Villordsutch reviews Doctor Who Vol. 3 #14…
Loathe her or love her, the Doctor likes the Impossible Girl and at the end of Dead Man’s Hand Part 1 we left her gunned down dead by the reanimated dead/robot hybrid corpse of Wild Bill Hickock whilst Oscar Wilde, the townsfolk of Deadwood, and the Doctor looked on helpless.
Now you may feel that with my opening paragraph the people at IDW have a true winner and it really should be a winner, however I cannot fathom out why this issue moseys along at a pace which makes you count the pages, wondering when it shall be coming to an end. I really shouldn’t feel like this but the story really does plod along like Kryll the Immortal Conqueror with both the Doctor and Oscar Wilde slowing him down. I don’t understand what Tony Lee has managed to do (or not do) in making what should be an all-out exciting tale into a rather dreary affair.
We find the Doctor crouched above the limp body of Clara and as the townsfolk crowd around, the Doctor proceeds in showing the people of Deadwood that this robot does not wield an invisible gun but the unfortunate victim(s) have all been stood on a small metal plate buried slightly in the mud. Following the cable (attached to the plate) they are led to a home of one of the town’s residents where we discover CCTV, monitors and an electrical keyboard – all the stuff that is really out of place in your normal run of the mill late 1800s Western town. Returning to Robot Zombie Wild Bill to disprove that this is the reanimated corpse of Wild Bill, the Doctor is met with a humble pie moment as the face plate is removed; luckily for the Doctor, Wild Bill’s not looking for a hot supper of brains and Bill’s body has been reanimated for some unknown reason other than to scare and kill the pleasant townsfolk. The Doctor and Oscar Wilde travel out of town to discover who or what is pilfering corpses, and whilst they’re away the Cavalry arrive and announce to the town that Bill’s corpse is not the only body recently removed from the graveyard.
All that in thirty-something pages and through it all no fun flows. It’s rather a shame really, as the art by Mike Collins and Charlie Kirchoff looks constantly splendid throughout this issue. With the dusty clay pallet, and the blasts of green from the Sonic Screwdriver and the CCTV monitors topped off with the burnt red in the sunset from Kirchoff and the excellent and consistent pencil work of Collins it can’t be faulted – even the ominous eyes of Kryll are rather creepy.
So to sum up this issue, the story needed a blast of caffeine; if they could have got a hot cup of Java down it, they’d have had an excellent issue on their hands here.
Villordsutch likes his sci-fi and looks like a tubby Viking according to his children. Visit his website and follow him on Twitter.
Originally published October 24, 2013. Updated April 11, 2018.
