Panini Publishing The Glorious Dead A Graphic Novel Collection

Published

2006

• A Review by Finn Clark

A Review by Finn Clark 2/8/11

If there's one thing this graphic collection makes clear, it's that Scott Gray's stories are more interesting when they're about something. Obviously this is true of everything, but it's particularly so with Gray. He's a fairly vanilla writer and he can't do that Gareth Roberts (or even Alan Barnes) thing of carrying a lacklustre story through sheer personality, but there's a sincerity about his work. He'll tackle themes more earnestly than you'll get from the comics work of either of those two aforementioned writers.

He's also got a better grasp of plotting and structure, by the way. However when he's merely doing pastiche, he's boring.

This collection is fascinating for this, because the writers' commentary at the back shows you exactly what Gray was putting into his stories. His good stories here are The Fallen, The Glorious Dead and The Autonomy Bug, with Happy Deathday getting a free pass because it's just a daft one-episode throwaway that's being carried by Roger Langridge. Of those three stories I just singled out, all three have fascinating stuff going on under the hood.

1. The Fallen is a proper sequel to the 1996 TVM, with Gray having clearly thought hard about the consequences of what, let's face it, was a goofy runaround. What he does with the Doctor-Grace relationship in particular is worthy of attention, even though it's a bit dull. (It would have been less so on original publication, when the TVM was fresher in people's minds.) He's treating the Doctor as a character like any other, whose actions are open to legitimate criticism, in a way that reminds me of New Who and strikes me as being different in approach from how the NAs and 8DAs would occasionally approach a similar-sounding premise.
2. The Glorious Dead is great, to my surprise. It sustains its length and is saying lots of stuff about theology, religious fanaticism and how mankind is both more dangerous and fundamentally more important than any monster in the universe, including the Time Lords.
3. Underneath its heartbreakingly adorable artwork, The Autonomy Bug is about our treatment of the mentally ill.

I liked those stories. Despite the DWM editorial team having sworn off story arcs after finally killing off the Threshold, this collection stands up very well as a collected narrative. The Master is introduced right at the beginning, on the second page of The Fallen. The whole thing could be regarded as an extended sequel to the 1996 TVM, in fact. Meanwhile, I also like the way the book builds up both its cast and its themes, with Katsura Sato and Junior Cyberleader Kroton being introduced naturally and the Doctor's actions being shown from beginning to end to have unintended consequences.

Unfortunately, not all the stories are particularly good. The Road to Hell is a pastiche of Japanese manga and movies, specifically Lone Wolf and Cub and Akira Kurosawa's samurai films. It's dull. The Company of Thieves is space pants with Kroton in it. It's dull too. Actually, that's it for the stories I'm not so keen on, giving Scott a 60% hit rate by story or 68% by episode count, again excluding Happy Deathday. Unfortunately, The Road to Hell and The Company of Thieves come back-to-back in the graphic collection, forming a 59-page lump.

Nevertheless, they're not horrible or anything, rating a mere two or so on the Scott Gray Dullness Scale. That's against five for stuff like Children of the Revolution or The Flood, so it could have been worse and there's nothing in this graphic collection that's bad enough to stop me recommending it..

That's the big story arc. Most of its arc material is thematic rather than "it's the Daleks again!", but that's a good thing. However, there are also several other little stories here, mostly by other writers. Adrian Salmon drew three pages of Unnatural Born Killers on spec with no script and they got him to turn it into a complete story. I believe that's still his only writing credit. There are two Roger Langridge one-off comedies, thus giving us a glorious five-episode block of Langridge since they've been moved after The Autonomy Bug. Finally, and even more excitingly, we have the original Cyberleader Kroton back-up strips from the days of the Weekly. We have STEVE MOORE, people. Not owning this book should be against the law.

Overall, this was a fascinating reread. Gray isn't as much fun as Barnes, but his stories are better constructed and his themes are richer. For a start, he has themes! That's something that didn't necessarily come across very well in seven-page monthly instalments, but collected here I thought these stories were much more interesting than I'd assumed at the time. He's underrated.