Customer Reviews

Longest Day (Dr. Who Series)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

What a depressing book! This one was a trial to read. How much can one person be expected to take? Since when did Sam become Superwoman? There's nothing but violence in this book. The poor Doctor has nothing but unhappiness and gets to see just about everyone used, abused and eventually killed.

This book is the start of a trilogy. One hopes the next two books are more upbeat than this. Even in the worst situations of Real Life one experiences black humor. There's none of that here - yet one of The BEST one liners the Doctor has ever had occurs on page 222. Go straight to this page, enjoy the paragraph and go on.

I feel the creation of the Kusks were a waste in this story. Shame. I don't intend to ever read this one again.

First off, I just want to say that the cover depicted here is much cooler than mine, which just has some picture of a generic ugly alien. By looking at what other people have said, this book gets quite the bad reputation and while I'd like to be the maverick and give a contrary opinion, I can't disagree too much with everyone else. What makes it worse is that the author takes what really could be a great idea and squanders it by running the plot into the ground and layering on too many subplots so that by the time the resolution shows up, you just don't care anymore. For those who aren't going to read the book, the Great Idea is the concept of a planet where time is all messed up, so that different sections are existing in different times and the states of flux make it almost impossible to move from one section to another. It's a fascinating setting, but unfortunately it all gets bogged down in plots that hardly seem to have any bearing on anything. We start in the moonbase that is keeping it all under control, with a character who's more annoying than interesting, before the Doctor and Sam get separated and stuck in different adventures. The Doctor's winds up being halfway decent, as he's actually trying to figure out how to keep the planet from rupturing and taking the galaxy with it. Meanwhile Sam gets rammed into a plot involving a penal colony and rebels that just goes nowhere and has a rather surprising amount of brutal violence, bordering on the sadistic. So you have her plot spinning its wheels and the Doctor sliding through some nice set pieces (the repeating soldier was a nice visual image) and none of it going anywhere fast . . . and then the aliens show up. What should become fast paced and exciting as everyone races to either achieve their goals or get out alive remains plodding and somewhat dull. There are some nice moments, the Doctor is actually written fairly well, he gets some good Tom Baker-ish scenes and other assorted eccentricities, but the big problem is that the supporting cast is basically boring. The rebels just sort of blend together with their jailers after a while, the people on the moonbase are kind of blah and the aliens are just your average bloodthirsty conquerers after a while. Memorable bits are few and far between, with probably the best being the entire sequence with the guy who has metal legs (you'll know it when you get there). It all wraps up more or less predictably . . . but wait! there's a cliffhanger. In what appears to be a sign that the BBC definitely had an overall plan for the line we get a setup for the future. Unfortunately by the time you get there, you're just glad it's over. Not a badly written book, it shows a lot of imagination and ambition but it either has too much padding or needed another run through Editor Central before being released, as the good stuff just sort of vanishes amidst all the noise.

The hardest thing about reviewing LONGEST DAY is that by the time I got to the end of the book, I'd already forgotten the events of the first half. There's nothing there to hold the reader's interest through to the end. The plot is about average with one or two bright spots here and there, but any ground made up is swamped by the poor execution.

Pacing, or the lack thereof, is probably the book's worst sin. No tension or excitement is built, things just sort of happen without any rhyme or reason until the end when they just sort of stop happening. The characterization is fairly decent, but the alien names are so confusing and interchangeable, that I reached a point where I stop bothering about trying to keep the characters in mind and just started winging it. This didn't seem to make much of a difference.

The bottom line is that it took me almost three times as long to plow through LONGEST DAY than it has for any other BBC Doctor Who book. It's a long, drawn-out story punctuated by occasional violence (which I didn't find as intrusive or as sickening as other people apparently did). There are some nice touches (such as the Doctor zooming through the corridors of an alien dome in his purple VW Beetle), but the book makes the reader work so hard to get to them that it really isn't worth the effort.

THE LONGEST DAY is just that, it is very long. Drawn out, dull and scatter shot all around, this, the ninth adventure featuring the Eighth Doctor and Sam is the start of a three part story arc with a intermission (LEGACY OF THE DALEKS) thrown into the middle. So, for those expecting a quick and happy ending (or even a cohernt one), be warned, we are left in cliffhanger territory pretty much from the get go. The book did start of pretty strong - but by page six the first sign of trouble appeared - that being found in the second reference to Sam being in a wet T-shirt (OPTION LOCK has the bragging rights as to being the first). The book tries to recover from there, setting us up in world right from the Third Doctor tone and feel of the Earth Empire Age, complete with space stations and Monitors (think the Third Doctor adventure THE MUTANTS). It's a great launching point that falls apart very quick. The author seems rushed throughout this book - almost like he knows he has to hit a lot of points fast before the book comes to a abrupt end - the seperation of the Doctor and Sam from each other... which I found almost refreshing. I've never been a big fan of Sam, and would like to see her removed from the series, but alas, she will be back (plus, this plot line feels like a direct rip from the VIRGIN days of Doctor Who, where Ace leaves the TARDIS to fight in the Dalek Wars, only to join up again later). There is a lot of head scratchers here, but none more than the Doctor's purple VW BEETLE - which is a hoot, and is actually very useful in this book, but merely a throw away... like all the rest of the plot and action in the book. A wasted effort all around, and worth only picking up to complete the set - but not to read. Next... THE LEGACY OF THE DALEKS.

This was one of the most enjoyable of the BBC Doctor Who books. At times it is somewhat dark and grim, and it's probably not the classic television-style Who (people seem to get hurt quite graphically). It's far more serious in tone than most of the previous BBC books. This book introduces a new species and begins a continuing plotline in the BBC range (continued in Dreamstone Moon, then Seeing I). An interesting problem, and a fascinating story. It starts out a little slow, but picks up fairly early on. The title of this review is taken from the dialogue of a character in the story, whom I found terribly amusing. I highly recommend this book, and encourage readers to undertake the three-part saga it begins.