The Monsters of Coal Hill School

"You will teach us! We will learn through your books and then take over your world!"

Writer: Moray Laing
Format: Comic Strip
Released: September 2014
Printed in: Doctor Who Annual 2015

Featuring: Twelfth Doctor, Clara

Synopsis 

The Doctor is missing the company of his companion Clara whilst she is carrying out her life teaching English at Coal Hill School. But as the Doctor arrives at the landmark location he discovered that the school has been taken over by monsters, and Clara is teaching them.

Verdict 

The Monsters of Coal Hill School was a good and rather unique comic strip story to kick off my adventures for our brand new Twelfth Doctor in this format. As you may know, I wait until the DWM range stories are fully complete before I read them so personally this marks Capaldi's debut in the range for me. Well, I guess Road Rage might be an exception if you count a shadow and hand as an appearance. So back to the story at hand and I felt that for an Annual comic strip, some of which can be pretty poor standard and art-wise but here I thought that both were of higher quality than recent Annuals before it. I felt the Doctor was sourly misrepresented in print on the first page with all the smiles and then later with the barrister sliding, but I liked the dialogue when he met Jeff, the French teacher. The setting was good and like Remembrance of the Daleks, School Reunion and The Caretaker before it, school is always a good basis of a story. The creatures were intriguing and I loved the concept of how they planned on taking over the planet... after being taught of its history and occurrences through the people they'd enslave. Clara's attempt of teaching the creatures was quite comical! At first, I disagreed strongly with the way the TARDIS was thrown off a cliff just outside the school. There's obviously no room for that as we've seen the school in a few TV stories. Thankfully, that was explained well and it seemed Coal Hill had been moved geographically, as had the planet. Just how the TARDIS managed to locate it I'm not entirely sure though. The resolution though was magical, absolutely wonderful. The Doctor took on the role of teacher and, although we didn't hear what was said, I like to imagine the Doctor echoed his words to the Sycorax at the end of The Christmas Invasion with the planet being protected. I also like to think that the Doctor told them of invasion attempts that he thwarted. If I was to pick some good examples of him to use as evidence then The Dalek Invasion of Earth, Spearhead from Space and The End of Time come to mind. Overall, a very decent story for the Annuals! 

Rating: 8/10