Top Five Doctor Who Magazine Comic Stories: The Seventh Doctor (Doctor Who)

Seven’s comic era is a little hit-or-miss for me. There are a lot of flimsy oneshots that are kind of juvenile for my taste, and others lean too much into that “we’re not the TV show, this grown-up Who for grown-ups!!!” attitude. And of course, the occasional dated racism/sexism cropping up very unappealingly. But the good stories really are very good, showing off a nice streak of inventiveness and new ideas. Here are my favorites.

 

"Claws of the Klathi!" (1988)

After “contemporary” London (whenever that is at any given point in the show’s history,) the Victorian era is probably the second most-visited period for the Doctor. But familiar or not, this is still quite the enjoyable story. It features a mysterious string of robberies, aliens hiding out in a circus side show, and a killer robot. The Doctor is traveling on his own here but picks up a temporary friend in the form of a Victorian scientist. I enjoy the Doctor gravitating toward scientists in any era, and I especially enjoy scientists from the past trying to keep up with all the wild things the Doctor tells them, so I like the interactions between Seven and Nathaniel.

 

“Stairway to Heaven” (1989)

The Seven comic era has quite a few oneshot stories, and while some of them feel either too hokey or too emphatically grimdark, I like this one. The Doctor comes across a hatchling creature carrying a brick up an immense spiral staircase in the air, a staircase adorned with the bones of its own kind. It’s a compact little story with a nice thematic thread and some pleasing schadenfreude. Of course, I like the stories with the necrotists too, so it seems there’s something about these kinds of tales that I find intriguing.

 

“The Grief” (1992)

A dark story, but a good one. The Doctor and Ace come to Sorsha, a barren planet that’s only just become accessible again after the tragic sacrifice that closed it off to the rest of the galaxy. Hearing about the Sorshans’ bravery in standing up to the Lom is lovely, and the specter of the long-dead Lom rearing their head once again is suitably creepy. We also get some good oneshot characters, and I appreciate where this story takes Ace emotionally. 

 

“Memorial” (1992)

A really lovely oneshot story, simple but effective. An old WWII vet wakes in the night and walks to the memorial in the village square to quiet his mind. There, he meets the Doctor and Ace, and the Doctor tells him the story of another war, huge and cosmic and so far away, but deeply personal as well. While the story features some really dark, heavy stuff, there’s light and hope in it as well, and it ends on a beautiful note.

 

“Cuckoo” (1993-1994)

An interesting historical yarn. The Doctor, Ace, and Benny come to Victorian England, where they meet a pioneering female paleontologist. Unfortunately, the Doctor knows that the great discovery she’s about to make flies in the face of established time and must be prevented. While the baddie of the story is plenty engaging, this is the real meat of the story, especially for Ace and Benny—history dictates that they rob this woman of her greatest achievement, the one that will lend her credibility in her male-dominated field. Do they have the right to take it from her?