Villordsutch reviews Doctor Who: Prisoners of Time #6…
“Our yearlong celebration of Doctor Who’s 50th anniversary continues! Mmm, I wonder… aha! It is the Sixth Doctor who takes the spotlight in this issue of a 12-part epic adventure featuring all 11 incarnations of the Doctor! As Peri and Frobisher attempt to free the Doctor from an asylum, not one, but two villains are revealed!“
I am a Who fan, and I have been since I was about 4 years old in 1979. I can recall scares, laughing, history and confusion. I can quite clearly remember disliking Colin Baker’s time spent as the Time Lord. My dislike has nothing to do with Colin himself (bless his big round belly) but more with what The Doctor became. The Doctor had gone from Barking Fun Uncle (Tom Baker) to Helpful Teacher (Peter Davison) and then Angry Dad – a dad that could easily be enraged and would belittle those who didn’t measure up to the expected mark. Perhaps you’re getting too much of my repressed childhood memories for one review here, but I’m sure you are getting the point – which is that I dislike The Sixth Doctor.
For me, this issue is tangled with negative bias before I even get to page one, and by the time I get to page four and we have a talking penguin I’m looking at the comic with disbelief. Can you see what negative bias brings out in a comic? I hadn’t even started Prisoners of Time #6 and I had already began to hate it! Due to my failings I gave the issue have a second read, but this time I acknowledged that this is a Doctor Who story rather than an Angry Dad tale. The second read was so much better.
We arrive in Antarctica with The Doctor, Peri and the shape shifting bounty hunter (and friend of the Doctor) Frobisher, who in the beginning is in the form of a penguin. After a beak-bending mishap we discover we are far in Earth’s future and are actually in a huge city built upon Antarctica. Forgetting his form, Frobisher speaks and this leads us to a chase by the Block Men, a tripping up and the return of two old enemies. We also get to see the face of a Future Lord.
Overall, this is a great Doctor Who story. The Block Men are a bit dodgy and the talking penguin (Frobisher) annoys this reviewer, but other that those minor things the story is great and I wanted more of it. Once again we are given a small part of the underlying story arc and this time it is touched upon ever so slightly more – enough to make you a wee bit happier about it.
The story again is penned by the Tipton Brothers (Scott and David), and in this issue they return to their good tale-spinning ways. What impressed me the most in this issue was the artwork by John Ridgway (Judge Dredd). John placed his fine nib black pen to paper and the results are rather fantastic to look at. Each scene is drawn with amazing love and it is beautiful to see and enjoy. The same goes for Charlie Kirchoff’s (DW Classic) colours, which have a great time-passed wash to them, holding you in the belief that this is an old strip brought back for a new story arc to be welded on. This issue’s artwork will look outstanding on paper as it did on my Nexus 7. A total pleasure to see.
If you can allow your mind to forgive the talking penguin and the Block Men, then what you have here with Prisoners of Time #6 is money well spent.
Villordsutch – Follow me on Twitter.
Originally published June 26, 2013. Updated April 11, 2018.
