The Love Invasion (comic story)

The Love Invasion
Doctor:	Ninth Doctor
Companion(s):	Rose
Main enemy:	Igrix
Main setting:	London, 1966
Key crew
Editor:	Clayton Hickman
Writers:	Gareth Roberts, Clayton Hickman
Penciller:	Mike Collins
Inker:	David A. Roach
Colourist:	Dylan Teague James Offredi (part two only)
Letterer:	Roger Langridge
Release details
Printed in:	Doctor Who Magazine 355-357
Release date:	31 March - 28 May 2005
Cover date:	27 April - 22 June 2005
Traded in:	The Cruel Sea
Format:	Comic - 3 parts
DWM comic stories
← Previous	The Flood
Next →	Art Attack

The Love Invasion was a comic story published in Doctor Who Magazine, plotted by Gareth Roberts and Clayton Hickman, and scripted by Roberts alone. It was the first comic strip to feature the Ninth Doctor and Rose Tyler. It also featured the brief return of former companions Ben Jackson and Polly Wright in a cameo role.

Summary

The Ninth Doctor takes Rose Tyler to London in the year 1966, where they find beautiful girls wandering the streets, doing good on behalf of a group called Lend-a-Hand. The Doctor notes the girls don't smell human. He becomes concerned when he discovers that someone is preparing to build affordable family housing on the fields where Rose's council estate is supposed to be built.

Plot

The Ninth Doctor and Rose Tyler travel to the site of Rose's estate before it was built in 1966, London. They discover someone has been changing history, and a housing development called Brandon Mews has been built on the estate's future, even though there should have been nothing there except fields. The Doctor goes to a pub to check The Daily Mirror for any other alterations to history, and discovers the football score in the World Cup had England scoring an extra goal against West Germany.

Later, the Doctor learns from Charlotte Cobb that her husband, Peter Cobb, had mysteriously died after being followed by Lend-a-Hand girls, Rose went to Lend-a-Hand House and found that humans were also being converted into Lend-a-Hand girls. Travelling to Lend-a-Hand House, the Doctor discovered the Kustollon Igrix has travelled back in time, and plans to use Lend-a-Hand girls, initially made up of female humans, but later including biotechnology grown from Kustollon gene-stuff, to alter history so that humanity would be given whatever they desire and never venture out into space, and consequently never win a battle between Earth and Kustollia in 3046. Igrix' first major step is to destroy the Moon in 1966, removing any staging post for Earth to have to break out into space. With the help of Peter's work on DNA resequencing, the Doctor creats a virus containing genetic instructions from Rose in the form of perfume, which Rose throws at the Lend-a-Hand girls, making them humans with human instructions.

The Doctor and Rose climb to the top of the Post Office Tower to stop Igrix using his spaceship to fire at the Moon. The Doctor sprays the human virus at his biotech ship. Now, the ship refuses to take orders from Igrix, and flies into space to explore and spend some "quality time" with Igrix. Setting history back on course, the Doctor uses his sonic screwdriver to destroy the housing development, and make them start over and build Rose's future home, the Powell Estate.

Characters

• Ninth Doctor
• Rose Tyler
• Charlotte Cobb
• Shirley Gilbert
• Igrix
• Mr Love
• Peter Cobb
• Shopper
• Barman
• Scooter owner
• Cart owner
• Ben Jackson
• Polly Wright

Worldbuilding

Ben proposing to Polly.

• The Doctor lists the warriors of Sun Tzu, the Ottoman Empire and Oligocene era as sights he can take Rose to see.
• A poster on the wall of a pub reads "Bad Wolf".
• The Doctor eats bread, chocolate and a chicken leg to save himself after Charlotte sprays him with a poisonous concoction.
• The Doctor screams "Geronimo" as he jumps from a building.
• The Doctor tells Charlotte that some of his best friends have attempted to kill him at some point.
• Rose got a D in her GCSE science, with the Doctor commenting he failed most of his exams as well.
• After being told their not a couple, Charlotte asks if Rose's relationship with the Doctor is more akin to Batman and Robin.
• Ben presents Polly with an engagement ring.

Notes

• The first words spoken by the Ninth Doctor in his comic book tenure are: "Best thing about sixties London, Rose... Only place in the universe where the TARDIS has any cop as a disguise!"
• The Love Invasion was the only Ninth Doctor comic story to be published during his tenure as the incumbent Doctor.
• When the Doctor finds Shirley has followed him to the Lend-a-Hand building instead of going home as he told her, he appears to break the fourth wall to address the readers of DWM by saying: "Why does nobody ever do what I ask 'em to do? Is there a tattoo on my forehead, 'Ignore this bloke and any sensible thing he tells you'?"

Continuity

• Igrix remarks he could have prevented the assassination of John F. Kennedy if he had travelled back further than 1966, with the Doctor alluding to his own attempt to save John F. Kennedy. (TV: Rose)
• Igrix leaves his ship on top of the Post Office Tower, which the Doctor calls "one unlucky building", harkening back to his encounter with the computer WOTAN. (TV: The War Machines)