WHO REVIEW ROUND-UP: The Wintertime Paradox

 

This an overdue review, given that this book came out in 2020 in the Christmas lead-up and I finally got it for Christmas '21, yet only now in March am I finding the time to sit down and review it. Which is negligent, because once I got this collection I read in a couple of days.

We've had plenty of Doctor Who short story collections over the years, many of which had overarching themes, from the most restrictive to the loose and nominal. The Wintertime Paradox stands out because not only is there a general theme – Christmas, that well-worn favourite – but all the stories are by a single author. Unless I've missed something along the way, I think this is the first time Doctor Who have done such a thing, although Jenny Colgan received a collected set of her stories and novellas around the same time.

Dave Rudden brings a new and interesting style to Doctor Who, presenting stories which cover various genres and subjects but still recognisably of one voice. His stories are easy to read and often very funny, but pack a punch as well. This isn't a feel-good book, in spite of the Christmassy theme; Rudden clearly gets that Christmas cheer works best alongside the bittersweet and spooky parts of that time of year. What's exciting as a Wilderness Era fan is the secondary theme that runs through much of the collection: the paradox of the title.

Rudden clearly got caught up in Doctor Who in the same period I did, and is one of the few writers to call back to the Eighth Doctor Adventures era of BBC Books that was one of the main ranges of Doctor Who between 1997 and 2005. Unlike the 90s New Adventures by Virgin, the EDAs haven't had much influence on contemporary Who, excepting the pretty major impact of a devastating Time War that saw the Doctor destroy Gallifrey to protect the universe at large. I much prefer the attitude that the War in Heaven seen in the EDAs and the Last Great Time War that preceded the modern series were different iterations of the same catastrophic event.

Rudden runs with this, presenting a post-War universe that is still reeling from the many interventions and revisions perpetrated by the Doctor and other belligerents in the War. As such, this is the first time in decades that official Doctor Who has called back to the War in Heaven, and specifically to Faction Paradox, the renegade cultists who were so important to the EDAs but seemingly didn't survive beyond that era (excepting fascinating work by Obverse Books). For most of the collection there are little hints and cameos by two surviving Faction agents, disconnected from their history during the Doctor's latest destruction/removal of Gallifrey, and they don't actually get a story to themselves until the twelfth story, “The Paradox Moon,” where they finally come face-to-face with the Thirteenth Doctor.

However, the Faction's influence is felt throughout the collection. They work in the shadows, as it should be. The gorgeous “Visiting Hours” focuses on Rory coming to see River at the Stormcage prison, bringing with him a plated-up Christmas dinner. It's absolutely lovely and tugs at the heartstrings even as a chaotic prison-break featuring powerful alien criminals goes on around them. And of course the Faction are there in the postscript – River is the most obvious target for them ever, both in herself and as a route to the Doctor.

Many of the stories work by sketching in the ongoing events around, under and behind the stories we're familiar with. “Father of the Daleks” proposes the odd but somehow entirely believable revelation that the Doctor meets with Davros every Christmas for a neutral parlay, as they both try to convince the other to see things from their point-of-view. It hammers home just how frighteningly similar the two ancient characters are, and works as a bridge to “The Magician's Apprentice” (as well as giving us an Eleven/Davros story, a pairing that works remarkably well). “A Day to Yourselves” is just brilliant, seeing the Ninth Doctor, just before the events of “Rose,” continually intervening in major galactic events only to find one of his later selves has got their first. It's a funny but affecting story of the Doctor working to heal themself by involving themself in their own past when they were most vulnerable.

Other stories don't feature the Doctor at all but focus on supporting characters. “A Perfect Christmas” is an adventure for the Paternoster Gang, but one that ties into the machinations of the Papal Mainframe seen in “The Time of the Doctor,” itself a deeply Paradoxical organisation. “For the Girl Who Has Everything” is a spot-on stoory for Osgood, leading up to her involvement in The Day of the Doctor but also managing to provide a well-reasoned follow-up to “The Sontaran Stratagem.” “Missing Habitas Frond” is an adventure for Missy, who is clearly just a joy to write for every author who gets to play with her.

While it's heavily focused on the BBC Wales series, classic era Doctors do get involved. “A Girl Called Doubt” features the Fifth Doctor, but mostly focuses on the experiences of one soldier in the Cyber Wars, and has a gut-punch reveal. “We Will Feed You to the Trees” is as effective a Seventh Doctor story as I've read in a while, seeing him not pulling the strings like a master schemer but heading somewhere to investigate a mystery and not stopping until he's left things better than he found them. It features a fascinating central sci-fi concept too, the sort of thing Doctor Who doesn't do enough of these days.

“Christmas With the Plasmavores” barely features the Doctor, instead being a standalone horror story that presents a clever new take on the monstrous race from “Smith and Jones.” “He's Behind You” and “Inflicting Christmas” are solid adventures for Ten and Rose, and Twelve and Bill respectively, but don't sing like the others in the collection. Even so, they're well-written, entertaining adventures, better than an awful lot of what gets published in the range lately.

Suitably paradoxically, the collection advertises itself as containing twelve stories, but the reprint version actually includes thirteen. “Canaries,” a previously released e-story that ties into the now defunct Time Lord Victorious event (remember when that seemed to be a big deal?) Primarily, though, it's a further exploration of the Faction's involvement in the Doctor's life and the endless array of discontinuities that have built up through constant time travel. It works far better here than as part of the TLV crossover, and, rather appropriately, isn't exactly the same version that was previously released. Stories, like time, can be rewritten, over and over again...

WHO REVIEW ROUND-UP: Echoes of Extinction (Time Lord Victorious)

 Ah, I was excited for this one. Originally intended for a two-sided vinyl release in November, it was pushed back due to COVID so that at least the shops could be open when the record went out. Having a Doctor Who LP sounds appealing, but since I'd have no way to play the thing I got the traditional download. The idea of Paul McGann and David Tennant meeting sharing an adventure was too tempting to pass up. Then it became clear that they would be experiencing separate but linked adventures, which seemed a missed opportunity, but then we've had a lot of multi-Doctor stories lately so I reasoned it was a different way of approaching it. Still, it seems a bit of a swiz that the two Doctors don't meet at all.

Still, let's rate the story on its merits, not its fannish concerns. Oh dear. Sadly, Echoes of Extinction just isn't terribly good. The central concept, that of a monster haunted by voices that push him to kill is solid, but the execution, if you'll forgive the pun, is unarresting. The second half, with the Tenth Doctor, is more entertaining than the first, largely because Tennant gives a spirited performance while McGann unfortunately sounds unenthused. This has always been a problem of his audios: you can tell when he's enjoying a script or not. There are some fan-pleasing actor choices here too, with Burn Gorman portraying the obsequious Network and Arthur Darvill as a cockney space pirate type, and while they're pretty entertaining, the characters aren't all that great to begin with. Mina Anwar and Kathryn Drysdale are pretty solid, but again, haven't got all that much to work with. Unfortunately, Inès de Clercq is wholly unsuited to her role as the Captain Frye. Is she only in this because she's Darvill's wife?

I'm also unconvinced by this release's inclusion in the Time Lord Victorious range, which is petering out now during its overextended run. The only link to the overall story is the vague similarity of the genocidal monster of this release to the genocidal monsters of the main plot. The Tenth Doctor name drops the Kotturuh and muses that the Eighth Doctor, whose involvement he has become aware of, is about to go through the nasty bits of the Dark Times affair, but it's pretty flimsy. This wouldn't really matter if the story itself was stronger, but as it is, it's all rather forgettable.

Placement: The Eighth Doctor is shortly to experience the events of the Time Lord Victorious range, so presumably for him this is after the Stranded box sets but before He Kills Me, He Kills Me Not. For the Tenth Doctor, it's after the TLV main stories, the most recent being All Flesh is Grass, however, he also mentions his fiance Liz, presumably a reference to Elizabeth I in The Day of the Doctor. On the other hand, they actually married in that story, and he sounds more like he's doing an impression of Elizabeth II, which raises all sorts of questions. On balance, right after The Day of the Doctor, allowing for some clouding of the Doctor's memories of those events.

WHO REVIEW: All Flesh is Grass (Time Lord Victorious)

Well, this is the big one. It's the epicentre of the Time Lord Victorious storyline, the return to full length prose by the Eighth Doctor, the unprecedented team-up of the Eighth, Ninth and Tenth Doctors and a right royal monster mash to boot.

In the the cliffhanging final scene of The Knight, the Fool and the Dead, the Tenth Doctor, beginning his crusade against the Kotturuh and death itself, is confronted by the Eighth Doctor on a Dalek warship, and the Ninth Doctor on a vampire coffin-ship. This ties in with the DWM comic strip and with the Big Finish audios, the latter of which I haven't got round to yet, but it's all easily pieced together with the brief exposition from the Eighth Doctor and Brian the Ood. You could enjoy this plenty as a prose-only event, but grabbing the other formats builds a bigger picture. I'm less clear from the story here how the Tenth Doctor comics and the Dalek cartoon fit in, but I think they're knock-on effects of the Tenth Doctor's disastrous alteration of history here, which has brought his earlier selves back to fight him.

Una McCormack is one of the most prolific modern Who writers. With this novel, she's written for eight incarnations of the Doctor, I think (plus a ton of Star Trek novels and some Blake's 7 material). She gets the Doctor down to a tee, notably the differences and similarities between his incarnations. It's fun having Eight, Nine and Ten together since, while being successive (well, almost) they have wildly different ways of approaching things. The Eighth Doctor here is still fundamentally optimistic but sarcastic as hell, the Ninth Doctor is tending his war wounds and the Tenth is so fundamentally full of himself he knows he's his own worst enemy. I mean, he's literally his own worst enemy in this one, but you know what I'm saying. Yet they also work so brilliantly together. It isn't long before Ten stands down and the three Doctors try to work out a way to get out of this mess without making things worse (and just possibly making things better), and they work tremendously well as a team.

There's a lot of colour in this novel. The Ninth Doctor gets a short-term companion in the form of Ikalla, a vampiress who develops considerably throughout the novel (or perhaps the Doctor just learns to see her differently). Eight doesn't have a companion really, but is accompanied for a good portion by Brian, and also Hector, a spider plant (so that's where he came from! Monstrus Beauty now makes perfect sense). He has some great interplay with the Daleks, particularly the Prime Strategist who's become such a persistent character in Time Lord Victorious. Ten saddles himself with some galactic mercenaries but can't help feeling sorry for them and overpaying. It's like he's trying to prove he's the big bad God of Time but can't help feeling a bit bad about it all the time.

It's a rattling good read, anyway. I mean, it's got a vampire Dalek in it. How can you not love that? 

Placement:

For the Eighth Doctor, uncertain. It's straight after the BF Time Lord Victorious audios, but while they and this show him in his Time War costume, he reads as much younger and more positive here. He's perturbed by the idea of a universe without Gallifrey, but not distraught, so this is surely before the first destruction of Gallifrey in The Ancestor Cell (most new series books would ignore this but given the cross-pollination of ranges going on here I can't believe McCormack didn't at least consider this). I could happily see this placed during the earlier EDAs, especially as he mentions Romana and K9, tying back to the Shada webcast, which is very early on. 

For the Ninth Doctor, in between the penultimate and closing scenes of the DWM comic strip Monstrous Beauty, while Rose is recovering. Some time between "The Long Game" and "The Empty Child," most likely (could be either side of "Father's Day").

For the Tenth Doctor, immediately after The Knight, the Fool and the Dead, itself immediately after "The Waters of Mars."

WHO REVIEW: The Knight, the Fool and the Dead (Time Lord Victorious)

This novel is part of the already quite sprawling Time Lord Victorious event, and while some of these different elements seem quite tenuously related the main strand, this is right in the very centre of it all. Picking up pretty much straight after the Doctor goes all power mad at the end of The Waters of Mars, it sees him travel back to the Dark Times at the very dawn of the universe simply because there's no one around to stop him.

It's a bit of a retcon, the whole concept of this crossover, since on screen the Doctor appeared to get the stuffing knocked out of him by Adelaide Brook's death and renounced his Time Lord Victorious ways... but then he did shoot off for a victory lap around the cosmos rather than go face his fate when the Ood showed up. So while it doesn't quite fit to the letter of what we saw, it does fit the ethos, with perhaps the most arrogant of Doctors (yes, even more than Six or Three) throwing his weight around. 

The BBC could have got someone a bit more... daring, I guess, to write this essential novel, but then, I suppose you want a safe pair of hands for something like this, and Steve Cole is a good choice in that regard. His prose is solid and easy to read, he has a good grasp of the Doctor's character(s), and he has a lot of experience. He was the range editor for the BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures and Past Doctor Adventures novels for a good while, wrote a bunch of them (often under pseudonyms Michael Collier and Tara Samms), came back for the New Series Adventures, did a whack of Big Finish audios, some Iris Wildthyme short stories, about a hundred comic strips for Battles in Time back in the early days of the new series. Basically, he's got form, and while some of his work is pretty forgettable, he's also responsible for some of my very favourite Who stories.

The Dark Times turn out to be a lot brighter and more lively than we might have expected from previous glimpses (something even the Doctor notices). This is an era before the invention of death, when everyone is immortal, barring accidents. It's a fascinating concept, and I wish there'd been scope for more exploration of how societies would evolve in such a fundamentally different universe. After throwing around Dark Times concepts in the other stories and showing us glimpses of the Kotturuh, this book brings them front and centre. They're truly nightmarish, Lovecraftian creations, and for reasons of their own, have given themselves the mission to assign limited lifespans to all of the universe.

It interesting seeing the Doctor confronted with what something that's part of his established ancient history, only to be reviled at the visceral personal cost of it. It's a great inversion of the situation in The Fires of Pompeii, and it's good to see the Doctor on the wrong side of destiny. Of course, this is the Doctor, who can overthrow empires when he's in a good mood. In a bad mood, he starts his own crusade against the Kotturuh and vows to rewrite the entire history of the universe. In spite of Cole's background on the BBC EDAs, this novel reads a lot like the New Adventures, with a frighteningly powerful Doctor facing threats from the dawn of time and meeting aliens with bizarre names, complete with interludes showing the First Doctor (and the Eighth and the Ninth, for that matter).

The Doctor finds himself working with Brian the Ood, an absolutely lovely creation; an Ood assassin with a split personality who places all his worst impulses in "Mr. Ball." I can see why Brian's been picked as a recurring character in TLV. The incidental characters are pretty solid, but none of them really stand out in the same way as Brian.

The book ends on one hell of a cliffhanger, with the Doctor taking on the mantle of the Time Lord Victorious once again and sets out to remake the universe to his own design... before two familiar faces turn up. While it's not the standout work of Doctor Who some of the hype built the TLV novels up to be, this is a solid novel with some powerful moments that sets up even more exciting things to come.