DWM comic stories

Comic stories have appeared in all but two issues of Doctor Who Magazine. Since its earliest days as Doctor Who Weekly, the publication has been home to many types of strips, but the most durable has been the one featuring the then-current televised Doctor. This "main strip" has usually been told in a multi-part format. Beyond these continuing adventures of the Doctor, the magazine has at different times printed comic adaptations of classic science fiction stories, reprints of original science-fiction stories from American comic book anthologies, reprints of strips originally printed in Polystyle or City Magazines publications, and original strips not featuring the Doctor which were nevertheless set in the Whoniverse.

Overview

In 1979, Marvel UK wrested control of the license to produce Doctor Who comics from Polystyle. Editor Dez Skinn immediately changed the style of the comic strip by hiring youngsters who were principally comic book artists, rather than the cartoonists and illustrators who had been in charge of Polystyle's output. With soon-to-be-luminaries like Dave Gibbons, Pat Mills and John Wagner working on the main strip and Alan Moore, Steve Moore, Steve Dillon and Steve Parkhouse initially handling the back-ups, Skinn instantly brought modern — and more American — sensibilities to the comic Doctor Who world.

At the same time, those early issues of Doctor Who Weekly brought American comic strips in front of British eyes by having a long series of reprints taken straight from Marvel's long line of American science fiction anthologies. Called variously "Tales from the TARDIS" and "Time Tales", the non-Whoniverse backup strips of those early issues involved a few panels of the Fourth Doctor framing a Marvel US adaptation of a classic science fiction story or an original strip taken from a Marvel US science fiction anthology of the 1950s or 1960s. Borrowed as they were from Marvel US, they featured the talents of Marvel legends Steve Ditko, Jack Kirby, Chris Claremont, and even Stan Lee himself. Skinn also resurrected the long-out-of-print Dalek Tapes stories that had originally appeared in TV Century 21. For a time, Doctor Who Weekly regularly had three or four different strips in each issue.

Skinn's successors rather quickly ended the non-Whoniverse material, and made reprints of 1960s material increasingly sporadic. But the non-Doctor original back-ups remained well past the time the magazine became Doctor Who Monthly. These backups, however, dried up at about the time the Sixth Doctor debuted. By the end of the 1980s, the magazine generally ran only the main Doctor Who strip. However, there were rare instances when a Polystyle comic made its way into print during the 1990s. These occasional reprints ended entirely by the dawn of the 21st century. In the 1990s DWM temporarily ran a series of comic strips featuring past Doctors in lieu of the then-current Seventh Doctor, but from 1996 it once again featured exclusively the current Doctor.

Today, Doctor Who Magazine exclusively publishes a single original comic strip per issue. As has been the case since 1979, most stories are serialised and told over the course of several issues, with the occasional single-chapter standalone. Originally published in black and white, the comic strip has been published in colour since the early 2000s.

Reprints

Many of the comic strips have been reprinted a number of times in, or as, various publications, including as a series of mini-comics given away free in multi-packs of crisp snacks.

Doctor Who Magazine material was first reprinted in America via the Marvel Premiere anthology series in the early 1980s. When sales proved favourable, a new title, Doctor Who (1984), was launched. Though cancelled just shy of its two-year anniversary, the title managed to reprint almost all of the Fourth and Fifth Doctors' DWM runs. It also offered some prominent American artists, such as Dave Cockrum and George Roussos, an opportunity to offer pinup and cover artwork of Doctor Who subjects. Like many DWM reprints, Doctor Who (1984) presented its reprints in colour. Towards the end of 2007, IDW Publishing picked up the option to again reprint colourised versions of DWM comic strips in a monthly American series entitled Doctor Who Classics, reprinting stories up to the early Seventh Doctor era, plus a two-volume standalone, Grant Morrison's Doctor Who, reprinting Morrison's output from DWM. IDW also published several omnibus trade paperbacks featuring DWM strip reprints. The reprints ended with IDW's loss of their license to publish Doctor Who comics.

In the UK, Panini undertook a long project to digitally restore all Doctor Who Magazine comics, and faithfully reprint the comics from their original masters. In most cases, this has meant the first monochromatic reprinting of most DWM strips. It has also offered the creative teams an opportunity to add explanatory notes and original concept artwork. These large-format volumes have to date covered most of the history of DWM from 1979 onwards.

Doctor Who Magazine's comic strips have also been a key feature of hardback publications like the series of Doctor Who Yearbooks, Doctor Who annuals and Doctor Who Storybooks, as well as numerous special, seasonal issues of DWM itself.

Main strips by issue

DWM	Title	Doctor	Featuring	Collected In
1-8	The Iron Legion	4th		The Iron Legion
9-16	City of the Damned	4th		The Iron Legion
17-18	Timeslip	1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th	K9	The Tides of Time
19-26	The Star Beast	4th	K9, Sharon	The Iron Legion
27-34	The Dogs of Doom	4th	K9, Sharon, Daleks	The Iron Legion
35-38	The Time Witch	4th	K9, Sharon	The Iron Legion
39-45	Dragon's Claw	4th	K9, Sharon, Sontaran	Dragon's Claw
46	The Collector	4th	K9, Sharon	Dragon's Claw
47-48	Dreamers of Death	4th	K9, Sharon	Dragon's Claw
49-50	The Life Bringer	4th	K9	Dragon's Claw
51	War of the Words	4th	K9	Dragon's Claw
52	Spider-God	4th		Dragon's Claw
53	The Deal	4th		Dragon's Claw
54-55	End of the Line	4th		Dragon's Claw
56-57	The Free-Fall Warriors	4th		Dragon's Claw
58-59	Junkyard Demon	4th	Cybermen	Dragon's Claw
60	The Neutron Knights	4th		Dragon's Claw
61-67	The Tides of Time	5th	Shayde	The Tides of Time
68-69	Stars Fell on Stockbridge	5th	Maxwell	The Tides of Time
70-75	The Stockbridge Horror	5th		The Tides of Time
76-77	Lunar Lagoon	5th	Angus	The Tides of Time
78-83	4-Dimensional Vistas	5th	Angus, The Monk, Ice Warriors	The Tides of Time
84,86-87	The Moderator	5th	Angus	The Tides of Time
88-89	The Shape Shifter	6th	Frobisher	Voyager
90-94	Voyager	6th	Frobisher	Voyager
95-97	Polly the Glot	6th	Frobisher	Voyager
98-99	Once Upon a Time Lord	6th	Frobisher	Voyager
100-101	War-Game	6th	Frobisher	Voyager
102-103	Funhouse	6th	Frobisher	Voyager
104	Kane's Story	6th	Peri, Frobisher	Voyager
105	Abel's Story	6th	Peri, Frobisher	Voyager
106	The Warrior's Story	6th	Peri, Frobisher	Voyager
107	Frobisher's Story	6th	Peri, Frobisher	Voyager
108	Exodus	6th	Peri, Frobisher	The World Shapers
109	Revelation!	6th	Peri, Frobisher, Cybermen	The World Shapers
110	Genesis!	6th	Peri, Frobisher, Cybermen	The World Shapers
111-113	Nature of the Beast!	6th	Peri, Frobisher	The World Shapers
114-116	Time Bomb	6th	Frobisher	The World Shapers
117	Salad Daze	6th	Peri, Frobisher	The World Shapers
118-119	Changes	6th	Peri, Frobisher	The World Shapers
120-122	Profits of Doom!	6th	Peri, Frobisher	The World Shapers
123-126	The Gift	6th	Peri, Frobisher	The World Shapers
127-129	The World Shapers	6th	Peri, Frobisher, Jamie	The World Shapers
130-133	A Cold Day in Hell!	7th	Frobisher, Ice Warriors	A Cold Day in Hell!
134	Redemption!	7th		A Cold Day in Hell!
135	The Crossroads of Time	7th		A Cold Day in Hell!
136-138	Claws of the Klathi!	7th		A Cold Day in Hell!
139	Culture Shock!	7th		A Cold Day in Hell!
140	Keepsake	7th		A Cold Day in Hell!
141-142	Planet of the Dead	7th		A Cold Day in Hell!
143-144	Echoes of the Mogor!	7th		A Cold Day in Hell!
145-146	Time and Tide	7th		A Cold Day in Hell!
147	Follow That TARDIS!	7th	The Monk	A Cold Day in Hell!
148-150	Invaders from Gantac!	7th		A Cold Day in Hell!
152-155	Nemesis of the Daleks	7th	Abslom Daak, Daleks	Nemesis of the Daleks
156	Stairway to Heaven	7th		Nemesis of the Daleks
157-158	Hunger from the Ends of Time! (The Incredible Hulk Presents reprint)	7th		Nemesis of the Daleks
159-161	Train-Flight	7th	Sarah Jane	Nemesis of the Daleks
162	Doctor Conkerer!	7th		Nemesis of the Daleks
164-166	Fellow Travellers	7th	Ace	The Good Soldier
167	Darkness, Falling	-	The Brigadier	The Good Soldier
168	Distractions	7th	Ace	The Good Soldier
169-172	The Mark of Mandragora	7th	Ace, The Brigadier	The Good Soldier
173	Party Animals	7th	Ace	The Good Soldier
174	The Chameleon Factor	7th	Ace	The Good Soldier
175-178	The Good Soldier	7th	Ace, Cybermen	The Good Soldier
179	A Glitch in Time	7th	Ace	The Good Soldier
180	Evening's Empire (Part One only)	7th	Ace
181	The Fires Down Below (backup strip reprint)	-
182	Spider-God (reprint)	4th		Dragon's Claw
183	Conflict of Interests	-	Sontarans
184	Business as Usual (backup strip reprint)	-	Nestene Consciousness, Autons
185-187	The Grief	7th	Ace
188-190	Ravens	7th
191	Memorial	7th	Ace
192	Cat Litter	7th	Ace
193-196	Pureblood	7th	Benny, Sontarans, Rutan
197-202	Emperor of the Daleks!	6th, 7th	Benny, Peri, Abslom Daak, Daleks
203-206	Final Genesis	7th	Ace, Benny
207	Time & Time Again	1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th	Susan, Jamie, Zoe, Adric, Frobisher, Ace, Benny
208-210	Cuckoo	7th	Ace, Benny
211	Uninvited Guest	7th
212-214	Victims	4th	Romana II
215-217	The Lunar Strangers	5th	Tegan, Turlough
218-220	Food for Thought	1st	Ben, Polly
221-223	Change of Mind	3rd	Liz, The Brigadier
224-226	Land of the Blind	2nd	Jamie, Zoe
227	Up Above the Gods	6th	Davros
228-230	The Curse of the Scarab	5th	Peri
231-233	Operation Proteus	1st	Susan
234	Target Practice	3rd	Jo, The Brigadier, Benton
235-237	Black Destiny	4th	Sarah Jane, Harry
238-242	Ground Zero	7th	Susan, Sarah Jane, Peri, Ace
243	Doctor Who and the Fangs of Time	4th
244-247	Endgame	8th	Izzy, Maxwell, The Celestial Toymaker	Endgame
248-249	The Keep	8th	Izzy	Endgame
250	A Life of Matter and Death	8th	Izzy	Endgame
251-255	Fire and Brimstone	8th	Izzy, Daleks	Endgame
256	By Hook or By Crook	8th	Izzy	Endgame
257-260	Tooth and Claw	8th	Izzy, Fey	Endgame
262-265	The Final Chapter	8th	Izzy, Fey, Shayde, Rassilon	Endgame
266-271	Wormwood	8th	Izzy, Fey, Shayde	Endgame
272	Happy Deathday	1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th	Izzy	The Glorious Dead
273-276	The Fallen	8th	Izzy, Grace, The Master	The Glorious Dead
277	Unnatural Born Killers	-	Kroton, Sontarans	The Glorious Dead
278-282	The Road to Hell	8th	Izzy	The Glorious Dead
283	TV Action!	8th	Izzy	The Glorious Dead
284-286	The Company of Thieves	8th	Izzy, Kroton	The Glorious Dead
287-296	The Glorious Dead	8th	Izzy, Kroton, The Master	The Glorious Dead
297-299	The Autonomy Bug	8th	Izzy	The Glorious Dead
300-303	Ophidius	8th	Izzy, Destrii	Oblivion
304	Beautiful Freak	8th	Izzy	Oblivion
305	The Last Word	7th	Ace, Benny
306,308-310	The Way of All Flesh	8th	Izzy	Oblivion
307	Flower Power (TV Comic reprint)	2nd	John and Gillian, Cybermen
311	Character Assassin	-	The Master	Oblivion
312-317	Children of the Revolution	8th	Izzy, Daleks	Oblivion
318	Me and My Shadow	-	Feyde	Oblivion
319-322	Uroboros	8th	Feyde, Destrii	Oblivion
323-328	Oblivion	8th	Izzy, Feyde, Destrii	Oblivion
329	Where Nobody Knows Your Name	8th	Frobisher	The Flood
330-332	The Nightmare Game	8th		The Flood
333	The Power of Thoueris!	8th		The Flood
334-336	The Curious Tale of Spring-Heeled Jack	8th		The Flood
337	The Land of Happy Endings	8th	John and Gillian	The Flood
338-342	Bad Blood	8th	Destrii	The Flood
343-345	Sins of the Fathers	8th	Destrii	The Flood
346-353	The Flood	8th	Destrii, Cybermen	The Flood
355-357	The Love Invasion	9th	Rose, Ben, Polly	The Cruel Sea
358	Art Attack	9th	Rose	The Cruel Sea
359-362	The Cruel Sea	9th	Rose	The Cruel Sea
363-364	A Groatsworth of Wit	9th	Rose	The Cruel Sea
365-367	The Betrothal of Sontar	10th	Rose, Sontarans	The Betrothal of Sontar
368	The Lodger	10th	Rose, Mickey, Jackie	The Betrothal of Sontar
369-371	F.A.Q.	10th	Rose	The Betrothal of Sontar
372-374	The Futurists	10th	Rose	The Betrothal of Sontar
375-376	Interstellar Overdrive	10th	Rose	The Betrothal of Sontar
377	The Green-Eyed Monster	10th	Rose, Mickey, Jackie	The Betrothal of Sontar
378-380	The Warkeeper's Crown	10th	The Brigadier	The Betrothal of Sontar
381-384	The Woman Who Sold the World	10th	Martha	The Widow's Curse
385	Bus Stop	10th	Martha	The Widow's Curse
386-389	The First	10th	Martha	The Widow's Curse
390	Death to the Doctor!	10th	Martha	The Widow's Curse
391-393	Universal Monsters	10th	Martha	The Widow's Curse
394	Hotel Historia	10th	Majenta	The Crimson Hand
395-398	The Widow's Curse	10th	Donna, Sycorax	The Widow's Curse
399	The Time of My Life	10th	Donna	The Widow's Curse
400-402	Thinktwice	10th	Majenta	The Crimson Hand
403-405	The Stockbridge Child	10th	Majenta, Maxwell	The Crimson Hand
406-407	Mortal Beloved	10th	Majenta	The Crimson Hand
408-411	The Age of Ice	10th	Majenta	The Crimson Hand
412	The Deep Hereafter	10th	Majenta	The Crimson Hand
413	Onomatopoeia	10th	Majenta	The Crimson Hand
414-415	Ghosts of the Northern Line	10th	Majenta	The Crimson Hand
416-420	The Crimson Hand	10th	Majenta	The Crimson Hand
421-423	Supernature	11th	Amy	The Child of Time
424	Planet Bollywood	11th	Amy	The Child of Time
425-428	The Golden Ones	11th	Amy, Axos	The Child of Time
429	The Professor, the Queen and the Bookshop	11th	Amy	The Child of Time
430-431	The Screams of Death	11th	Amy	The Child of Time
432	Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night	11th	Amy	The Child of Time
433-434	Forever Dreaming	11th	Amy	The Child of Time
435-437	Apotheosis	11th	Amy	The Child of Time
438-441	The Child of Time	11th	Amy	The Child of Time
442-445	The Chains of Olympus	11th	Amy, Rory	The Chains of Olympus
446-447	Sticks & Stones	11th	Amy, Rory	The Chains of Olympus
448-450	The Cornucopia Caper	11th	Amy, Rory	The Chains of Olympus
451-454	The Broken Man	11th	Amy, Rory	Hunters of the Burning Stone
455	Imaginary Enemies	-	Amy, Rory, Mels	Hunters of the Burning Stone
456-461	Hunters of the Burning Stone	11th	Ian, Barbara	Hunters of the Burning Stone
462-464	A Wing and a Prayer	11th	Clara	The Blood of Azrael
465-466	Welcome to Tickle Town	11th	Clara	The Blood of Azrael
467	John Smith and the Common Men	11th	Clara	The Blood of Azrael
468-469	Pay the Piper	11th	Clara	The Blood of Azrael
470-474	The Blood of Azrael	11th	Clara	The Blood of Azrael
475-476	The Crystal Throne	-	Vastra, Jenny, Strax	The Eye of Torment
477-480	The Eye of Torment	12th	Clara	The Eye of Torment
481-483	The Instruments of War	12th	Clara, Sontarans	The Eye of Torment
484	Space Invaders!	12th	Clara
485-488	Blood and Ice	12th	Clara	The Eye of Torment
487-491	Spirits of the Jungle	12th	Clara
492-493	The Highgate Horror	12th	Clara
494-495	The Dragon Lord	12th	Clara
496	Theatre of the Mind	12th	Clara
497-499	Witch Hunt	12th	Clara
500	The Stockbridge Showdown	12th	Maxwell, Sharon, Frobisher, Izzy, Destrii, Majenta
501-	The Pestilent Heart	12th