The Fifteenth Doctor #05

'Space Babies' (2024) from Target Books.

These novelisations are definitely nice to draw some more attention to the very few-and-far-between Doctor / Ruby moments across these episodes, as well as getting a little bit of Ruby's inner thoughts during situations, but aside from that they're not necessarily doing much for me outside of re-experiencing the stories in a little more depth. Nothing particularly special here for me to call out, but it was a decent and quick read.

By now I think I made my Thoughts on the TV Episode clear: Flawed and not a favorite but by no means one of the worst like many others would say.

Having now read this Novelization, I do think I like this one more than the actual TV Episode, does it more than say the Target for Rogue? No. It doesn’t expand much, mostly fleshing out a few Things that were otherwise a bit clunky in the TV Episode. But really it didn’t have to in my Eyes, because a big Bonus of this Novelization is the Fact it’s Prose. Now some might disagree with it, but I think for me the actual Visuals of Space Babies are a bit uncanny. The Mouth Movements of the Babies feel very odd and I simply don’t like them. Now, I do think they did the best with what they were able to do, but it’s not a perfect Story for being live action. So the lack of any Visuals honestly helped me much more to enjoy the Story. Again, it’s not as of a major Step-Up to other Novelizations such as Rogue or Day of the Doctor, but it doesn’t really have to. It does a solid Job and I enjoyed my quick read throughout!

This novelisation is definitely 100% BETTER then the episode like I was putting it off for a while but I’m very happy now I’ve finished it

I know that I'm the Space Babies defender, but I really liked this novelization! The prose is incredibly good (way better than The Church on Ruby Road), and it's a great story. (to me, at least)

A+.