The Vortex (comic story)

The Vortex
Doctor:	[[doctor::Third Doctor]]
Main setting:	England, 1970s (see UNIT dating controversy an alien craft
Key crew
Writer:	Dennis Hooper
Artist:	Gerry Haylock
Release details
Printed in:	TV Action 125-129
Release date:	7 July - 4 August 1973
Format:	Comic - 5 parts (10 pages)
TVA comic stories
← Previous	The Spoilers
Next →	The Unheard Voice

The Vortex was the penultimate Doctor Who story in the pages of TV Action. A full-colour, painted strip, it followed a kind of Polystyle convention of pairing the Third Doctor with a temporary, juvenile male companion. During the story's run, the letters column of TV Action gave the name Gallifrey as the home planet of the Master — some six months before television viewers would first hear the name in The Time Warrior.

Summary

A tornado in space whisks the Third Doctor and his new friend Tom inside a vast biological computer.

Characters

• Third Doctor
• Tom Phipps
• Brian Phipps

References

to be added

Notes

to be added

Continuity

• The Third Doctor's penchant for solving problems by "reversing" something is alive and well in this story. Here, he doesn't quite "reverse the polarity", but he does "find the programming bank and reverse its order".
• The aliens who capture the Doctor and Tom have some commonality with the Atraxi. They're giant eyeballs.
• The story gives Bessie an explicit new power. At one point the Doctor is seen to turn on Bessie's "increased gravity stabliser", something the Doctor says will resist the force of a tornado.

Production errors

• Tom's father is called "Brian" in part one, but "John" in part two.
• Bessie is called "Betsy", a common Polystyle error.

Timeline

• The Vortex takes place after TVA: The Spoilers
• The Vortex takes place before TVA: The Unheard Voice