Crisis on Kaldor

"Centuries have passed since man first colonised Kaldor, thriving on the riches mined from the swirling sands by their robotic servants..."

Writer: Steve Moore

Format: Comic Strip

Released: March 1981

Series: DWM 50

Featuring: Fourth Doctor

Synopsis 

There's conflict amongst the three varying types of robot on Kaldor, and this enhances to a crisis once a fourth kind is introduced in the form of an Ultra-Voc.

Verdict 

Crisis on Kaldor was a good little, and I mean that literally, comic strip! You'd think for a 50th issue story (something I'd consider a landmark!) you'd have an extended story rather than a 'backup' one as it seems to have been dubbed. I liked how the story events themselves were Doctor-less yet as you may have noticed my 'Featuring' says Fourth Doctor and that's because it seemed like he was narrating the story! We did get a graphic of the cheeky Tom Baker at the beginning telling us what we may have forgotten from The Robots of Death and I think the recap really did help to understand what was happening in the story. It was quite similar in places with the robot conflict and mining. The dialogue was good and I loved the idea of a fourth type of robot on Kaldor! The Ultra-Voc. I'd love that concept to be taken a whole lot further in the future whether that be on TV, audio, comic strip or prose I really don't mind! Corpse Maker is a novel I really am anticipating to read at some point in the future to learn more about these infamous Doctor Who enemies. The TV serial is rightfully considered an absolute classic and there's a reason these robots have returned in this comic and then later in audio and in novelised format. The characters of Orikon and Korkolo were decent and I liked how they thought man was far superior to robots, and that humorously caused the apparent death of one of them! Disassembling an impersonating robot because the deactivate switch doesn't work. Genius comedy! I'm not really sure what else there is to say with the story only spanning 4 pages but I really liked what I read! The Doctor narrating, I think, and continuation from the brilliant The Robots of Death. A good 'backup' comic indeed!

Rating: 8/10