Doctor’s mind like this, with the kind of proper writing you show here instead of the jumbled mess of the truly awful cliffhanger we end on? One of my favourite pieces concerns an excerpt from Oolon Colluphid’s biography of “Nick McShane” (and just why do books get published about Nick…?), which sounds exactly like I’d imagined Oolon Colluphid’s work to sound, given my long-held love of "The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy", and, erm... "Destiny of the Daleks" - especially this bit: “But even then - it is a little unlikely, isn’t it? Go on, you know it is really.” How great is that? So chatty and informal, reminding me strangely of Kenneth Williams doing his “snide” voice; yet pure Douglas Adams. In fact the Doctor himself seems to be influenced by a Douglas Adams inspired Season Seventeen Tom Baker, in particular the lines, “The Doctor was a bit annoyed at the irritating thing trying to spoil his death scene,” and “Gasping in shock was the natural thing to do. He sat in front of the mirror sometimes, and practised particularly shocked expressions to use for the next time it became appropriate.” I’m sure a section of the biography contains a continuity error, though. It is suggested that this was only the second story that Nick gave an individual title to in his journal after “his last little misadventure,” The Mirror and the Pomegranate - implying that there were many stories before that that he hadn’t titled. But didn’t Nick only start writing his journal in that last adventure? The Collector is a like a box of chocolates that’s been watching "Dimensions in Time" too much. You’ve got your Strawberry Cremes and Caramel Kegs in the form of the lovely prose on offer and the interesting ideas, but they’re tempered by the coffee-flavoured dark chocolates that nobody likes - some dire writing and bad execution, the plot being reminiscent of the Rani’s plan in the above-mentioned 30th anniversary special. How can something so well written be so badly written? Confusing. Chapter Two; Think For A Minute! The visitors gather... The idea of a Space Zoo (great name!) collecting the last survivors of various races has probably been done before. A menagerie of aliens collected for some new purpose appeared in Doctor Who most famously in "Carnival of Monsters", although the Rani did something similar in "Dimensions In Time". Where this story differs is in the telling of it. This Chapter is composed of many sections of different “historical” documents, which combine to form the overall story. When writing like this, it’s probably possible to hoodwink the reader with the (quite valid) technique of style over substance, hiding the meat of the story behind tricks and wordplay. Adam Perks takes full advantage of this. It’s quite noticeable when reading that the best sections are those written as normal prose, for Perks’ prose is often a wonder to read. The excerpts from film scripts and diaries serve to bring a touch of variety into the piece, and they work very nicely in this respect; reflecting the idea of a menagerie of races in the story, the text is composed of a menagerie of styles. They are also useful as ways of expositing useful information about the races travelling to the zoo, without it being as obvious that that is their sole purpose (apart from adding some diversity, of course). In particular, the section describing the liquid creature is done this way, and done well - the idea of the creature deciding to travel light (i.e. in a hip flask!) is hilarious! Perks clearly has some fun when writing - the image of Doug the black-tie Crocodileman will stay with me forever, and I can’t read the name “Dr Nick” without seeing "The Simpsons’" ineffectual physician in the role (“Hi, everybody!”). One section is most definitely written about the 1996 Paul McGann Doctor Who film - it describes a similar film based upon a television series (albeit a television series from Mark Gatiss’ "Nightshade" novel) which was based too closely upon continuity from the original, and which featured “pointless revelations” about the lead character. Half-human anyone? And this is one of the complaints about the chapter: a lack of focus. It tends to stray from the point occasionally, and it is not always clear how events are connected with those at the zoo. Now these could set up a sense of mystery, to be explained in later chapters, but I wonder if they are not just the author writing to wherever he is taken. This is also evidenced by the continuous use of the word “Interlude” (five times). Interludes from what, exactly? The plot? If they’re part of the story, narrow their focus and let us see how they connect. If they’re not part of the story, and are not there to add new information about the events, then why include them? This episode is another that centres heavily on Nick. He’s a favourite of the writers, it seems, as the Doctor and Alf barely appear. Still, we do see that Nick is worried that the three are beginning to move their separate ways, and their absence highlights this. Alf’s torture at Nicholas’ hands still casts a shadow over Nick, and something very nasty seems to happen to the Doctor (although I’m not sure what). Nick’s diaries prove to be one of the most interesting examples of Perks’ use of excerpts, although in this particular case, they come across as being much more akin to spoken records than written ones. I’m not sure whether that’s what was intended, but I certainly had the impression after his meeting with Oscar Wilde in the previous story that his journals were to be written things. “I… shit, why am I so crap at this, I… love her. Alf. Shit shit shit!” can only be a spoken journal transcribed - fortunately the author is effective at capturing that desperate dialogue; Nick being so much in love with Alf. There appears to be some setting up of future events in this story, as the lady in the Victorian dress (another lovely image) notes that something “truly terrible” is going to happen to the Doctor. That has been one of the successes of Doctor Who: 3a, the way in which the much wider story of the season can take place alongside the much narrower story at hand. It’s almost always handled well, and it doesn’t feel out of place whatsoever. Another interesting take on Doctor Who, then; different to previous stories, and better than the last chapter because we can begin to see what is going on. Perks’ variation on prose works much better this time around, with thankfully little of the telepathic speech that so blighted Chapter One. Some lovely insights into differing writing styles. More like this please. Colourful. Chapter Three; Runaway Brains And once again, Nick gets legless. Well, I know it’s an old complaint of mine, but it really seems when reading these stories that the authors have little interest in writing about the Doctor. Now I can understand people wanting to play with their own creations, but when I read ­Doctor Who fiction, I am reading it because of Doctor Who, not because of his companions or some monsters or a jellyfish that’s telepathic (although they’re important too). It’s a shame then that the 3a authors don’t seem to recognise this. It’s like what Paul Cornell or Gareth Roberts or whoever said about "Casualty" - you have all these people having accidents every week, yet all the time you’re watching their family having an argument, you’re really aching to get back to the hospital to see how the regular characters are interacting. That’s what you’re interested in. The series is called Doctor Who, not "Dr Nick". In fact, much of the Chapter focuses on Alf’s hunting mission. I’m not sure when she actually turned into a cold-blooded killer, but we see here that she has, and we see it in every detail. Each movement of Alf, each function of her combat suit, each weapon she fires gets an explanation, and it feels for a moment we’ve wandered into "Predator" or "Die Hard" or something. I know I’ve made comparisons to "Die Hard" before in this season, but it seems the standard for the amount of (often pointless) violence we witness. Still, it’s all a convincing, if rather lengthy, study into how Alf’s suit protects her from absolutely anything; and anyway, I realised it was still Doctor Who when she escaped up a ventilation shaft. When I reviewed the first story of this season, I suggested that Episode Three is the most difficult to write, and that in that particular story, Kuang-Shi, a measure of fatigue had seemed to set into the prose. There’s an element of that here I think, as we lose the various “collection of historical documents” style: but that at least means we get more of Perks’ lovely prose, which I did ask for. There’s definitely a small amount of lazy writing on show - when Alf’s hand is held away from her, it is revealed that: “because of the nature of the plan, she needed to activate the procedure manually,” despite the fact that her combat suit has been telepathic thus far. The worst is definitely when the Crocodilemen encounter a Tyrannosaurus Rex - a creature they are specifically stated as not recognising - yet when one of them is picked up by its tremendously powerful jaws, he not only survives, but knows exactly which muscle inside the creature’s jaw to pull out to enable him to escape. Now, though he was strong enough to survive being crushed between the razor sharp teeth of a dinosaur, when he bloodily walks up to Alf she throws his mate’s jaw at him and, “the carefully placed impact shattered his neck.” I won’t dare to tell you what my notes say at this point, but suffice to say they contain a swear word. And of course, we get another evil since the dawn of time (yes, a whole one story since the last one!); it’s a shame, as an author of this calibre should be able to come up with something less clichéd - I wonder if Perks actually considered an alternative to the phrase “dawn of time”, or was it just the obvious thing to put? Even so, suspicions on the identity of the evil abound; but please don’t let this be the third story in a row with an unoriginal villain. Whatever happened to mad scientists? Some wonderful ideas are hidden away amongst the meandering prose - I’ll confess, I haven’t got a clue what’s going on with half of the story, as much of it seems to be composed of set pieces, with a medley of alien races who have little bearing on each other - but I know a good idea when I spot one. The suggestion that the Doctor’s mind could be stored in the Collector’s (and later Nick’s) brain is intriguing, for when at least one is telepathic, how would they communicate? I love the sequence in which the Collector talks to the Doctor in their brain, and the Doctor realises it isn’t real because the leather sofa doesn’t squeak when he moves. The shapeshifting bounty hunter is fantastic (despite having very little to do): I don’t know why no-one’s thought of something like that sooner (or maybe they have?); but the best thing is definitely the villain - just floating around doing nasty things. Marvellous. Nevertheless, with spiders, canines, crocodiles, jellyfish, dinosaurs, Time Lords, humans, shapeshifters and evils since the dawn of time, there’s just far, far too much going on. And yes, I know it’s a zoo. Chapter Four; More than Words In which the Doctor changes his mind. There’s a wonderful moment in Chapter Four of this story in which Alf and Nick have some sort of memory exchange thing going on: she feels everything that happened to him when she nearly shot him, and he feels everything that happened to her when his alternate self tortured her. It’s beautifully written, perfectly showing the lack of coherent thought in Nick’s mind; using long, twisting sentences to emulate his senseless mind, passions running high; and it becomes quite clear, if it wasn’t before, just how much these two characters are in love with each other. That they’re now equals again hopefully heralds some reconciliation amongst the travellers, which will be a welcome change, given recent events. Some reviewers have claimed the Alf we have been treated to in this story is the Ace from the New Adventures (as Nick says, “she was too much the soldier all of a sudden”). It’s an understandable idea, and given that Ace’s angst and woe was the most interesting aspect of that character, it’s unsurprising that it should be recreated here. Still, I think the New Adventures covered that trait as much as anyone could, and it seems a little passé. Nevertheless, a companion willing to sacrifice the Doctor for the cause is a highly appealing one - for then they become more than just “companions”: they become characters. One gets the feeling that, despite his wisdom and experience, the Doctor doesn’t lead this group; and that Alf is one of the Doctor’s experiments gone wrong, in that she cares more about herself than the Doctor: but is that necessarily a bad thing? We get some more of Perks’ top quality writing in this chapter. Given that the story is set in a zoo, there’s obviously a lot going on with the different species, and the sequences in the first half of the Chapter comprised of many short paragraphs really give the impression of a busy place that’s quite quickly falling apart, leaving me wanting more. Sections of it reminded me of "Jurassic Park", and the way in which the dinosaur zoo in that film degenerated into chaos. Unfortunately, there’s a lack of explanations, in what should be the explanation-driven final episode (the Collector remarks, “he had no idea what the spiders were,” which describes the feeling exactly). We get no real hint to the identity of the creature (the evil “creature”, not the shape-shifting “creature”), beyond it being the nameless embodiment of death that has ravaged planets. Since it is killed at the end of the story, it is unlikely to return (unless it’s pulled off the Doctor’s trick of destroying only a copy of its mind!), so we are left wondering who it is. Now, I was going to complain about this, but as I’ve just realised, does it actually matter who it is? Granted, its motives seem a little unclear, and perhaps if it was a returning villain we would know a bit more about what it hopes to achieve, but if it is meant to be a completely new enemy, then what does it matter if we know its name or not? What does that actually tell us? Even so, a little more information about the creature may have made the threat seem closer to home, and I truly am glad if it’s not another returning evil - this season feels at times like Big Finish’s over-extravagant plans for the fortieth anniversary! I mentioned the Doctor up there, which is coincidentally what he gets in this story - a mention. No, he does appear really, but not very much. I’m not sure whether authors find it difficult to duplicate the Doctor’s general eccentricity and heroism on paper, but we don’t see enough of him. He may pop up at the end with an ingenious plan to destroy the creature, but there’s a sense that he’s not really necessary. I’ve been watching American vampire series "Angel" lately, and I’ve noticed something similar. In mid-Season Two of that programme, the undead detective fires his staff. Now, the writers clearly want to follow the adventures of his staff, as they are by far the more interesting characters when compared to a miserable, sulking vampire. But the programme’s called "Angel", so after an entire episode in which Cordelia, Wesley and Gunn argue with some demons, Angel will turn up (after about three previous, entirely unconnected, scenes scattered throughout the episode) and kill some baddies - and this is the best way I can make my point. They could get rid of Angel and still have a programme, but Angel’s the name of the programme, so they must pander to the networks, and include him in every episode. Our series is called Doctor Who, so Doctor Who must be included. Can you imagine pulling a "Blakes’ 7" with the Doctor (although the New Adventures did it!)? So if you don’t like the Doctor you’ve got, more than any other character in history, you have the ability to change him. But please, not for the purposes of a pointless shock cliffhanger. Overall Perks writes very well: I don’t think that’s in doubt, as my fellow reviewers seem to agree. He has some fantastically mad ideas. He likes mucking about with languages, something I wholeheartedly approve of when done well (I hate all the rules surrounding languages - language after all is merely a tool of communication, so if you can say what you want to say by breaking a certain subject-verb agreement clause or whatever, then go for it). Next time, though, I’d like to see some more planning to his work. There’s just too much going on, and too little explanation for any of it. The sections in the earlier chapters taken from lots of different historical texts are nice, but they stop so suddenly it isn’t always clear what their purpose is. And like The Mirror and the Pomegranate before it, this story seems to be written (or designed to be read) chapter by chapter, each separately: which is a technique I like very much, and is a good note for future authors - take advantage of the four chapter format, and make each one different: a story of it’s own, yet part of the wider tale. Bizarre.