Liberation of the Daleks (comic story)
Liberation of the Daleks was a comic story published in Doctor Who Magazine, starring the Fourteenth Doctor, as portrayed by David Tennant.
In what was pre-emptively described by editor Marcus Hearn as an "unprecedented" move in the magazine's forty-three-year history, the strip was the first full story in any medium to star the Fourteenth Doctor, being printed a mere two-and-a-half weeks after the broadcast of The Power of the Doctor. The story picked up immediately from his regeneration at the end of that episode, officially beginning a line of stories that were affectively "in lockstep" with the television continuity for the first time in the DWM comic series.
Additionally, it was the first DWM strip since Children of the Revolution, twenty years prior, to feature the Daleks as the main enemy.
Summary
Part one
From a sheer cliff face overlooking the sea, as a beautiful new day dawns, the Doctor has been born again. Returning to his TARDIS, the newly-regenerated Fourteenth Doctor takes a look to see what the universe has to offer and is immediately distracted by a noise. Noting the changes in his new yet old body, the TARDIS suddenly dematerialises without his input; it responds that it is following Automated Protocol Epsilon Delta Rho, or in other words, is answering a distress signal. The Doctor is only too happy to help.
With the TARDIS landing for the first time in this incarnation, the Doctor sees he is outside Wembley Stadium on Saturday 30 July 1966: the date of the 1966 World Cup Final. Wondering who is supposed to be in distress, he enters the stadium with the score at 2-2 by lying to a security guard and begins to ask the crowd one by one. Realising this method is futile, he starts discreetly scanning the crowd by pretending his sonic screwdriver is a microphone, not realising he is being watched by outside forces.
Suddenly, the sonic gets a signal three rows behind him, but not a distress signal. Instead, he spots a family of four glowing faintly blue. He confidently tells them that their psychic shields should be properly adjusted in public, and as they deny all knowledge, he sonics their disguises off, revealing them to be a group of four purple-skinned and space-suited aliens. The Doctor realises they are time tourists, there to see how "Hurst hits the crossbar, ball clips the line, referee says yes, England 3-2, Kenneth Wolstenholme, people on the pitch, Hurst again, 4-2", but they dispute this, pointing out that nobody is watching the match any more.
Confused, the Doctor looks back towards the pitch where all the players have stopped. Hovering above Wembley is a giant, and terrifyingly familiar, flying saucer. As it opens up, the Doctor tries to herd the crowd out, telling them the game is over, but he cannot stop a fleet of several dozen Bronze Daleks from emerging and exterminating the players. With the Doctor stunned into silence and the time tourists looking smug, they question his assertion that the game was "all over", declaring that "it is now", as the Dalek invasion begins.
Characters
References
- The Fourteenth Doctor uses his psychic paper to enter Wembley Stadium, claiming to a security guard that he is Nobby Stiles' cousin.
- There are 98,600 fans watching the 1966 World Cup Final.
- The Doctor can speak German. When questioning random members of the crowd, he asks, "Welches team unterstützt du?", which roughly translates to, "Which team do you support?".
Notes
- This story is set immediately after The Power of the Doctor.
- This was the first Doctor Who Magazine comic story to feature the Fourteenth Doctor. The first words spoken by the Fourteenth Doctor in his comic book tenure are; "All right then, universe - what have you got for me today? What's that whauw-ing?"
- In order to avoid spoiling the appearance of the Daleks in part one, the story title was given on the spine as simply "Liberation Part 1", was not given at all on the magazine's contents page, and does not appear in the strip itself until the final page.
- This is not the first non-televised story to feature the first full, post-regenerative story for the Doctor. AUDIO: Light the Flame was the War Doctor's first post-regenerative story.
- As detailed in The Strip of a Lifetime, an article printed on the pages immediately after part one, this story was overseen by returning showrunner Russell T Davies himself, with Scott Handcock, specifically to make the TV series and DWM comics end up "in sync" for the first time. To account for this, a break in tradition saw the Fourteenth Doctor make his comic debut immediately after his regeneration scene, rather than his first full TV appearance like previous Doctors.
- The time tourists' line, "'All over'? Well... it is now" is based on the famous final words of Kenneth Wolstenholme's BBC TV commentary of the World Cup final.
- There's an error in that the tail of the last speech bubble in part one is slightly cut off.
Original print details
- (Publication with page count and closing captions)
- DWM 584: (6 pages): Next Issue: Daleks Invasion Earth 1966 A.D.!
Continuity
- The Doctor has just regenerated on a cliff. (TV: The Power of the Doctor)
- The Doctor has been at the 1966 World Cup Final during or prior to their ninth incarnation (COMIC: The Love Invasion) and twice in their eleventh incarnation. (COMIC: They Think It's All Over, PROSE: Extra Time)
- The Dalek gunsticks have fired out a red ray before. (TV: Revolution of the Daleks)
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