BBC Past Doctor Adventures

#040. Rags ~ 2/10

WARNING:

This book contains some ridiculously violent content which I do discuss during this review. Proceed at your own discretion.

◆ An Introduction

It would be fair to say that Doctor Who is no stranger to incredibly awful writers, but none of them are quite as vilified as Mick Lewis. Despite only writing two novels in the early noughties, both have become utterly notorious for their countless scenes of over-the-top violence, and a worrying obsession with cannibalism (which will become very apparent when I get round to ‘Combat Rock’).

Doc Oho – a man who I have a great deal of respect for, and the reason I started writing reviews to begin with – appears to be the only person on the internet willing to shower these horror stories with praise. ‘Rags’ has been slated by almost everybody that’s decided to read it… so when I saw that Joseph Lidster was selling his copy on eBay, for less than £10, I decided to take the plunge!

◆ Publisher’s Summary

Join the Unwashed... Join the Unforgiving. Join the Ragged, for we are the way.

A convoy of disenchanted ragamuffins is winding its way through the south-west of England. At its head, a filthy cattletruck containing four punk mummers... and something else. The band plays sudden, violent and hate-filled gigs along the way: Dartmoor, Glastonbury Tor, an old cemetery in Bristol. And every time they play, people die in unspeakable ways. Aristocrats, high-flying stockbrokers, police officers, all find themselves the victims of a Class War that is threatening to shatter society.

Within the dark cattletruck, a malevolent force is leading this ragged army on a Magical Mayhem Tour towards its final, secret destination. With Jo powerless to resist its seductive influence and the Doctor lost in a nightmarish void, can the band from hell be prevented from staging its final society-cracking performance, and thus spelling the end of the road for… everything?

◆ The Third Doctor

The Doctor made absolutely no impression on me in this book. Mick Lewis was clearly more invested in crafting a well-written and disturbing horror story… which is something else he utterly failed at.

If the Brigadier came in the lab just one more time ‘to see what on Earth he was up to,’ the Doctor was sure he would have to kill him. He loved the man dearly, of course – although he would never have admitted it – but there were limits to any Time Lord’s patience. Jo was amazed by the Doctor. He’d dined in all the most exotic restaurants in the universe, and here he was looking forward to sausage and eggs at a pub in the middle of nowhere. He believed that the middle of nowhere was sometimes the most rewarding place to be.

◆ Jo Grant

Meeting Katy Manning will always be one of my fondest memories relating to this franchise. The woman has so much personality and charisma, which positively shines through her no matter which role she is playing. Unfortunately, Lewis had no interest in Josephine Grant, and decided to take an orbital sander to her personality!

Jo was bad enough, knocking over the Doctor’s instruments and bumbling around in general, but at least she giggled her way out of his bad books. She’d never really adjusted to punk. Too violent, too nihilistic. The flower child in her would take some banishing.

◆ Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart

Thanks to the expanded universe, I’ve gained a new appreciation for the commanding officer of British UNIT. Gary Russell previously spent a good portion of ‘The Scales of Injustice’ showcasing the collapse of his marriage, showing us a man who struggled to balance everyday life with his duty to homeworld security. I wish I was still reading that book now, because ‘Rags’ does absolutely nothing of interest with the poor old Brigadier.

The Brigadier, bless him, just became bluff and flustery if he ruined one of the Doctor’s experiments with his clumsy curiosity: red in the face, and acting as though it was the Doctor’s fault for having the blasted delicate instruments in his way in the first place. He is too busy to be bored. There seem to be a million and one things demanding his attention.

◆ Story Recap

Within a dark cattle truck, a malevolent force is leading a group of punk mummers on a tour of the West Country. The band plays sudden, violent and hate-filled gigs along the way – each one resulting in some of the most violent deaths imaginable. A pickaxe is driven through the chin of a prison officer, another has his head smacked in with a shovel before being promptly hacked to pieces with garden shears! The Doctor and Jo were present for once such gig, witnessing the band’s horrific effects on the people of Princetown.

Something has awoken from a long slumber on the moors, and it threatens to tear the world apart in a conflagration of classist violence.

◆ The Most Arduous Review To Write

Completing this review has taken me three weeks for a plethora of different reasons – which I’ll elaborate on in just a second – but suffice to say, I’m relieved that I never have to touch my copy of ‘Rags’ again!

I had tonsillitis for the first week, which was utterly horrendous. My diet consisted of bottled water, risotto and tubs of banoffee ice cream. It also felt like someone was forcing a sea urchin down my throat anytime I tried to have a drink. I felt physically exhausted!

I uploaded my review of ‘The Scales of Injustice’ during the second week, only to realise that the way I’ve been structuring these reviews for the past year is utterly dreadful. I spent those seven days converting all my novel reviews to this new format, and I must admit that it looks a damn sight better than it did. Huge thanks to my best friend – and now fellow TimeScales user – Just Fin for helping me with the new format.

I’ve had a chaotic few weeks, but I’m fully rested and looking forward to getting back into the swing of things (especially since I have the next two weeks off work). Now let’s finish talking about this godawful book, so that I can start reading ‘The Slitheen Excursion’ instead!

◆ Is This Doctor Who, Or A Manhunt Game?

After reading only three chapters of ‘Rags’, I was already subjected to some incredibly gruesome scenes of death and dismemberment. I wasn’t personally offended by this – I would look like a hypocrite if I was, considering my favourite Seventh Doctor story is ‘Red’ – but blood spills from every page of this book.

The sheer level of violence stopped being frightening after the first punk rocker had his head stoved in by a privately educated ponce wielding a tyre iron, something which happened literally within the first few pages. From that point onwards it stopped being frightening and just became monotonous. I have never been so bored reading a book!

Mick Lewis must’ve known that none of this would be able to capture the attention of readers for long, so attempted to put us all off our lunch instead. Pages 95-96 literally have the punk band spitting out blood and vomit as they sing, chucking up maggots onto the crowd, and into an audience member’s mouth! I went into this book with an open mind, I really did, but it’s just nauseatingly bad.

◆ Attack On The Upper Classes

Let’s move onto the main villain of ‘Rags’, because it’s the one thing I can actually praise Mick Lewis for. Originating on an asteroid, the Ragman gained sentience after being exposed to stellar radiation. It crash landed on Earth and became part of a stone circle, drawing power from ley lines. It had the ability to reanimate corpses, using them to generate class-based violence amongst the living.

Certainly an interesting idea. Such a shame then that this book was released a year after ‘The Fearmonger’, whose titular entity was another violence vampire. I would much rather be listening to that story than focusing on this utter dross.

◆ Conclusion

“Join the Ragged, for we are the way.”

The corpses of a punk band have been re-animated by an entity that feeds on violence, and it’s using their bodies to spread its message of chaos and class envy. That could be the basis of an incredible little horror story that delves into the depths of the human psyche… unfortunately, Mick Lewis wouldn’t know subtlety if it punched him square in the jaw!

Some writers have actually succeeded in melding scenes of extreme violence with Doctor Who, but that’s only because they understood that you have to balance it out with something else. Otherwise, the violent acts stop being frightening and just become tedious. The only conceivable use I can see for a book like ‘Rags’ is to make that old witch Mary Whitehouse turn in her grave! Avoid this one at all costs.