Doctor Who Omnibus Volume 1 by Gary Russell

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book collects a grand total of 18 Doctor Who comics featuring the tenth doctor: six one shots in between two six issue mini-series, so here's my thoughts on each component on this 400+ page collection.

1) Agent Provacteur: This was the 2008 Doctor Who mini-series and it had lot of good features. The story starts off solidly enough with the Doctor and Martha in search of the best chocolate milkshake ever. However, weirdness is afoot as the populations of entire planets disappear leaving only one survivor. The reasons for this are very confusing and convoluted. The result is a story that. while quirky and fun at times, is also too complex for a six issue comic book. Issue 6 is full of pages with exposition bubbles and very long speech bubbles that's very tedious in a comic. This sounds like it might have been better as a regular if handled right. Still, for some fun interactions between the Doctor and Martha, I'll give this a C.

2) The Whispering Gallery: Another Adventure features the Doctor and Martha visiting a planet where an entire culture is afraid to express their emotions. The Doctor met a girl named Grayla who did. However, when he returns to her planet, he finds that's she died and she finds her last message indicating that she said her culture was right and that there was no place for emotion. The doctor sets out to find out what happened while Martha stays behind in the whispering gallery, a place where pictures containing parts of the consciousness of the dead whisper their regrets. It's a thought provoking story about things that aren't said and regrets that's surprisingly moving for a comic book. The only thing I can ding this one on is art that's kind of iffy. Grade: B+

3) Time Mechanations: A great Doctor solo story where he meets HG Wells and a mysterious friend in Victorian England and he needs a part to repair the TARDIS. However, he's hindered by the fact that Queen Victoria banished him during Season 2 of the Revived Series. And there's even more than that than meets the eye. A very good solid timey wimey story that's deserving of Doctor Who. Grade: A

4)Autopia: The Doctor and Donna travel to a planet where humans have become lazy and indolent as they live in luxury while machines serve their every need. The Doctor and his companion are promptly ordered executed. Now they have to save their lives and try to change a lazy society without destroying it. Slightly contrived, but understandably so for the limits of a one shot. Grade: B

5) The Cold Blooded War: The Doctor and Donna arrive by accident on a planet that's about to have their first queen running the country. They'd actually been trying to attend an opera and the doctor said he'd been waiting so long for tickets that he'd ordered them back when he had a long scarf. Unfortunately, it's all down from there with a heavy handed tale that's tedious and unengaging. Grade: D

6) Room with a Deja View: The doctor encounters a creature who lives backwards in crime who is charged with a crime. The tale is an interesting concept, but it's a tad confusing, and also a bit dubious from the standpoint of whether the Doctor would actually do this as it requires multiple version of the tenth doctor and traveling back through his own timeline. Still, a worthy experiment. Grade: B

7) Black Death White Life: The Doctor and Martha arrive in the middle ages when a plague's occurring that isn't supposed to according to the history books. The cause is unknown but an alien creature is helping a local priest heal them which means aliens are also behind the disease. This is an okay story, but given what it actually represented, it was only borderline on the inventiveness side and Martha's question on the end is uncharacteristically dumb. Grade: C+

8) The Forgotten: This six issue mini-series finds the Doctor and Martha inexplicably at a museum dedicated to the Doctor. The Doctor loses his memory of all of his past regenerations and has to get them back in order to figure out what's happening to him. Each time he touches an object from one of his prior selves, he regains a bit and finds a clue. This means that in the six issue mini-series there are nine mini-stories featuring each of the first nine doctors. Given that there's hardly any easily available reprints of the first three doctors and the eighth and ninth, this is a great bonus. The first two doctors are even done in black and white. Even though I'm pretty new to the doctor, I was pretty amazed by the amount of history and companions that this story represents. Longer time fans of the Doctor will probably appreciate it even more. The mini-series had some great humor, but also some poignant moments particularly in Issue 6. Compared to the memories and the resolution, what actually is behind this isn't as great. Still, I think it's solid. Grade: A

This story definitely has a couple great gems in, one total dud, and a few that are between mediocre and good.

I checked this out from my local public library. If I were buying, I would probably only purchase the trade paperback containing the Forgotten.



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