I feel that I’m being a bit mean by saying that this is one of the weaker TV Comic. As we all know, these stories were written with young children in mind. They were intended to be disposable little stories that would entertain its young audience for a few minutes each week. I don’t think anyone at the time would have imagined that these stories would be read, dissected and reviewed by grown adults some 60 years later.

Even taking all this into consideration, though, this is still the weakest of the TV Comic stories to date. Now, the previous two stories might not have been stone-cold classics but it feels like a lot more thought and imagination went into those stories than this one.

It’s a shame as things start promisingly enough. We’re in Earth’s not so distant future where spaceships carrying supplies are mysteriously disappearing shortly after launch. It turns out that the ships have been hijacked by space pirates, captained by the villainous Thrax. Just in case you weren’t sure that he was a pirate, the visuals make it very clear – all he’s missing is a parrot on his shoulder and a wooden leg. There’s also some unintended humour as Thrax channels his inner Doctor Evil and ransoms the contents of the spacecraft for…”ten thousand earth pounds.” Sadly that figure doesn’t sound quite as impressive now as it did back in 1964.

For such supposedly fearsome villains, the pirates are defeated remarkably easily by a combination of soap and potatoes and everything is wrapped up in just six pages.  In fact it’s not even a full six pages as the last panel is used to promote next week’s story: Return to the Web Planet.

Sadly, that’s not really anything to recommend in this strip.  There’s a real sense here that no one was really all that bothered about this story, possibly because the focus was on the imminent appearance of the first monsters from the TV series in the strip.  Hopefully the next story will see a step-up in quality.

I was lucky enough to be at the first of the live performances for this story, back in September of 2024 so this release has brought back a lot of happy memories for me. My thoughts at the time was that the story was 'OK', nothing too special but that the experience of being in the audience and to be able to watch Paul McGann and co. perform Doctor Who live on stage made up for any shortcomings in the story itself.  The question was, would I feel the same when it came to relistening to the story months later.

Happily I can say the story is just enjoyable second time around.  This is a classic Doctor Who story, basically The Dalek Invasion of Cornwall with some Master shenanigans added.  It's definitely been written in the full knowledge that there will be a (mostly knowledgeable) audience watching as there's lots of fun lines and in-jokes designed to get a reaction from those watching (or listening).  That said, I missed one or two of the in-jokes completely and only got them after listening to the extras on this release. But every one else seemed to enjoy them.

The performances are all excellent and it's clear that every one was relishing the opportunity to perform in front of an audience.  I was particularly impressed by Alex McQueen's Master.  I've not really experienced his version of the Master before so this was quite a revelation to me - in equal measures silly and sinister. I will definitely have to listen to more of his work.

I don't often listen to the extras on these releases as they often tend to be rather samey. However I am going to recommend listening to the interviews on this one as they really highlight how much time and effort was put into this show by all involved and how different making this was to recording a standard Big Finish release.

In short, this is a fun, easy to follow story that was just what was needed for this sort of live show.  If you didn't get to go and want to know what it was like or if you did go and want to re-live the experience then this is well worth a listen.

 I think it’s fair to say that the TV Comics stories are unlikely to blow anyone’s mind.  These are, after all, fairly simple straightforward stories written for a young audience.  Yet, it’s hard to not be impressed by the ambition in this story. In the space of just twelve pages, the Doctor and his grandchildren visit three different planets, meet two alien races, fight two different monsters and help cure a serious illness plaguing a world. In modern comic terms, a story of this scale would probably take at least three times as many pages to tell the story.

Right from the start, the story subverts the reader’s expectations.  You assume that Grig, the squat bald-headed alien who points a gun at our heroes is going to be villain only to discover that he’s on a urgent mission to save his entire planet from a illness that is sweeping through the population. It’s actually the inhabitants of the ice planet Ixos that are the real villains as they look to exploit the Theorvians plight for their own ends.

Characterisation in this story is fairly one-note.  Once it’s been established that the Ixons are the villains they slip into cliched villain mode.  John and Gillian feel very much like background extras in this, doing nothing of note.  The Doctor, however, comes out of this surprisingly well.  I do feel that the unknown writer of this story has really managed to capture his character.  Most impressively, the Doctor escapes from the villains by using his brain rather than resorting to violence or relying on someone with a gun to save him.

One final thing that I’ve only just realised: the TARDIS spins as it flies through time and space. Nothing particularly noteworthy about that, you might think, except that I don’t believe we see the TARDIS spinning on screen until the 1970s.  So it’s nice to see TV Comic getting ahead of the game in that respect.  Who knows, maybe TV Comic was the inspiration for how the TARDIS’ travelling through the vortex would later appear on screen.

All things considered, this isn’t a bad first attempt at a Doctor Who comic strip.  The story is basic but - with a few tweaks - I could imagine it as a televised story from the First Doctor’s era. Indeed, I can see a few similarities with the first Dalek story.

The artwork is also fairly basic - at least compared to what would come later but it has a certain charm to it. The design of the Klepton city and, indeed, of the Kleptons themselves is quite impressive. The more humanoid looking Thain people are somewhat less so.

The dialogue is fairly functional and non-descript so none of the characters really stand out, including the Doctor and his grandchildren. Gillian in particular does nothing of note. John, on the other hand seems quite bloodthirsty. He’s more than willing to punch out a Klepton or gun them down if necessary.

Overall, it’s hardly an auspicious debut for what will become over 60 years worth of Doctor Who comics.  But then the same could probably be said for the first televised story and look at how that turned out. As with the TV series, the best is yet to come.

After the somewhat lacklustre ending to the Fifth Doctor’s comic strip run, this story - despite being a continuation of what has gone before - feels like a breath of fresh air.

I think this can be attributed to two things. The first thing is the debut of John Ridgeway as artist. For me Ridgeway is synonymous with the Sixth Doctor’s comic strip adventures as he illustrated virtually all of ‘Ol’ Sixie’s’ DWM stories. It’s a personal thing but I much prefer his art style to that of Mick Austin.

Secondly, this story introduces the character of Frobisher, the shape-changing private eye who ends up tagging along with the Doctor at the end of the story. To a certain section of fandom Frobisher is a truly iconic character. He’s a lot of fun here and, in the short time they spend together, he and the Doctor have excellent chemistry.

And what of the Doctor himself? Considering that this was written before the Sixth Doctor’s on-screen debut, I think that Steve Parkhouse manages to get the Doctor’s character pretty much spot-on. Possibly I’m projecting slightly but I can definitely hear the Sixth Doctor’s voice in my head when I read his part. There seems to be an air of tetchiness to his dialogue that I didn’t get from the Fifth Doctor.

All in all an enjoyable, if somewhat slight story. It ties up the previous era quite neatly and nicely sets up what’s to come.