Barnes, Alan

AVERAGE REVIEW SCORE:

4 out of 5

(1 book)

Liberation Of The Daleks

(Art by Lee Sullivan)

Set between 'The Power of the Doctor' and 'The Star Beast' and released as part of the 60th Anniversary celebrations of Doctor Who, this graphic novel features the very first adventure of the freshly-regenerated Fourteenth Doctor (as played by David Tennant).  The Doctor discovers a theme park where psychic projections of Daleks are used for entertainment but it soon becomes clear that even fictional Daleks are dangerous.

I was tragically underwhelmed by the 60th Anniversary Specials (they didn't feel that 'special' to me and just seemed like normal episodes) and so, where previously I was excited to explore this new incarnation of the Doctor, by the time I read this I was feeling a little jaded.  Things didn't get off to a great start, with the Daleks initially being nothing more than a punchline here.

However, where this book got interesting was when the fictional Daleks became self-aware and I particularly enjoyed the fact of which type of Daleks it is that initially break free.  You see, if you didn't know, due to the weird licencing rules back in the day, Terry Nation retained the rights to the Daleks and was able to capitalise on Dalekmania by endorsing products which could legally feature the Daleks but weren't allowed any reference to the Doctor.  This resulted in an off-brand series of Dalek comics in which the Dalek Emperor is bright gold and has a massive globe for a head.  This book, then, serves to crossover those spinoff Daleks back into the Doctor Who universe in an inventive and somewhat meta way.  I also liked that the Doctor is forced to call on the help of various other variants of the Dalek leadership to help him, including the Emperors from the eras of the Second and Ninth Doctors, the Dalek Supremes faced by the Tenth and Eleventh Doctors, among others.

One of the big disappointments for the 60th TV specials was them not featuring the Doctor's most iconic foes at all.  This book goes a long way to make up for that shortcoming and definitely serves as a suitable celebration of sixty years of the Daleks in comics (off-brand or otherwise).

4 out of 5

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