Chapter One; Man Out Of Time The Doctor’s spaceship has crashed on an asteroid. But why is the symbol of the Doctor’s people hanging on the wall? Well, now. I’ve been complaining for weeks that the Doctor is not himself. Now I could be clever and pretend I knew what was going to happen (or rather, what had happened), but I won’t, because that would be a lie, and my Mother taught me not to lie (or did she?). I am sure of one thing, though: Andie Frankham’s a swine! He had it planned all along! This is another of what Americans might call an “arc” Episode, after two largely stand-alone stories, and it’s fine for it. Frankham again experiments with structure, eschewing a straightforward A to B to C narrative, instead choosing to show the events of the crash in pieces, as the three survivors wake up. Seeing the collision from each of their perspectives individually as they remember what happened makes a lovely contrast with the scenes of their revival, explaining how they received their particular injuries. The best part of this story is the Prologue, and it’s the best Prologue of the Season thus far. The idea that the Doctor might choose to regenerate himself just to make him able to get up and help his friends perfectly nails this character as the Doctor we fell in love with better than any other moment so far: ironically, considering developments later in the Chapter. The absolutely splendid opening is finished off perfectly with the last line, which grabs any fan of Doctor Who with a knowing sense of terror - what must it be like if our hero can’t do the one thing he is unique among literature for? It is excellent playing upon (excuse the pun) fan fictions, mucking about with things only we know and would understand. Frankham does it again in the scene in which (gasp!) the Doctor dies, consumed in a ball of flame. He’s toying with us! I told you he was a swine! There is a note scribbled by my magic pencil that says, “What’s going on?” which shows how effective the author’s techniques are. They really had me questioning what I was reading, proving how much I was drawn into the text. I admit, it’s perhaps simpler to ensnare a fan in your story when you’re writing about regeneration than it is when you’re writing about weird space meerkats from Wongabong or whatever, but it’s still all done magnificently, and when it all falls into place, you’ll cry like a baby as you realise what’s been happening in this and previous stories. It’s even more impressive when you consider that this Chapter has no plot whatsoever besides the spacecraft crash (and even that only happens in flashback). The whole Chapter is written as one massive character piece, with merely a hint of what’s to come with the aliens (although I am worrying if the entire text has been written to resolve a small piece of design discontinuity from a 1970s television adventure). Nick and Alf come out of it well, as usual - there’s plenty of evidence that they still love each other, which was perhaps in doubt after recent events (I love the bit of Alf just looking at his hair) - and the writing is of a uniformly high standard. Even the idea of the clone is re-introduced seamlessly, without coming across as clumsy expositional set-up for the climax - it’s just written as the Doctor trying to come to terms with the vision he’s just had. I thought that Frankham was perhaps having trouble writing for the Doctor when he had him quoting something Nick would have said, which sounded at first like the author struggling to come up with something that the Doctor would actually have said in that situation. However, it’s only a minor thing; and I could be wrong, but I seem to recall the Doctor doing something similar in Kuang-Shi, by the same author, so I’ll let it go as characterisation. I still think Frankham writes for “his” Doctor better than almost anyone. It’s possibly a shame that Frankham watched so much latter-day "Star Trek" before authoring these stories, though. Food replicator? I can almost see the fake cave set that that programme has used for so many away missions in the last ten years. Hmm, perhaps that means I’ve watched too much "Star Trek"? There’s also a worry over excessive use of continuity (even down to Abydos, a planet mentioned once in "The Leisure Hive" back in 1980!), but I think Frankham has got it about right so far. I do know one thing for certain: I’m dying to skip forward to read the next chapter to find out what happens: but I must resist my urge to break the rule I set myself not to read them in advance of my next review. I’m definitely looking forward to next Saturday, though! Frankham’s writing gets better. The best story of the Season. Chapter Two; Breathless More surprises… Ruins of Self 1 has little plot in itself; rather it is the culmination of background themes running over the past year or so. As such, much of the chapter is formed by exposition explaining what has been going on in recent stories. Now, this all had to come out at some point, but perhaps saving it all up for one story takes away some of the need to come up with new ideas - it’s difficult to fit them in alongside all of the stuff that needs to be dealt with first. At times it feels like "The Five Doctors" or "Planet of Fire", in that there’s about forty-two elements that have to be included in the story, as well as the actual story. However, whereas those adventures included many physical elements to be covered (e.g. the Master, farewell to old companion, welcome of new companion, Lanzarote, final use of dodgy Kamelion prop), Andie Frankham’s adventure has many bases to hit in the plot itself. The way Frankham goes about writing these events are as a series of surprises. No sooner are we treated to the revelation of what planet we are on than we are told what has been wrong with the Doctor for months; no sooner is the identity of the Figure revealed than we are told that we were wrong about the planet. Some of these are excellently done - I love the concept of the Figure: it’s a wonderful idea to have the living embodiment of such an abstract notion, and it’ll be a shame if we don’t see much more of him, as I suspect we won’t. Others are less impressive - the shock of Voga’s true nature seems the stuff of second-rate fanboy writing than the intelligent professionalism that Frankham usually displays. Overall though, there’s a sense that there’s too many surprises for one story - we recover from one shocking twist only to discover another is hitting us in the face, and thus it is difficult to fully appreciate what’s being said. Where’s the surprise in declaring a surprise announcement after four other surprise announcements? It’s a shame the breathless enthusiasm couldn’t have been spread throughout the season a bit more equally. Elsewhere, Nick and Alf get a few scenes as they try to escape from the Vogans. These action sequences serve as a useful counterbalance to the events of the main plotline, and are a welcome relief from the continuity overload therein. One thing this author seems adept at is balancing his main threads, one being action and character-based, the other plot driven, given a feeling of overall satisfaction: none of the three being neglected. At last Alf starts to wonder why she is killing things all the time - as she says, “she did not like what she had become:” a “tough-nut bitch”! This is one of the finest sections of the episode, as Alf thinks over why she has become like she is, at the same time realising just how in love she is. Frankham delves into the hidden insecurities we all have, Alf suggesting that maybe Nick doesn’t want her any more: you’ve all been there, only this instance happens to be because Alf is a serial murderer, which I hope you’re not. We are again treated to one of the best interpretations of the Doctor: the man about to die who creates a clone of himself to continue the fight. That the Doctor would not worry about his own death to ensure the universe was in good hands is exactly the faithful act we would expect from the character. I do, however, have a problem with the clone of the Doctor. He becomes depressive when he learns the truth of who he actually is; yet surely he is still composed from the Doctor himself, so to some extent he is the Doctor. I understand clones are meant to be identical to the original on a congenital level, environmental factors being the only differentiation: the old nature versus nurture debate. For this Doctor to be so different to the original that he would get depressed at his very existence, Frankham must be suggesting that the Doctor’s traits of caring for others above himself are something he has specifically learnt, rather than being natural instincts: something I hadn’t believed about the character. I’d always taken him as being good to the core, not just consciously trying to be good. Still, why a clone of the Doctor could be so different from the original is something that could be elaborated on in future; and at least it allows us to be treated to the gorgeous phrase, “a shadow of the man he was supposed to be.” Frankham fills the story with his usual horrific images that I’m never sure are meant to be jokes or not; this time of a deteriorating Doctor who punches his fist into the wall only for it to splat into a soggy mess - which if nothing else brings home the fact that the Doctor is in real danger. The chapter is a bit too sensationalist following the previous episode - like reading the Daily Star after The Times (not that I read the Star, I should add! (or The Times either for that matter…)). Still, there’s plenty for long-term readers, and it’s by no means a bad episode. Just stay away from the dodgy fanboy continuity, and you have a wonderful chapter. In fact, that might be some advice to the author - don’t worry excessively about "Attack of the Cybermen"-style overuse of familiar concepts, even occasionally. It gives the impression of clumsy writing. And I’ve a feeling I once said something similar for Kuang-Shi. Dependent. Chapter Three; Ray of Light A restoration comedy? Continuing with its rather striking premise that the Doctor is dead, Ruins of Self maintains its focus on the clone of the Doctor that is falling to pieces. As such, it sets us thinking about what can be in store for the future of this series: for with one Doctor dead and another forgotten and dying, what possible direction can we travel in now? It’s a little unfortunate that in killing the Doctor, our hero, off, Andie Frankham was forced to do it in such a low-key manner that we only hear about it half a year later, when it has lost some of its impact. It is a necessity of the story, but perhaps the death of such a character as the Doctor should be more significant or touching (one of the few things that BBCi’s "Death Comes To Time" broadcast earlier this year got right). Still, the Doctor must be indispensable - he was always more of an idea than a character, and if you have someone who is as intelligent and witty and charismatic and wonderful as the Doctor who first got us interested all those years ago, what does it matter if he didn’t used to look like Jon Pertwee? The degeneration of the clone is handled flawlessly in this chapter, though, making up for any fears of redundancy. Since the Doctor is dead, this is all that is left of him, so to all intents and purposes, the clone ­is the Doctor. His physical deterioration is horrific: the skin melting off his face, bone showing through; his body returning to raw matter. His mental descent is even better, as his memory begins to fade: he forgets who he is, who the figure is, even the most basic details of what makes him him, as evidenced from the opening line of the Chapter. We get to the point where he becomes almost as a child, giving us the finest line in the entire story: “It’s pretty.” In an instant, we understand just how bad things have become with only those two perfect little words. There’s a certain sense of Frankham having a bit of fun with reader expectations at times, most notably in the cliffhanger resolution. What read last week as a hugely grandiose and important statement that would have repercussions for the future (“He spread his arms wide, attempting to take in everything around him. ‘This is the heart of the Capitol. This planet on which we stand is the remains of Gallifrey itself.’ ”) is defused this week with the fantastic response, “Where?” It sounds like something Joss Whedon would do on "Buffy" - in fact I think he did once, with Spike being zapped during a big speech. Frankham must have been watching too many episodes of that American series, as he pulls the same trick again later, when the Figure announces grandly, “Behold, the Matrix!” and the Doctor replies “The What?” Well, it made me laugh. Nick and Alf seem to have become little more than two characters that are in love at this point. Granted, some would say that when you are in love that’s all you think about, but it feels at times that they are solely defined as people by the fact that they do love each other, such continual reference is made to it - Nick (rightly) standing in front of Alf when a gun is aimed at her, for instance. Perhaps in future some other character traits could be sketched to affix the lovers in our minds? The ending of the story displays one unfortunate aspect of the adventure - there’s no actual adventure. There’s no enemy to defeat, no injustice to overcome, no death to avoid. As soon as the three companions have made it back together, they just leave, without any further word from the supporting characters. There are really only a few chase sequences offset from the expositional dialogue to form a plot. I think it was Terry Nation who always used to prevent the travellers from using the TARDIS by having a fluid link break or a rock fall cover the door, thus ensuring the Doctor couldn’t leave until he had had an adventure. There’s none of that here, as the plot is basically: “come here, so we can go.” Still, a nice chapter, with some hints for the future (I want to know what it was that was “calling” Nick to the onyx temple, and if the Outpost Gallifreyans are tracking the restored TARDIS, as the Figure said they would). There’s an odd bit more dodgy editing than usual, the worst offender being the sentence, “The clone was pealing skin of its face.” There’s only actually two words wrong, but it’s a bugger to read, because I’m not sure whether it was meant to be “The clone was peeling the skin of its face” or “The clone was peeling skin from its face.” It’s a pity, as it’s such an unsettling image. Oh, and would the Vogans assume their Gods had returned because one of them saw one man in a certain style of dress? It could’ve been a Hallowe’en costume or something. Although, no, then they’d’ve come as Cybermen. Right, I’m not going to do an Overall bit: I shall save that until the whole seven-parter’s finished. For now, I’ll just say that Frankham’s prose is as readable as ever, if nothing particularly special this time round; and I’m dying to find out what happens next. And the TARDIS is back! Foundational.