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Doctor Who: Virgin New Adventures #57
Doctor Who: Bad Therapy
"We're not like you - we can't be whole on our own."
Seeking respite after the traumatic events in the thirtieth century, the Doctor and Chris travel to 1950s London. But all is not well in bohemian Soho: racist attacks shatter the peace; gangs struggle for territory; and a bloodthirsty driverless cab stalks the night.
While Chris enjoys himself at the mysterious and exclusive Tropics club, the Doctor investigates a series of ritualistic murders with an uncommon link - the victims all have no past. Meanwhile, a West End gangster is planning to clean up the town, apparently with the help of the Devil himself. And, in the quiet corridors of an abandoned mental hospital, an enigmatic psychiatrist is conducting some very bad therapy indeed.
As the stakes are raised, healing turns to killing, old friends appear in the strangest places - and even toys can have a sinister purpose.
Seeking respite after the traumatic events in the thirtieth century, the Doctor and Chris travel to 1950s London. But all is not well in bohemian Soho: racist attacks shatter the peace; gangs struggle for territory; and a bloodthirsty driverless cab stalks the night.
While Chris enjoys himself at the mysterious and exclusive Tropics club, the Doctor investigates a series of ritualistic murders with an uncommon link - the victims all have no past. Meanwhile, a West End gangster is planning to clean up the town, apparently with the help of the Devil himself. And, in the quiet corridors of an abandoned mental hospital, an enigmatic psychiatrist is conducting some very bad therapy indeed.
As the stakes are raised, healing turns to killing, old friends appear in the strangest places - and even toys can have a sinister purpose.
272 pages, Paperback
First published December 5, 1996
246 people want to read
About the author
Matthew Jones
9 books1 followerSee also: Matt Jones
Matthew David Jones is a British television writer and producer. He got his start writing articles for Doctor Who Magazine in the 1990s, and went on to write Doctor Who fiction for Virgin Books and Big Finish Productions.
Matthew David Jones is a British television writer and producer. He got his start writing articles for Doctor Who Magazine in the 1990s, and went on to write Doctor Who fiction for Virgin Books and Big Finish Productions.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
June 17, 2017
I must have read this before when the books came out because I can remember the one before (I liked it) and I can remember the one after (I didn't like it), but I don't remember reading this one.
I was kind of surprised at how much I liked it. It was a very good, solid story as the Doctor and Chris try not to deal with the consequences of the last book and end up having to do so. The mystery was good, the surprise arrival worked within the course of the story and it all held together very well.
I'm a bit sad we're nearly at the end of the series and I haven't decided if I read the next one in conjunction with the podcast (did I mention I didn't like that one), but the rereads have been fun. I may go back to the beginning and do some selective rereading.
I was kind of surprised at how much I liked it. It was a very good, solid story as the Doctor and Chris try not to deal with the consequences of the last book and end up having to do so. The mystery was good, the surprise arrival worked within the course of the story and it all held together very well.
I'm a bit sad we're nearly at the end of the series and I haven't decided if I read the next one in conjunction with the podcast (did I mention I didn't like that one), but the rereads have been fun. I may go back to the beginning and do some selective rereading.
October 5, 2020
Another really strong entry in this current run of New Adventures! It’s well-paced, well-structured, and well written, which is fairly impressive considering it’s a first novel for Matt Jones (perhaps best known to Who viewers as the writer of The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit).
Initially, this should have been released after So Vile A Sin, but due to the troubles with that it ended up following Damaged Goods. So, there’s obviously a pretty big shift between those that must’ve been a bit of a head scratcher for readers at the time. Long story short, the Doctor and Chris are now travelling without Roz, and it’s created a bit of a shift in their relationship as they try to deal with this.
Interestingly enough though, they spend most of the story apart, but this allows both of them to get a good dose of action but also emotional exploration and character moments, though it’s fairly amusing that the Doctor believes he’s managing to keep Chris out of trouble for the majority of the story when that couldn’t be much further from the truth.
The Doctor gets plenty of good moments here especially - trying to process his emotions while doing his best and being pushed into situations where he’s not fully in control - it’s an interesting character beat that’s felt especially relevant in this recent run as he seems to have moved past the point of playing chessmaster, but at some cost. Still, he’s facing up to things, and at one point an old friend even comments that he seems more human now. It’s an interesting route to explore with the Doctor and Bad Therapy does it extremely well and very touchingly.
Chris also gets plenty of focus and a chance to explore his character and his feelings. A lot of the time in previous books he’s sort of played second fiddle to Roz, but this time round he gets to take centre stage a bit more, leading to some lovely moments as he evaluates his relationships with Roz, the Doctor, and his various other flings during his travels. His dynamic with the Doctor has shifted for sure, and this straining relationship is felt quite a lot over the course of the story.
As for the plot itself, it’s a great combination of a kind of classic mystery meets horror film - the mysterious institute full of faceless people is home to pretty chilling scenes throughout. The supporting cast are all very well-realised and multi-faceted, in particular Jack Bartlett, who spends most of the story as the Doctor’s companion - he’s a tragic, likeable character and builds a great dynamic with the Doctor throughout the story, even saving his life on a few occasions. Of all the companions-that-never-were, Jack is probably now my favourite.
But, yeah, all in all, another really strong New Adventure, which makes it all the more disappointing that the end is near.
Initially, this should have been released after So Vile A Sin, but due to the troubles with that it ended up following Damaged Goods. So, there’s obviously a pretty big shift between those that must’ve been a bit of a head scratcher for readers at the time. Long story short, the Doctor and Chris are now travelling without Roz, and it’s created a bit of a shift in their relationship as they try to deal with this.
Interestingly enough though, they spend most of the story apart, but this allows both of them to get a good dose of action but also emotional exploration and character moments, though it’s fairly amusing that the Doctor believes he’s managing to keep Chris out of trouble for the majority of the story when that couldn’t be much further from the truth.
The Doctor gets plenty of good moments here especially - trying to process his emotions while doing his best and being pushed into situations where he’s not fully in control - it’s an interesting character beat that’s felt especially relevant in this recent run as he seems to have moved past the point of playing chessmaster, but at some cost. Still, he’s facing up to things, and at one point an old friend even comments that he seems more human now. It’s an interesting route to explore with the Doctor and Bad Therapy does it extremely well and very touchingly.
Chris also gets plenty of focus and a chance to explore his character and his feelings. A lot of the time in previous books he’s sort of played second fiddle to Roz, but this time round he gets to take centre stage a bit more, leading to some lovely moments as he evaluates his relationships with Roz, the Doctor, and his various other flings during his travels. His dynamic with the Doctor has shifted for sure, and this straining relationship is felt quite a lot over the course of the story.
As for the plot itself, it’s a great combination of a kind of classic mystery meets horror film - the mysterious institute full of faceless people is home to pretty chilling scenes throughout. The supporting cast are all very well-realised and multi-faceted, in particular Jack Bartlett, who spends most of the story as the Doctor’s companion - he’s a tragic, likeable character and builds a great dynamic with the Doctor throughout the story, even saving his life on a few occasions. Of all the companions-that-never-were, Jack is probably now my favourite.
But, yeah, all in all, another really strong New Adventure, which makes it all the more disappointing that the end is near.
March 20, 2016
A surprisingly addictive read: part chase caper, part pure historical, part gangster flick...with a bit of fanwank thrown in for good measure. It's the last of these that bothers me a bit; it's not my preferred version of Peri Brown's ultimate fate, but it's written very convincingly. There are also great swaths of compartive imagery to the other recent exploration of the 1950s, the TV episode "The Idiot's Lantern", but here there are larger shades of darkness entwined into the story. The cherry on the top of this confection is the very authentic portrayal of the 7th Doctor. A neglected, forgotten little gem in the "Doctor Who" New Adventures line.
August 13, 2025
Of course, I randomly pick the gay murder mystery Doctor Who book where Peri returns. I really enjoyed this book and all of its INSANE storylines.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 1, 2017
The Doctor discovers a psychological experiment
27 December 2011
This is one of many books in the 'New Doctor Who' series which was published by Virgin Publishing between the years 1991 and 1997. The idea was that the books continued the story of Doctor Who from the final episode of the television series. Basically, the television series have pretty much entered a hole from which it wasn't to recover until about fifteen years later, and these books were written to give Doctor Who fans their monthly dose of Doctor Who. Now, I like Doctor Who, but I found the challenge of reading each of these books, and in order as well, along with all the other rubbish that I read, too much so I ended up picking and choosing the ones that I read.
Now, books are a lot more flexible than television shows in that they are not constrained by budgets and limitations of technology. The author (remembering that they do have time constraints) is free to develop the story however they see fit. Now, the original Doctor Who's were hardly children's shows, though as the series developed, it began to drift that way a little. However it is clear that these books are targeted at the young adult market. This, once again, is not surprising as many of the young adults reading these books grew up with Doctor Who.
This book is set in the 1950s and, as can be expected, involves aliens and a mystery. The Doctor stumbles across a murder, but this is no ordinary murder, but somebody who turns out to have little, in fact nothing, of a background. Not only that, but there is a driverless black cab haunting the streets of London. After a bit of digging around the Doctor works out who the aliens are, though they claim to be refugees.
Once again, as can be expected with Doctor Who, all of the elements tie up together and the mystery surrounding the murders is revealed. In a way I found it quite clever in that the victims were actually artificial humans with emphatic abilities who read the emotions and desires of their 'patients' (they were used in therapy) and morph into what those desires reveal. However, as can be expected, something goes wrong and the creatures are being hunted down one by one. As is typical with the Doctor, all intelligent life is sacred, and despite them being a failed experiment, they still deserve to live.
I guess in a way this book tries to address the ideas of discrimination and the morality of killing an intelligent being if it has ceased to be of use. However, while we are not yet at the stage were we can create life (beyond the natural ways obviously) it is still something to mull over. However, we still must remember that this is a book that has been churned out by a publisher to satisfy a niche market. It was never meant to be a work of literature.
27 December 2011
This is one of many books in the 'New Doctor Who' series which was published by Virgin Publishing between the years 1991 and 1997. The idea was that the books continued the story of Doctor Who from the final episode of the television series. Basically, the television series have pretty much entered a hole from which it wasn't to recover until about fifteen years later, and these books were written to give Doctor Who fans their monthly dose of Doctor Who. Now, I like Doctor Who, but I found the challenge of reading each of these books, and in order as well, along with all the other rubbish that I read, too much so I ended up picking and choosing the ones that I read.
Now, books are a lot more flexible than television shows in that they are not constrained by budgets and limitations of technology. The author (remembering that they do have time constraints) is free to develop the story however they see fit. Now, the original Doctor Who's were hardly children's shows, though as the series developed, it began to drift that way a little. However it is clear that these books are targeted at the young adult market. This, once again, is not surprising as many of the young adults reading these books grew up with Doctor Who.
This book is set in the 1950s and, as can be expected, involves aliens and a mystery. The Doctor stumbles across a murder, but this is no ordinary murder, but somebody who turns out to have little, in fact nothing, of a background. Not only that, but there is a driverless black cab haunting the streets of London. After a bit of digging around the Doctor works out who the aliens are, though they claim to be refugees.
Once again, as can be expected with Doctor Who, all of the elements tie up together and the mystery surrounding the murders is revealed. In a way I found it quite clever in that the victims were actually artificial humans with emphatic abilities who read the emotions and desires of their 'patients' (they were used in therapy) and morph into what those desires reveal. However, as can be expected, something goes wrong and the creatures are being hunted down one by one. As is typical with the Doctor, all intelligent life is sacred, and despite them being a failed experiment, they still deserve to live.
I guess in a way this book tries to address the ideas of discrimination and the morality of killing an intelligent being if it has ceased to be of use. However, while we are not yet at the stage were we can create life (beyond the natural ways obviously) it is still something to mull over. However, we still must remember that this is a book that has been churned out by a publisher to satisfy a niche market. It was never meant to be a work of literature.
July 23, 2023
There's a lot of stuff I found compelling going on here, like the nature of personhood and mourning (and the relation of those things to gender also). I guess if I had a few minor quibbles it would be 1) I'm not sure Jones always got the Doctor's voice down exactly right and 2) it's by no means the worst example of co-opting a real world event that Doctor Who's done but I remain slightly unsure on how I feel about the Notting Hill riots being tied into a sci-fi plot like that.
January 30, 2026
We didn't get many novels with the just-Doctor-and-Chris TARDIS lineup, but this makes a decent case for the idea that they could have worked well. Full review: https://fakegeekboy.wordpress.com/202...
November 4, 2014
At the start of this story, I was struck by how similar it was to Delta and the Bannermen. Aliens on earth in the late '50s are being hunted, and the Doctor arrives to save them. There's even a side story involving an alien queen! Granted, some of these initial suppositions prove to be false, and the environment is quite different (urban vs. rural), but I think you'd want to work hard to avoid stepping so closely upon another story involving the same Doctor.
Anywho, this story's core idea of creatures that become what people want them to be is intriguing, and Jones a few times uses it to talk in interesting ways about loneliness and community. He also puts it to good use as the eponymous "bad therapy" to help Chris move past Roz's death. These are all clear highlights of the book, which also had two reveals that caught me by surprise, which usually adds to my enjoyment.
But the core plot just wasn't that interesting. Granted, Doctor Who often has a problem where it's all about racing back and forth to fill four 23-minute episodes. And that certainly goes on here with enough back and forth to fill at least a four-parter. (To the asylum! Back from the asylum! To the asylum! Back from the asylum!) But the good Doctor Who episodes have that, but they simultaneously have a spark of something that makes them exciting ... and this book was largely sparkless. To be more clear: for the most part, it was dull.
OK, onward to the big surprise: we eventually learn that the alien queen is Peri Brown, abandoned by the Sixth Doctor, with her plot never having a good resolution in TV land. This was one of those exciting reveals, and I generally agree with the fact that her story deserved a better resolution. (Amusingly, I actually thought she was dead for many years, having seen just part of Trial of a Time Lord.) Deciding to position her as angry and abandoned was a good choice that really allowed us to look at the character of the Doctor.
But as soon as Jones gets Peri to 1958 earth, he seems to lose all interest in her. We should have gotten great scenes between her and the Doctor, and given that there were no actor constraints in the novels, we could even have gotten her tagging along for a book or two. Instead she's pushed totally to the sidelines, and all she gets to do is offer advice. What a waste of a return.
This was Jones' first novel, and sad to say it shows in dry text and unfulfilled promises. A pity, because there was promise. I gave this one a 6 out of 10.
Anywho, this story's core idea of creatures that become what people want them to be is intriguing, and Jones a few times uses it to talk in interesting ways about loneliness and community. He also puts it to good use as the eponymous "bad therapy" to help Chris move past Roz's death. These are all clear highlights of the book, which also had two reveals that caught me by surprise, which usually adds to my enjoyment.
But the core plot just wasn't that interesting. Granted, Doctor Who often has a problem where it's all about racing back and forth to fill four 23-minute episodes. And that certainly goes on here with enough back and forth to fill at least a four-parter. (To the asylum! Back from the asylum! To the asylum! Back from the asylum!) But the good Doctor Who episodes have that, but they simultaneously have a spark of something that makes them exciting ... and this book was largely sparkless. To be more clear: for the most part, it was dull.
OK, onward to the big surprise: we eventually learn that the alien queen is Peri Brown, abandoned by the Sixth Doctor, with her plot never having a good resolution in TV land. This was one of those exciting reveals, and I generally agree with the fact that her story deserved a better resolution. (Amusingly, I actually thought she was dead for many years, having seen just part of Trial of a Time Lord.) Deciding to position her as angry and abandoned was a good choice that really allowed us to look at the character of the Doctor.
But as soon as Jones gets Peri to 1958 earth, he seems to lose all interest in her. We should have gotten great scenes between her and the Doctor, and given that there were no actor constraints in the novels, we could even have gotten her tagging along for a book or two. Instead she's pushed totally to the sidelines, and all she gets to do is offer advice. What a waste of a return.
This was Jones' first novel, and sad to say it shows in dry text and unfulfilled promises. A pity, because there was promise. I gave this one a 6 out of 10.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 11, 2024
This is both a look at the fallout of the events of So Vile a Sin on our main cast and part of a loose trilogy of late 2oth century English character-driven social realist stories.
This one is particularly effective by keeping Chris and The Doctor (and Peri) apart for the most of the story to allow them to try to deal with their grief on their own.
This one is particularly effective by keeping Chris and The Doctor (and Peri) apart for the most of the story to allow them to try to deal with their grief on their own.
November 8, 2014
Loved it, one of the best Doctor Who novels I've ever read.
April 28, 2018
This novel was written as part of an ongoing series back when Doctor Who was off the air in 1996, and is probably best read within that context. Readers picking up the book in isolation, as I did, will still get a great story but won’t fully understand the tragedy from the previous novel that haunts the Seventh Doctor and his companion throughout their current adventure.
Nevertheless, there's a lot to draw an interested Whovian to this title in particular within the New Adventures series. Author Matthew Jones would later go on to write the TV double-feature "The Impossible Planet" / "The Satan Pit" (as well as the Torchwood episode "Dead Man Walking"), and an early exploration of similar themes can be found here. Jones also uses the opportunity of his first full-length Whoniverse story to bring back classic companion Peri Brown, whose narrative arc was never really resolved when she left the show in 1986. For any fan of the character, it's a thrill to see her interacting with Seven, especially when she confronts him for the way his earlier selves have treated her in the past.
The story itself is also a fine one. During the so-called 'wilderness years' when Doctor Who was kept alive through novels like this, writers had free range to take the franchise in a more mature direction than the family television program could allow. There's frank confrontation of racism and homophobia, adult relationships (including several healthy gay romances), and a nuanced take on grief and trauma. Wrap all that in an alien invasion with compassion for refugees, and it's no wonder that fans stayed hooked.
Nevertheless, there's a lot to draw an interested Whovian to this title in particular within the New Adventures series. Author Matthew Jones would later go on to write the TV double-feature "The Impossible Planet" / "The Satan Pit" (as well as the Torchwood episode "Dead Man Walking"), and an early exploration of similar themes can be found here. Jones also uses the opportunity of his first full-length Whoniverse story to bring back classic companion Peri Brown, whose narrative arc was never really resolved when she left the show in 1986. For any fan of the character, it's a thrill to see her interacting with Seven, especially when she confronts him for the way his earlier selves have treated her in the past.
The story itself is also a fine one. During the so-called 'wilderness years' when Doctor Who was kept alive through novels like this, writers had free range to take the franchise in a more mature direction than the family television program could allow. There's frank confrontation of racism and homophobia, adult relationships (including several healthy gay romances), and a nuanced take on grief and trauma. Wrap all that in an alien invasion with compassion for refugees, and it's no wonder that fans stayed hooked.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews