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“CHASING THE DAWN: A PERIOD PIECE WITH PLANES, PARASITES, AND PAINFUL AWKWARDNESS”

Jenny T. Colgan’s Chasing the Dawn is an intriguing oddity. Framed as a gentle moment inside the Thirteenth Doctor’s TARDIS, it begins with Yaz struggling through period pains and ends with a bittersweet, potentially explosive encounter between the Eleventh Doctor and Amelia Earhart. Somewhere in the middle, there’s parasitic alien horror, socially awkward time travel, and a hammock towing a plane.

It’s a slightly messy, often charming, sometimes frustrating tale that tries to say something about gender, guilt, and independence—though it doesn't always quite land its points.

A CURIOUS FRAME FOR A CURIOUS STORY

The story is bookended by a present-day scene featuring Yaz and Thirteen, as the former seeks help from the TARDIS crew for her period. In response, the Doctor offers her comfort—complete with chocolate, a hot water bottle, and a story about one of the Doctor’s previous selves. The gesture is sweet, but this framing device doesn't sit entirely right. Thirteen feels oddly flat here, with dialogue that lacks her usual warmth and cadence. Yaz is also sidelined after the setup, her story quickly giving way to Eleven’s.

THE DOCTOR MEETS AMELIA (AND TOTALLY BLOWS IT)

The real meat of the story lies in the Doctor’s encounter with Amelia Earhart during her fateful transatlantic flight. It’s the Eleventh Doctor we follow here, and while he’s written with affection, he’s also dialled up to eleven (no pun intended). Colgan leans heavily into his zany, clownish side, which ends up feeling a bit off-kilter. His usual cleverness and quiet wisdom are buried under eccentric blabber, which sits awkwardly alongside the tale’s darker themes.

Amelia, by contrast, is marvellously portrayed: fierce, capable, grounded. She’s not here to be rescued, and she makes that clear. Her independence and irritation with being underestimated by men becomes the heart of the story, and Colgan uses this tension to highlight how Eleven’s bumbling demeanour only makes things worse. There’s even a hint that, had the Doctor been a woman during this encounter, things might have turned out differently.

PARASITES, PLANES, AND PATHOS

The alien element here is a parasitic creature that possesses Earhart’s navigator, Noonan—an unsettling presence with pulsating skin and bulging eyes. The early sequence of Amelia battling the creature mid-flight is easily the highlight: thrilling, tense, and cinematic. But the alien menace quickly recedes, replaced by a slower, more introspective stretch on a remote island where the Doctor and Amelia regroup.

This middle act is where things sag a little. The tension fades, and the conversation becomes awkward, with Eleven flailing in the face of Amelia’s steel. The brief interjection from Yaz and Thirteen in the present feels more disruptive than insightful, and there’s a slight tonal clash between the humour and the melancholy.

THE GUILT OF A TIME LORD AND A PLANE ON A HAMMOCK

There’s real emotional weight in the Doctor’s guilt. He could have saved Amelia. He knows it. But she refused help—pridefully, stubbornly—and he didn’t push back. The image of the TARDIS gently towing her plane on a hammock is delightfully absurd, but beneath the whimsy lies regret: a sense that Eleven simply didn’t do enough.

In the final act, the parasite returns, prompting Amelia to take matters into her own hands. She detonates her plane—with herself and the creature inside—providing a grim but poetic explanation for her disappearance. It’s a gutsy, if slightly morbid, ending that casts a shadow over Eleven’s actions. Or inaction. The story leaves her fate tantalisingly ambiguous, with the Doctor still clinging to hope that she might reappear one day.

📝VERDICT: 6.7/10

Chasing the Dawn is a fascinating, if uneven, short story. Jenny T. Colgan offers a strong, complex portrait of Amelia Earhart and tries to explore what happens when the Doctor meets a woman who absolutely does not want to be saved. It’s packed with atmosphere, pathos, and a bit of period pain comfort thrown in—but it also stumbles in characterisation and pacing. Eleven feels slightly off, Thirteen even more so, and the alien threat is ultimately sidelined. But for all its flaws, it’s a heartfelt piece with memorable moments and a surprising emotional bite.

The Thirteenth Doctor #5

'Chasing the Dawn' (2019) from Star Tales.

Despite being more of an Eleven story, it's quite a nice one to see re-experienced through the eyes of Thirteen. Both of them are captured well, and I enjoy Thirteen's relationship with Yasmin here. The Amelia Earhart story is nice although the antagonist concept is a little thin. Altogether a decent little story however.