Customer Reviews

Doctor Who: Macra Terror (A Target book)

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Few of these Doctor Who novelisations can be called litery masterpieces , in fact some of them are just downright bad , but for me THE MACRA TERROR is almost certainly the worst of the whole range. What`s wrong with it ? Allegedly the televised story the novel is adapted from is " a classic " , but reading this bland novelisation left me underwhelmed . It lacks anything resembling atmosphere or charachterisation. In fact it`s just like reading a script with a few brief visual descriptions thrown in. I know the Target series of Doctor Who novelisations are aimed at children but that`s no excuse for not thrilling the reader. Tedious in the extreme

This is Ian Stuart Black's novelisation of his own script. And not a bad story, as it turns out.

The TARDIS arrives in the "far future" on a colony world, which seems based on the concept of English holiday camps. The fact that they meet one of the colonists, who claims that the colony is being invaded by monsters, before he is imprisoned for medical treatment casts some doubt on the claims that everything is just peachy keen.

The activities of the invaders are more invidious than many in the series, and the enforced cheerfulness of the colony mean that the travellers have a hard time convincing people that the monsters do exist. Especially after Ben falls under the influence of the invaders...

While this adaptation is quite solid, what is lacking is the atmosphere of the colony. The BBC have long since destroyed the original TV serial, but its sound track has been released on both cassette and CD. For my money, the audio version is better than this adaptation.