World Distributors The 1976 Annual

Published	1975
SBN	7235 0320 6

Starring the fourth Doctor, Sarah, Harry and UNIT

• A Review by Finn Clark

A Review by Finn Clark 24/2/04

They're reducing the page count again! The sixties Dr Who annuals were 96 pages long, then became 80 pages long under Pertwee and now in 1976 have dropped to a mere 64 pages. This was to become the standard length. The following year's 1977 annual was eighty pages long again, but thereafter everything was back to 64 pages.

It's a shame, because for the first time a Dr Who annual feels insubstantial. In previous years one felt that one was getting decent value for money, even when the stories were dumb as a box of rocks. However this feels like a fifteen-minute read at most. It's not bad, but it's hard to get worked up about it one way or the other.

It doesn't help that the stories are poor. A New Life is a throwaway mystery with an interesting idea but almost no merit as fiction. The Hospitality on Hankus is another intriguing concept turned into a complete non-story, though I found Jen-Ka charming. The Doctor isn't saving the universe but merely trying to visit some friends, including a small boy who spends all day looking forward to meeting him and even goes fishing for Spads to have something to show off. Avast There! is trivial nonsense about space pirates, dragged down further by bewildering art that seems to be illustrating a completely different tale. And yet again, finally, The Mission turns a cool idea into a tedious plod. Strangely, for no reason whatsoever the robot in its illustrations is Kettlewell's Giant Robot.

Ah yes, the artist. This was the debut of a new artist, Paul Crompton. Undoubtedly the most controversial illustrator to work on the Dr Who annuals, he drew Tom Baker right through the seventies... but unfortunately in this book he's no damn good. Don't get me wrong, he draws amazing pictures. In fact his work looks fantastic, brimming with detail and atmosphere. His comic strips in particular are downright sinister, Neuronic Nightmare turning a pretty stupid script into a hallucinogenic headfuck that could give an adult nightmares. Skizos and the Neuroids look totally freaky and evil, by anyone's standards.

Unfortunately there's more to illustration than drawing wacky pictures. Crompton's paintings don't match the stories they're supposed to illustrate, instead being random surreal images that are nearly disturbing. As a visual experience it's great, but several stories get sunk without trace. I'm sure the author(s) went ballistic. The Sinister Sponge is sufficiently loopy for pointless incomprehensible imagery to be actually quite appropriate, but Avast There! is dumb "shiver me timbers" fun that would have been a million times more enjoyable with the annuals' usual jolly children's pictures. As for the comic strips... well, Neuronic Nightmare is demented genius but The Psychic Jungle is almost unreadable, with the poor reader struggling to work out what the hell's going on. It looks great (albeit wildly disturbing), but as a narrative it fails.

Oh, and Crompton's pictures of Sarah and Harry are wonderful representations... of complete strangers. Trying to make yourself believe that these people are Liz Sladen and Ian Marter will leave your imagination bleeding and bruised, though amazingly photos of Tom Baker seems to have been provided for drawing the Doctor.

Even the writer doesn't seem familiar with the show. Benton and the Brigadier make cameo appearances, but The Hospitality of Hankus gives us a TARDIS fitted with floor-mounted chairs and seat belts. It's the bridge of the Enterprise! [However in fairness I don't think we get a TARDIS scene in a Tom Baker story until Planet of Evil, so even if he had done his homework by watching Season Twelve the poor writer would still have been guessing here.]

To be honest, I couldn't really recommend the 1976 Dr Who annual. It only has a few stories and most of those are pretty bleah. Paul Crompton's art is extraordinary and you should certainly check out his two comic strips, but there's only one worthwhile short story here - The Sinister Sponge. Harry turns into transparent jelly, the Doctor hides inside a cabbage, Sarah is kidnapped by a sponge and the women of Inscruta are driving their men insane with noise. This is 115% proof World Distributors lunacy, so demented that it might as well be trademarked. For five pages you'll doubt the workings of your brain. In a distant second place comes The Hospitality on Hankus, which has its own charm, I suppose.

Unfortunately, apart from those bright spots, the 1976 Dr Who Annual is a bit crap. Buy The Amazing World of Doctor Who instead, which came out around the same time and reprints the best bits with extra material. However having said that, this annual's The Plasmoid Jungle (pp38-39) is officially the best Ludo-esque dice game ever. Space Bees! The Restless Rock! The Maze of Madness! Hours of fun for all the family...