Book Review: Star Trek: The Next Generation/Doctor Who Assimilation2 Vol. 1

Star Trek: The Next Geneartion/Doctor Who Assimilation² Vol. 1 is a crossover created by people who clearly love both Star Trek and Doctor Who. Scott Tipton, David Tipton, and Tony Lee catch everyone's voices; I could hear the characters speaking as Doctor McCoy grumbled, the Eleventh Doctor rattled through his speeches, Geordi commented on the technology, Guinan mused on the nature of time—all through the piece, through two Enterprises and two Doctors the pacing and word choice were right on track. J. K. Woodward's catches everyone, down to Riker's signature smirk₍₁₎.

Star Trek and Doctor Who are ripe for crossover work. Both feature explorers in space, and often time (there are always anomalies. Then, too, there is the undoubted₍₂₎ similarity between the Borg and the Cybermen. The two would think it was a good idea to put their cybernetic minds together to conquer the universe if they ever learned of each other. So, of course, in Assimilation², they do, and the Eleventh Doctor, Amy, Rory, and the crew of the Enterprise D have to work together to stop them, with a small detour to the past to see a time when the original Enterprise crew stopped a cyber-invasion with the help of the Fourth Doctor. This last puzzles the Doctor as, up until Geordi found the record in the ship's database, he didn't remember the event, and then he did: Time is changing, as Guinan confirms when the two meet. Guinan, by the way, puzzles the Doctor every bit as much as she should. It is a delightful conversation.

Other favorite moments of mine include Rory getting to use his Roman centurion skills while driving a chariot early in the book and the Doctor's delight in meeting Data for the first time. Here, he rattles on in characteristic fascinated-Doctor fashion until Amy reminds him he's being rude.

Woodward uses a painterly style in his art, providing small portraits of the familiar figures of all the crews. He's clearly spent some time looking at their varied expressions and gestures, so it is easy to transition from the television world to the comic book world. It's interesting that he chooses to use something of a 1960's comic book art style when he goes back to portray the first Enterprise's logs.

This is volume one of two, so of course it ends with a cliffhanger. I have volume 2 on hold at the library—so do a few other people. On the one hand, I always love it when other people use the library, on the other, I now have to wait to find out what happens next!
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(1) Nothing against the character (not most of the time, anyway), but he does smirk.
(2) And probably not coincidental. I can't track down the interview(s) at the moment, but it's pretty clearly on record that the Borg were inspired by early Cybermen. I, for one, jumped up and down in great excitement and rewound multiple times to watch the Cybermen declare "To struggle is futile" in Tomb of the Cybermen when I watched it.

Hmm… I took the time to do a short search, and now I can only find people denying the similarity, which is weird. I thought it was known? And why would it be a problem to design one really creepy set of monsters that are rather like another? I thought it was homage (which is good) not mere copying (which is bad). Ok…that could be a real rabbit trail. Stopping now!

Who's Who
Writers: Scott Tipton, David Tipton, Tony Lee
Art: J. K. Woodward
Additional Art: The Sharp Bros. (Issue #3) and Gordon Purcell (Issue #4)
Cover: J. K. Woodward

Publication Details
Publisher: IDW Publishing
Published: October 9th 2012
ISBN 1613774036 (ISBN13: 9781613774038)

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Doctor Who, Fifth Season, Reviews, Kind of

""I'm the Doctor, and I'm worse than anybody's aunt!" from The Eleventh Hour

I finally saw some of the fifth season of Doctor Who. It's late in broadcasting, so I'll do some quick, sort of stream-of-consciousness, reviews before going to try to catch up to the end. I'm also pretty much assuming that readers of the blog have seen the shows, too.

I've skipped The End of Time for now. Having been thoroughly spoilered, I'm going to wait til I stop sulking about the Doctor holding to the Obi-Wan Kenobi school of truth-telling.

Right. Onward:

The Eleventh Hour: Matt Smith is the Doctor. I think he could be better at this than Tennant; like Eccleston, he does alien very well. The whole fish-custard sequence really works. I wouldn't have expected it to, but it does. I love the interaction between the Doctor and kid Amy. Am I wrong for liking Kid Amy more than Adult Amy?


The Beast Below: Not a bad episode, not the best. Why and how does Amy know the Doctor is very old and very kind? Sexy Doctor could get almost as annoying as Lonely God Doctor. "So much for the Virgin Queen" could also get very old.

I don't really believe in Amy's rebellious streak when she sits down to pick that lock. It feels very script-driven, not character-driven. Why does she get so hysterical about the ship's story when she's first shown it? It's not her history. I could, just, see the inhabitants of the ship being guilt-and-survival driven enough to keep hitting "forget," but why does she? She gets to save the day, using fairly plausible reasoning. You know, now that I think of it, I could see Rose in this episode. Not sure who Amy is, yet.

I liked Liz X, overall, but did she really think that a mask perfectly molded to her face constituted a disguise? Really? Still, she can come back, any time. She and Sally Sparrow. And the Doctor's Daughter. Will we see her again?

It has a space whale. I like space whales.

Victory of the Daleks: Skipped this one. I'm tired of Daleks. Probably will have to see it before the end, though, to find out why it matters that Amy doesn't remember Daleks.

The Time of the Angels and Flesh and Stone: Love River Song, love Amy's banter with River. River's method of escape at the beginning was very impractical, but thoroughly awesome.

I spent most of these episodes wishing the monsters were anything but the Weeping Angels, since I also spent most of them grumbling that these were not at all like the angels in Blink and somehow not nearly as scary. Suddenly, these are beings that don't eat people's stolen time, they munch radiation; they snap necks; they can stare at each other without turning to stone; and, they, yawn, want to devour the universe, just like every other monster out there. The funny thing is, Moffat knows that smaller scale scares work: Blink and Silence in the Library were seriously creepy, and not even a city was at risk. That said, I'll admit that the slowly emerging faces on the statues were pretty creepy, as was the moment when they realized "Those aren't statues."

Since when has closing your eyes turned off the vision center of the brain? I'd ask whether the Doctor had ever heard of dreaming, but I've seen Amy's Choice. "It would take all those angels to equal one Doctor" (paraphrasing). How convenient that... they did!

A borg forest? Beautiful. The Doctor's gravity solution at the end of The Time of the Angels? Very nice. Watching him work with River? Also good. I had my doubts about her return, now I'm glad it looks like she'll be a semi-regular.

Is the crack in the universe following Amy? Or is she following it?

Overall, held up better than previous two parters; there wasn't the feeling of sag or letdown they sometimes have, and the tension ratcheted up nicely.

The Vampires of Venice: Oooh, alien-fish-vampire people. Proper Doctor Who at last! And running down corridors and along alley ways--excellent.

Signora Rosanna Calvierri is one of those awesome evil queen types. Pity she gives up at the end ("One city to save an entire race?" Yeah, did she have to go pose as a victim? Oh well. She was magnificent until then). Why didn't the Doctor offer her & her babies a ride in the Tardis? He's always offering races trips to new planets. Why not this lot?

Hmm... she refers to "cracks in the universe," plural, but we've only seen the one. I wonder why?

Amy's Choice. Why are the two men in Amy's life fighting over her? Are they really?

I wouldn't mind seeing more of the Dream Lord.

Hm... who contributed what to the nightmare? I vote Amy contributed the "nothing happens" element, Rory the monsters, and the Doctor an immobilized Tardis.

Does Amy think the Doctor tells her everything? Why? Does she think she's the only one? She took River Song in stride, and surely the Doctor has learned to tell others about previous companions? OTOH, the Tardis has completely reconfigured itself. Who knows where the knickknacks and mementos from past lives are now?

Still not really sure about Amy's character. I like her well enough, but there is something missing. Smith's got the Doctor character down.

The Hungry Earth and Cold Blood. I'm not that up on my old Doctor Who, but--they already did this story, didn't they? The one where the Silurians oversleep and wake up to find the earth overrun by apes? And where the nice guy who wants to share is killed by the evil military types who don't?

Ok, so Moffat split the nice-guy role this time around. Our friendly vivisectionist gets shot, but the benign leader is spared.

Why does the female Silurian soldier look so very human? Do all old English churches have chains in the walls? Really?

Does Amy have to keep wearing really short, tight clothing?

Amy, honey, those places you're offering the Silurians as uninhabitable... are inhabited. The current residents just might object to you giving away their property.

Why isn't the Doctor offering the Silurians a trip to another planet? Granted, they have a bit more reason than most for wanting to stay on this one, but he could try.

The fixed point/not fixed point in time thing... I don't get it. I don't think the creators get it, either. Fixed points seem to be a dramatic convenience rather than anything believable in-story.

Rory and the Doctor using the Meals on Wheels van to capture a Silurian--fantastic. Liked Nasreen quite a bit; she's (wisely) scared, but also curious and determined not to miss a thing. She also has the sense to see that future human/Silurian relations might be helped by having a human or two on the inside the next time the alarm goes off.

Rory... Um. Didn't know him well enough to be all that shocked, unfortunately. Pity. Creepy bit at the end there, with the Doctor and the Tardis.

Verdict so far: Uneven, but, then Doctor Who always has been a bit uneven. Also definitely enjoyable, and I'm going to settle down now for Vincent and the Doctor, which I've been looking forward to.

"I am about to tell you something very important. Listen carefully, because your life may depend on it someday: I am definitely a madman with a box.” from The Eleventh Hour

More Fifth Season Goodies from Doctor Who

The first minute of the first episode (TheEleventh Hour):



And something from Vampires of Venice



I love the way they're playing out the teasers! Also love the Doctor's delighted response to meeting vampires. That's the Doctor I like!

Still haven't seen The End of Time. My copy finally came in at the library--during Holy Week. While my sister (not a Doctor Who fan) is visiting. So, I returned it & put it on hold again. We'll probably be well into Season Five, maybe Season Six by the time I get around to it.

Doctor Who: Season Five Trailer

Oh, I like the look of this one:

Television - News - The second 'Who' series five trailer! - Digital Spy

Love that grin while Amy is flying outside the TARDIS.

The Eleventh Doctor

So.

They've finally revealed who he'll be. I know nothing at all about the actor, so all I can say is:

1) He looks really, really young.
2) He has a promising last name.

3) Once he stops being the Doctor he used to be, will it be safe for Donna to see him again? Can we have her back, please? (Really have her back, I mean. Not the way we had "Rose" for a while).