Doctor Who - The Wheel Of Ice (2012) - Plot & Excerpts
Stephen Baxter (author of the 'Xeelee Sequence' series of sci-fi novels) was chosen to write this Second Doctor adventure. Which is probably aimed at us older fans who wanted a bit more from the BBC's range of Doctor Who novels. The plot does meander a bit and I found the background 'interludes' a bit distracting after a while, but Stephen Baxter has done his homework and has managed to capture the Second Doctor's era remarkably well. This really does have the feel of a proper Second Doctor adventure.'The Wheel of Ice' is a simple, and traditional, Doctor Who story which starts in the classic 'base under siege' mode that all Doctor Who fans would be familiar with... The Second Doctor, Jamie & Zoe arrive on the Wheel, not completely by accident, at a time when things are being sabotaged. The Doctor and his companions get the blame from some quarters of course, so then have to prove themselves innocent and solve the mystery of what exactly is happening, making friends and enemies along the way. So not exactly an original Doctor Who storyline! However, this a Second Doctor story that is very faithful to the televised era of Doctor Who in which it was set. This audio-book version is narrated by David Troughton who, unsurprisingly, manages to capture his Father's style and nuances very well. Although he does a good job of narrating the other voices too. Which makes this an entertaining audio-book to listen to. Fans of Patrick Troughton's Doctor should love this Doctor Who story, I do. The Doctor, Jamie and Zoe arrive at The Wheel of Ice, a mining operation on the moons of Saturn, in this adventure which could have been wrenched from black and white television broadcasts in 1969. The characterisation is perfect, with all three leads (particularly Troughton) captured so well, so as they dash down various corridors and dark tunnels, that any fan can picture them doing it as we’ve seen those images so many times before. Of course this being a novel, it’s far more ambitious than anything which could have been achieved in 1960’s television. The huge base with many different bubbles and areas, and the armies of blue children and blue men would all have been impossible to capture in this era of ‘Doctor Who’. What’s more interesting though is that The Doctor actually stays around for a little while at the end to try and sort everything out, something classic ‘Doctor Who’ noticeably never did on TV. It makes a nice change, with The Doctor using his large intellect and grasp of history to put forward ideas and raise points of concern and lay the groundwork to set them on their way. Not long after he does slip away, of course he does, there’s a world of adventure out there and I think ‘The War Games’ is next.What works less well is the execution of the plot. The plot itself is hoary and sturdy, torn from the pages of dozens of Victorian melodramas – the factory/mine boss who places profit and productivity before all else, and the rebellious youth she sorely underestimates. Unfortunately the less good aspects of Victorian melodrama have also been dragged forward, with the villain being so calculating and remorsefully evil that you half expect by the end for her to have spouted an elegant moustache with which to turn. I criticise it as it did seem so wildly over the top, but then over the top villains do fit beautifully into the Troughton era.I particularly like that ‘The Wheel of Ice’ is not a science fiction novel in the 2012 (the year of publication) sense, but a science fiction novel based on science fiction as perceived by the Patrick Troughton era of Doctor Who. So that whilst some claims about the future look absolutely outlandish, other things which are not science fiction but very much part of our present seem to have been missed altogether. So we’re in the latter 21st century on a base in the fantastical locale of the rings of Saturn, and yet digital technology as we know it doesn’t exist at all. In fact one of the characters is so suspicious of embryonic digital technology she grew up with (?!) that she insisted on having every document printed out on paper. The dissonance, the fact that it’s based on a vision of the future now elapsed, makes for a very pleasing historical science fiction. And why not? ‘Doctor Who’ is a perfect source for this as all (most, anyway) eras are different and have different visions of the future. What’s more. ‘Doctor Who’ remains culturally relevant. So why not extrapolate that version of the future out (even if it’s sometimes inconsistent within its own eras) and create stories set in that universe? The possibilities of historical science fiction are endless. And, really, why stop at ‘Doctor Who’? I know that there were comic book artists delighted when a rights issue were sorted and they were able to draw for Adam West’s version of ‘Batman’. But why aren’t new novels being written about what happened on Moonbase Alpha after the moon spun out of orbit fifteen years ago? Or catching up with an incongruous, ageless English gentleman and his kitten-heeled lovely young companion still fighting robots in a weird psychedelic 2014 London? Or seeing what Adam Adammant thinks after another forty years in hibernation? Come on, fans of old genre television, this is truly a call to arms!
What do You think about Doctor Who - The Wheel Of Ice (2012)?
Fast and straightforward, but fun. Reads like a teleplay that was expanded
—beedoes
Nice little adventure with the Second Doctor. Worth a read.
—julia
