Doctor Who Club of Australia

Greg · Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2005 9:47 pm Post subject: Monsters and Villains

Not quite a novel, but a book put out to coincide with the new series, so I'm including it in this section.

Listed in alphabetical order (in most cases, I'll mention an exception later), the book covers the Doctor's opponente from Autons to Zygons.

There's 13 main entruies, and one of those (the exception) is Platform One: The Visitors, and contains 6 sub-entries on various races and individuals that appeared in The End of the World.

With the obvious exception of the Autons and the Daleks, which span both old and new series, the remainder of the book tends to favour the old series over the new in terms of page count, and this would be true of the Autons and Daleks too.

However, more individual detail goes into the new series entries, which includes some background material for some of the characters by Russell T Davies. (Ever wonder about when Cassandra was a boy? Or the Face of Bo giving birth? The information is here!) The new series material includes more behind-the-scenes information on how the creatures were built and used in the series.

Published at around the same time as the first three new series novels, the book contains no information on any episode after Dalek, so we can probably expect a follow-up volume next year to cover the rest of series 1, the Christmas special, and the first 6 episodes of series 2.

Of interest for the RTD authored material and (if you don't know it already) the old series information. There's some cross-format information, with some brief information on the origin of the Daleks as detailed in the TV21 comic strip and a mention of the Blatheen, as featured in The Monsters Inside.

meglos · Joined: 29 Jun 2005 Posts: 660 Location: Perth

I quite enjoyed this book. Even though it goes over a lot of old ground, the information on the new series monsters is intersesting. There are some good pictures as well which my 4 year old son likes. In fact I just used this book the other night to convince my son that I was'nt a Slitheen. I showed him the pictures of how they were made and put together. So even though it may have taken some of the magic out of it for him, I hope now knows that he I am not going to start unzipping my forehead Smile

Greg · Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2005 11:07 pm Post subject:

So, when will you be scaring the bejeezus out of him by pretending to unzip your forehead, then?

meglos · Joined: 29 Jun 2005 Posts: 660 Location: Perth

It's very tempting Twisted Evil

. I could'nt be so evil could I? Smile

Beatly · Joined: 24 Jul 2005 Posts: 375 Location: London

It's a fine volume, but is lacking on detail somewhat - but I guess that depth wasn't in the remit. RTD's little pieces on the new characters and races are interesting, and it'd be nice if any of that info actually appears on screen - the bit on the Face of Boe suggests pretty heavily that he'll be back, with an important role to play - but I doubt it will, which is a shame.

SharazJek · Joined: 12 Aug 2005 Posts: 892 Location: Hobart, Tasmania

I don't have this book but I dreamt it was in my bookcase today.

Wierd.

TheDalek079 · Joined: 11 Feb 2006 Posts: 3 Location: Gallifrey

I got this book as soon as i saw it. I was slightly disappointed by it but i still think it was a great book that any Who fan should purchase Laughing

montypython · Posted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 2:22 pm Post subject:

It wasn't what I expected, but I did find it quite interesting. I couldn't believe how many Dalek stories there were!