Confetti On The Floor

I've missed bin day because of the interrupted routine of these cold, grey days between one year's end and the next. I got back from Glasgow on Sunday, before trains were packed or cancelled ( more about that next time) and I've been housebound since then- barring a ten-mile walk to Lossie and back, yesterday. Not bad for an auld basturt.

I'm not really enthusiastic about Hogmanay: the first highlight of 2019 for me was the first Doctor Who festive special to skip Xmas Day for thirteen years. Resolution,  the 851st episode of Doctor Who, wasn't  the first episode to be broadcast on Ne'er Day, of course; Day of the Daleks, in 1972, beat Chibnall's team to it. The secret appearance of the Outer Space Robot People this year had been leaked in the BBC's final trailer with a croaked" Ex-ter-min-aaaate"! in the closing seconds, as if to reassure the audience.


There was no title sequence, this time. Instead, a globe- spanning prelude evoking the barbaric Game of Thrones (or so I imagine) preceded a South Yorkshire-based scenario that resembled much of ordinary tv drama. The awkward flirtation of Lin and Mitch reminded me of the human interest of Chris Claremont's sketched-out victims in his X-Men comics. This familiar ,mundane tone was effective counterpoint to the methodical actions of the predatory evil mutant. Unfortunately, all the police activity would have been an ideal opportunity for Yaz,  to carry the story. I'm frustrated by the lack of development for the the most underused member of #TeamTardis.


This episode of course was very, very reminiscent of the seminal Eccleston story, Dalek. But that was nearly fourteen years ago, the distance between Peter Davison's last season and Jon Pertwee's first. Resolution had a family focus which was the great strength of last season. The corny Xmas Day joke about families having to talk to each other when the wifi went down was redeemed by the witty blow struck to UNIT by BREXIT.


While the long café scene with Ryan and his dad slowed the story down ( indeed, the whole episode had an amateurish stop-start pace, which is one of the ways Chibnall's work lets us down.), it resolved one of the dangling plot threads. I was relieved neither Ryan nor Aaron were lost in a black hole at the end: Ordinary tv drama might do that.

 More importantly, Jodie's vulnerable and fallible Doctor is not the thief and madman of Moffat's devising, which is important. Here, the Doctor was gifted with more grit and gravitas facing her oldest enemy, even if its Sheffield steel casing was a little comical.


So, the Thirteenth Doctor seems firmly established in the public consciousness. This year's Official Annual seemed a little nervous with its fan service: comic strip and text feature cameos for all the previous Doctors and many of their "best friends" ( the term "Companions" having been retired for the moment). I was also amused to see my favourite member of #TeamTardis, my contemporary Graham in a Union Jack topper and making jokes about Red Star Belgrade ( a Billy Bragg gag?)

Back in November, Jodie's Doctor was also  launched in a Titan Comics title. In the last year, I had moved to trade-waiting with these books. They're often gorgeously drawn but stories can be thin and bland. Scott Gray's strip in Doctor Who Magazine is much better-written.

The Thirteenth Doctor also appears in The Secret in Vault Thirteen. I read a fair bit of YA for work; I know of David Solomons' books but despite the huge popularity of Wimpy Kid in my classroom, I haven't really read much of that kind of kidlit. But this Doctor seems to lend herself to a more cartoony portrayal and this book, while it's a simple quest for a "Genesis Seed", is full of DW in-jokes: the icy planet Calufrax, a bearded villain named Mr. Delgado and a chapter entitled "Unearthly Child's Play"(3/5 Talmars).

On my way to Glasgow last week, I listened to Terry Nation's Dalek Audio Annual.  I wished for this almost a year ago  http://somefantasticplace-dougie.blogspot.com/2018/01/atoms-infinite.html




It's a series of readings of stories -"battlefield reportage"- and fact files from World Distributors hardback annuals, published between 1975 and 1978 in the wake of the nightmarish and influential Genesis of the Daleks. We're treated to an exploration of the Dark Side of Skaro and the specifications of the android Mark Seven ( who also appears in Terry Nation's US pilot for a Daleks series, The Destroyers.

I never read any of these annuals in the 70s; I don't know why- probably economy on my parents' part. They were very generous with what they had, in any case. But I enjoyed this disc and the readings by Louise Jameson, Matthew Waterhouse and Nicholas Briggs.
 Nation's penchant for reusing plots and devices from his own stories is strongly in evidence, however,"Timechase" is essentially a retelling of The Chase, with two young boys replacing the Tardis crew. The final story, "Report from an Unknown Planet", is a retread of Mission to the Unknown's tape recording McGuffin. It's a doomy thing about an explorer's unwitting revival of a Dalek army ( like the one in Planet of the Daleks) and it ends on the same foreboding note as the aforementioned Destroyers. Like Resolution, the audio annual depicts the Daleks as an implacable enemy in a way that only Moffat's Asylum of the Daleks managed. (5/5 Talmars)


There's a lot of Who audio from Big Finish and the BBC coming this year. But, in the next few days, before term re-commences, I'll be reading about Wonder Man and the Beast, Thanos and Mike Grell's Starslayer. Some or all of that might be reviewed this month. I have to give some serious thought to my 400th post...


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