Plot: The Doctor and Donna are separated from each other in
Andromeda galaxy and caught in the middle of a race war…
Mockney Dude: ‘I’m the Doctor’ ‘That’s not a name, it’s a
title’ ‘Well as long as I get the job done isn’t it enough?’ Splitting up
the Doctor and Donna is a great idea because initially she gets to do all the
Doctory bits with the villains and he gets to do all the Doctory bits with the
good guys and then halfway through the book they get to swap places. It’s a
chance to see both characters at their best amongst ally and enemy. The Doctor
brought Donna to the Andromeda galaxy for the very reason that he was out of
his depth, he wanted to take her somewhere where his ignorance matched hers.
Donna wonders what the Doctor would do in her situation and ponders if he has
ever sat any of his companions down and taught them ‘Breaking out of Locked
Rooms for Beginners.’ He shows real compassion for Mother when she reveals
about her shady past and the lengths she went to to escape it. Threatening
Donna is the quickest way of ensuring that this is the Doctor’s fight.
He’s rather attached to his head and is (fairly) certain that if it is cut off
another one wont grow back. The Doctor knows that if you stop thinking of
somebody as being like you then it means that you start treating them
differently and that usually means treating them worse. He points out the one
flaw in all megalomaniacs plans when they are trying to subjugate others: ‘When
you’re done and look around you’ll find that the universe isn’t any better
after all!’ The Doctor hates people who turn individuals into types. For
one awful moment he genuinely thinks that Donna is dead.
Tempestuous Temp: I think its tragic that Donna only
appeared in four Doctor Who novels (she was similarly neglected in the comic
strip whereas Martha had a wealth of stories in both medias) but in a way I can
almost understand why they chose this option rather than keeping her on because
she’s almost too good in this format and practically overshadows the
Doctor. Its fortunate that the Donna tetralogy came along when the NSAs where
really picking their feet up and producing works that could easily sit side by
side with the paperback ranges that preceded them and The Doctor Trap, Ghosts
of India, Beautiful Chaos and Shining Darkness are all great reads with a great
role for Donna. I find that the Doctors/companions that transfer most
successfully into print are those that had an awful lot of personality on
screen (the First, Third, Sixth and Tenth Doctors, Ian and Barbara, Jamie and
Zoe, Leela, Romana and Peri work really well in the books) and the ones that
tend interpret blandly are those whose performances were a little more subtle
(the Fifth and Ninth Doctors especially). Donna definitely falls into the
former category and in the hands of Michalowski (who has never been accused of
subtlety!) she springs from the page as a fully formed character, hilariously
funny, armed with acerbic wit, ready to tackle anything that is thrown at her
and almost fulfilling the Doctor’s role for large chunks of the book. Its an
extremely vivid depiction (compare and contrast with the yawnsome handling of
Amy Pond in the books) and throughout you can hear Catherine Tate saying the
lines (‘Go on, Sister Wendy, what is it?’).
Within moments Donna is being bossy, funny, picking fights
and tossing pop culture references at anyone who gets in her way (‘That
supposed to be some kind of insult? ‘Cos where I come from, sunshine,
that wouldn’t get you on Trisha, never mind Jeremy Kyle!’). She
nearly coughs up a furball when somebody calls her the Doctor’s pet. Donna
genuinely loves art and had a copy of Van Gogh’s Sunflowers at home but she
thinks that you have to earn the title and not just slap random things together
and call it art. She thinks of herself as an Ambassador for Earth (Lord help
us!) and spells her name TROUBLE. The Doctor describes her as a priceless
treasure when she is stolen along with the exhibit. She has never been this far
away from the Doctor before on a world that feels so alien. These robots
creeped her out because they looked too much like living things. If they look
more like robots then she might be more comfortable around them – the novel
goes on to explore her prejudices in a very creative way. For Donna
psychological abuse is being kidnapped and locked up without a
television. She shows great compassion for one of the bimbots when its spine is
snapped and is determined to point out that it is murder when Ogmunee shoots
it. As a child Donna was teased relentlessly about the colour of her hair and
so becoming a Goddess for that very reason almost makes up for it! For one
silly moment she wished that her mum (who always told her to stop being so
sensitive) was her to see her being treated to deification. There’s a very
telling moment where Mesanth compares Donna’s non reaction to her kicking a
door to her more emotional reaction to the destruction of the bimbot on Karris
– Donna’s emotions very much depend on appearances. The Doctor grins at her
down-to-Earthness and how she often misses the bigger picture but gets the
details right. Donna is not a racist because she judges by appearance and not
race (‘Its only natural to see something that doesn’t look human and
doesn’t act human and assume it doesn’t think human’). She
acknowledges that her shortcomings aren’t how things should be and that we
are only as ignorant as we choose to be. Donna is a quick thinker when she
is in danger and thinks up the awesome plan of everybody squeezing into an
escape pod, Mother wrenching it free of its defective release mechanism and
ride atop as they fly away from the exploding spaceship! Travelling with the
Doctor scares the willies out of Donna but she’s learnt to question what is
normal with hi and to question her core beliefs in a way that she feels has
made her a better person.
Great Ideas: Mother is our main robot character and is
described as looking like a high speed collision between a truck and a steel
mill (you can check her out yourself on the splendid cover!). She was created
as a product of war but tried to damage herself so she would be of no use to
them, literally attempting to commit suicide so she wouldn’t have to kill.
Through Mother we experience a robot with feelings and the emotional/thematic
crux of the story. Promechanicals are friendly types that harp on about robotic
rights. The Cult of the Shining Darkness on the other hand are a bunch who
refuse to believe that machines intelligences are sentient They consider
anything non organic to simply be a collection of spare parts. The Shining
Darkness is a time when they fear that the machines will rise up against
organics and slaughter them all. The people of Jaffee collect religions like
ornaments and they often have two or three mutually incompatible ones going at
the same time! They are too smart and rational to actually believe in any of
them and so consider the pinnacle of sophistication to believe in something
utterly without any proof. It was easy to believe in things where there was
evidence but took a special sort of person to devote themselves to something
when there isn’t a scrap of corroboration. They especially love the idea of
Heaven because you could make it as fabulous or as strange as you wanted and no
one could prove you wrong! Sacred artefacts are great because you can lose them
and then spend ages going on quests trying to find them again. These sequences
are simply divine, like we have tripped into the Hitchhikers Guide with
a wonderfully silly parody of religious zealots who can change their faith on a
whim. Like Adams at his best there is a serious meaning here amongst the fluff.
Unfortunately the artefact that was left on Jaffee by the cult was tossed in
the junk cupboard when a more interesting religion came along! Junk is a
planetoid where you can unload all your obsolete technology and it is crushed
and catapulted into the sun. For the surface think of the opening scenes of
Wall-E with towers of junk. Crusher (he crushes the junk up) and Chuck (he
tosses it into the sun) make an impressively macho entrance like two killer
Transformers but they turn out to be a pair of bitching mincers who let their
squabbles interfere with their work! Weiou with his cartoon display emotions
and excitable manner is another gorgeous invention. Given the right resources
machinekind can reproduce at a much greater rate than organics (‘But they haven’t’
points out the Doctor). The Cult have an ideal hidey hole inside a black hole
where they can plot and put their plan into action. There’s a really exciting
sequence where the Sword of Justice is on a collision course with the Torch
and Donna’s only escape route (the TARDIS) has been blown into space! ‘Every
home should have one’ says one character about the robots and it evokes a feel
of how black women were treated in the 50s. Li’ian is revealed to be Cult
member and in an unexpected moment shoots who we thought was our central
villain, Garaman, right between the eyes! Her plan is to take control of all
the mechanicals via the Mechanet and use them as an army to subdue organics and
ensure that their warped view of reality endures. They want everybody to be frightened
of machines so they will wipe them out. Boonie placed an antimatter bomb inside
Mother as a final solution to stop the cult if all else fails. I really like
how the Doctor comments that even though their plans have been scuppered they
cannot wipe out the Cult because it’s a state of mind and not an organisation.
As much as I hate the BNP if we managed to snuff out their political party
there will still be racists out there. The Doctor sums up this books moral:
‘People being people. That’s normal.’
Funny Bits:
- ‘I have to find a friend!’ ‘You’ll be wanting the companion district then…’
- ‘A bit Scooby Doo, isn’t it?’ – if only he would go on to be this smart in Judgement of the Judoon where that is literally the case!
- ‘Earthons!’ ‘We’re called humans’ ‘How confusing!’ – I love the way that Michalowski is constantly taking the piss out of science fiction conventions in this book. Donna also names the Solar System and the Sun (‘how quaint!’) and suggests that because they are invaded all the time that humanity are ‘major players!’
- There is a forty year old childlike man…is the author taking the mickey out of the fact that every NSA has to contain a child of some kind as an identification figure?
- ‘You never hear of the second rate ones going mad though, do you? Its always the geniuses.’
- Donna winging her way into becoming a deity is as priceless as you can imagine! Michalowski has really though about how Catherine Tate would bring this scene to life and its all in there; dramatic pauses, mouth hanging open and sudden bursts of emotion! What a shame The Ginger Goddess never made it to the screen! The Doctor: ‘I think she’s getting ready for panto season.’
- The Mechanet: ‘Generally its just full of nerds and losers complaining that machinekind isn’t what it used to be or circulating rumours about an organic agenda’ Naughty, naughty Michalowski! Hahaha! Even Weiou has been looking at specialist sites that make his display blush!
- Weiou: ‘Explosions always make me feel bilious!’ and ‘So we’re all dead and this is the final upload?’
Notes: ‘Don’t use Huon particles for anything, do you?’ the
Doctor asks as Donna is beamed away.
Result: Nothing made of circuits and cogs could really
feel, could it? Why is it when Star Trek tries to humanise machines it
comes across as a preachy sermon but when Doctor Who tackles exactly the same
theme its more of a charming fairytale? I’m putting it down to Shining Darkness
having a fantastic sense of humour so that despite having a very serious point
to make it is always a joy to read regardless. Michalowski packs his book full
of silly, quirky, funny touches and whips up a crazy, colourful corner of the
universe for the Doctor and Donna to have a spin around. Within its chucklesome
exterior is a very serious message and a touching exploration of prejudice
proving that the NSAs can tackle important themes and yet still keep things
light and readable. By making the victims of hate crimes robots the author can
tackle the subject of racism in a censored and creative way. I love all the
idiosyncratic robotic creatures that we meet along the way and the author has
the voices of the Doctor and Donna so perfect its as though he had created the
characters himself. Donna in particular is expertly handled and learns some
valuable lessons from this adventure. It’s a genuinely lovely piece of work
that wouldn’t be at all out of place next to Mad Dogs and Englishmen and
The Tomorrow Windows in the EDA range. I got through this in record time
and I don’t think there was a point where a smile left my face, this is a book
which evokes pure sunshine: 9/10
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