Dr. Who

[mattofthespurs]

Dec 14, 2012 14:45:46 GMT ripper said:

I had that magazine knocking around for decades, but now have no idea whether it is languishing in a box in our attic or if it was thrown out. I didn't know that it had been re-printed a few years ago.

I've still got my original, tatty, copy here.

And I did try to build the Dalek but as I was only 8 and tried it using cardboard it did not end well.

Now my Son is into Doctor Who in a big way I keep thinking of re-trying to build one as a summer project but as I'm shit at DIY and a lazy bastard I doubt I will ever fulfil that promise.

[Craig Herbertson]

Dec 14, 2012 18:05:28 GMT mattofthespurs said:

Dec 14, 2012 14:45:46 GMT ripper said:

I had that magazine knocking around for decades, but now have no idea whether it is languishing in a box in our attic or if it was thrown out. I didn't know that it had been re-printed a few years ago.

I've still got my original, tatty, copy here.

And I did try to build the Dalek but as I was only 8 and tried it using cardboard it did not end well.

Now my Son is into Doctor Who in a big way I keep thinking of re-trying to build one as a summer project but as I'm shit at DIY and a lazy bastard I doubt I will ever fulfil that promise.

You'll be happy to hear that my old punk band used to play the doctor who theme tune and the drummer pulled out the large toy dalek on stage and we all shouted 'exterminate' - unfortunately after this brilliant start we kind of deteriorated into mediocrity...

[cauldronbrewer]

Dec 15, 2012 0:16:29 GMT Craig Herbertson said:

You'll be happy to hear that my old punk band used to play the doctor who theme tune and the drummer pulled out the large toy dalek on stage and we all shouted 'exterminate' - unfortunately after this brilliant start we kind of deteriorated into mediocrity...

Well, that plan worked out fine for the KLF, didn't it? ;D

[ripper]

Talking about daleks has reminded me about an annual-sized book that I had as a child c.1965 I would guess. It was called The Dalek World and there were text and strip stories featuring daleks. Included was the film version of Dr. Who and the Daleks shown as a series of photo stills. I do stand to be corrected if it was, in fact, not the film version, but the BBC TV serial :-D. There was also a comic-strip story about the daleks fighting a race of invisible bird-men, as well as a text story in which humans were imprisoned in glass bottles. On the inside front covers were paintings of daleks fighting against spaceships in outer space.

[mattofthespurs]

Dec 15, 2012 12:54:17 GMT ripper said:

Talking about daleks has reminded me about an annual-sized book that I had as a child c.1965 I would guess. It was called The Dalek World and there were text and strip stories featuring daleks. Included was the film version of Dr. Who and the Daleks shown as a series of photo stills. I do stand to be corrected if it was, in fact, not the film version, but the BBC TV serial :-D. There was also a comic-strip story about the daleks fighting a race of invisible bird-men, as well as a text story in which humans were imprisoned in glass bottles. On the inside front covers were paintings of daleks fighting against spaceships in outer space.

In good condition that annual goes for £80-£120.
Never had that one by I do have a Dalek annuals from 1977 and 1979. Sadly not worth as much as the 1966 annual.

[ripper]

I do still have the Dalek World book in one of the umpteen boxes up in the attic, along with other annuals from my childhood. Sadly, it is not really in very good condition, though all the pages are complete. I remember writing little captions beneath each of the photo stills from the Dr Who and the Daleks film or serial. It's like the arctic up in our attic right now, but when the weather warms up I really should go up there and get them all out.

[valdemar]

I've got all the old Dr Who annuals - except for 1972, when for some reason, one was not produced. It is very, very strange that although in 1971, Jon Pertwee's portrayal of the Doctor's third incarnation made the show more popular than ever, there was no nice shiny annual. I can only put the omission down to executive oversight, on the lines of Decca Records 'Guitar bands are going out of style'[sic] to Brian Epstein, when he tried to sign the Beatles to the label. Or the other executive, being shown the Rolling Stones as prospective signings, who said something to the effect of: 'The band, as a whole, are great - but get rid of the singer with the tyretread lips'. Or the board of Mattel Toys telling a certain Mr. Lucas in 1977 that no child would want to play with piddling little 3.5 inch figures from a film that could only have 'limited appeal' to a niche market. Ouch. Hmm. seem to have wandered a bit there.
Concerning the 1973 tenth anniversary special [yup, still got one, and the 1993 reprint], the Dalek plans are a bit suspect - all the dimensions are 'off' slightly, and it's a lot of work to make one. Also, it's worth remembering how big it will be when finished - a friend of mine, many years ago, made one in the back room of his house, to a different set of plans. It was painted in black, and it looked superb; you could get in it just like a real one. unfortunately, it had to stay in his back room, because most of it would not fit through any of the doors of his house. After several years of constant nagging from his wife, we took it to pieces [broke it, mainly], put it in his van, took it to a secluded bit of woodland, and blew it to smithereens with a load of fireworks. Very irresponsible, yes. Great fun, yes. Rather sad, definitely. What I'm saying, is that a Dalek is a big bugger, and best made in a garage.

[ripper]

Other than the Dalek World book, I have just a single Dr. Who annual, dating from when Patrick Troughton was the Doctor. Please could I ask how many Dr. Who annuals were produced, Valdemar?

[valdemar]

No problem, Ripper. Which Patrick Troughton annual is it? - he had three; the 1968 one had a pinkish cover with sinister looking stick men; 1969 had a truly great cover of a Cyberman [The Moonbase/Tomb version], barging into the TARDIS, with the Doctor, in that hat, and Jamie; the 1970 one had a photo cover. This, for me, was the hardest to acquire, and several fans I know, regard it as possibly the rarest.

In total, there were [are; it's still ongoing] 20 'Classic' Dr Who annuals, from 1966 to 1986. The mantle was then picked up by the mighty Marvel Comics, with five 'Yearbooks' from 1992 to 1996, then a ten-year gap until 2006, when Panini start a line of Annuals and Storybooks. The storybooks are, strangely, more adult in tone than the annuals, and are written, generally by the TV show writers. From 2011, BBC publishing has produced 'The Brilliant Book', which is full of various items about Dr. Who, from infront and behind the cameras. They're well worth a look. So, to summarize:

20 'Classic' Annuals;
5 Year Books;
7 'New Series' Annuals; [up to the 2013 issue]
4 'New Series' Storybooks;
3 'New Series' 'Brilliant Books'.
________
= 39 in total

In addition to the usual annuals, there are a couple of oddities:
1966 saw the publication of 'Doctor Who And The Invasion From Space' - an annual-sized storybook, in which the First Doctor, along with a family he rescued from the Great Fire Of London [which, incidentally, he accidentally started, in his Fifth Incarnation, in the story 'The Visitation'!], defeat an alien invasion, and in 1983, there was a K-9 annual to tie in with the 'K-9 And Company' spin off show.
Also, between 1965 and 1979, there were published seven Dalek Annuals, of a very similar ilk to the World Publishers' Doctor Who annuals, but featuring reprints of the quite superb 'Daleks' comic strip created origianally for the equally wonderful 'TV Century 21' magazine .

My favourite annual is the first one, as it's stories are text only, quite grown-up in tone, and could be slotted into early Dr Who chronology. The clincher for me, though, is that they are written by David Whittaker, who wrote for the early series of Dr Who.
A story from the annual, 'The Lair Of Zarbi Supremo' appears as an extra on the DVD of Doctor Who: The Web Planet, and is read, quite superbly, by William Russell, who played the First Doctor's early companion, Ian Chesterton. My favourite story from the first annual is 'The Sons Of The Crab', which is both thought-provoking and, at the end quite heartbreakingly sad.

Hope this helps.

PS
How many annuals per Doctor?

William Hartnell: 2
Patrick Troughton: 3
Jon Pertwee: 4
Tom Baker: 7
Peter Davison: 2
Colin Baker: 2
Sylvester McCoy: 0![although he appears in a small portrait on four of the Marvel Yearbooks]
Paul McGann: 0
Christopher Eccleston: 1
David Tennant: 8 [Four annuals, four storybooks]
Matt Smith: 5 [Three annuals, two Brilliant Books].
Like I say, glad to help. Now all I've got to do is get this big pile of books back into the loft.

[andydecker]

McCoy got no annual? Talk abpout popularity. (Okay, I like McCoy, he is my "first" doctor

But what I wanted to ask, is there an index of all Dr Who strips somewhere? I know that most of the UKs comics writer did write them at a time, but only if some later famous blokes did them, they got reprinted. You get some Wagner/Mills stuff, of the course the one by Grant Morrison. The rest went into obscurity.

[valdemar]

I liked McCoy as the Doctor. I liked his mercurial temperament, the way he'd deliberately leave people in the dark, and his general air of knowing exactly what was going on, as if his move had been planned centuries before. If any incarnation of the Doctor could have the phrase ''The Doctor Lies'' applied to them, then surely number 7 is the one it applies to most.
I liked Sylvester McCoy's portrayal as it was at odds to anything else I'd ever seen him in [BBC Childrens' shows, like the astonishing 'Vision On', and the strangely creepy 'Jigsaw', and Central Television's anarchic 'TISWAS']. He played the Doctor as a dangerous player of games, an enigma that could really do some harm. His best moment, surely, is at the end of the story 'The Greatest Show In The Galaxy', where he saunters away from a huge, real explosion [no CGI then]. You've got to love him just for that. Oh, and as for having no annual of his own, he had all the 'New Adventures' novels. ;D

[ripper]

Valdemar, thank you very much for the great information on the Dr. Who annuals and associated books. I had no idea that there had been that many published. The Patrick Troughton Dr. Who annual that resides in my attic is the one from 1968. Is the Dalek World book that I mentioned in a previous post one of the series that you wrote about in your post? I had always assumed that it was just a one-off. I can remember a Dr. Who strip in TV Action and (I think) Countdown from the early 1970s when Jon Pertwee was the Doctor. Was the dalek strip you mentioned in the same mag that had the strips for the Gerry Anderson series? In my mind that was a large format publication, but I can't remember a dalek strip, so wondered if I was confusing the mag with something else. I may have one or two Countdown/TV Action comics lurking in a dark corner, but sadly none anymore of the earlier Century 21 mags.

Just for the record my favourite doctor was Jon Pertwee :-D. I liked the serials that were made when he was exiled on Earth. I continued to watch when Tom Baker took over, but gradually drifted away from it. I know that the new series i.e. from 2005 onwards is very popular, but I prefer the classic series that I watched on saturday afternoons as a child. I also miss the multi-part serial approach with the cliffhanger endings.

[valdemar]

Ripper, The Dalek World book is the second of the seven Dalek annuals, published in 1965.

[ripper]

Thanks, Valdemar. I had no idea that it was part of a series :-D.

[ripper]

I've been re-reading a few of my Target Dr. Who books over the past week or so. I started with Auton Invasion (Spearhead from Space) and moved onto Day of the Daleks. In the first, Liz Shaw is the assistant, while in the latter it is Jo Grant. While I liked Katy Manning's portrayal of Jo very much (she's the kind of girl that your mum would like you to bring home for her to meet...and I mean that as a compliment to both Katy and Jo Grant), the character is rather easily fooled by the Controller when she is accidentally transported into the future in Day. I can't think that Liz Shaw would have been so easily taken in, but I think that is part of the character of Jo Grant's charm. She is rather innocent at times when faced with the double-dealing of many of the Doctor's enemies, but speaking personally I quite like that. I had to smile at the end of Auton Invasion. Brig. Lethbridge-Stewart persuades Liz Shaw to become UNIT's scientific advisor, but as soon as the Doctor (and Liz) have destroyed the Nestene, he offers the job to the Doctor. A 2013 version of Liz Shaw would have had something to say about that, but the 1970 Liz just accepts it and becomes the Doctor's assistant, a definite demotion. It does show how things have changed over the last 40 years :-).