Sticks & Stones

"You're rewriting the language centres of the human brain, then the DNA code of their entire bodies! You're translating them into living names!"

Writer: Scott Gray 

Format: Comic Strip

Released: April - May 2012

Printed in: DWM 446-447

Featuring: Eleventh Doctor, Amy, Rory

Synopsis 

As an Allen graffiti artist attacks London, the Doctor discovers that the sticks and stones rhyme is incorrect - words can hit you! 

Verdict 

Sticks & Stones was a great comic strip to continue along my reading of The Chains of Olympus graphic novel! It's not going to be a long read as opposed to some other graphic novels that I've done like Oblivion and The Child of Time as I've only got the one story left to do but that just makes the fact I borrowed this from the college library all the more beneficial. I absolutely loved the name of the story once I'd read the contents! It was really clever I must say. I liked how the Doctor and his companions were separated for the majority of the story and I also thought it was quite funny, for whatever reason, that on today's Election Day I should be reading a comic strip where a 24 hour news channel is featured! They'll be getting a lot of views over the next few days as we look to see who will form the next government. Let's hope my vote counted and the Conservatives got in! I think I'll be calling on the Doctor if Ed Milinand is looking likely to be Prime Minister when I wake in the morning. Speaking of which, I thought the characterisation of Matt Smith's Eleventh Doctor was spot on in this story. I was really impressed with that. I also think they've got Rory nailed down but, despite them doing better with Amy, I'm still not sure it's justifiably representable of the companion. I liked the artwork in the story and the idea of a graffiti artist targeting historic London landmarks was great! The culprit never got caught and wasn't even seen in doing the act. Of course, there was something alien about the mysterious Monos. It appearing on the likes of Big Ben and St Paul's Cathedral, historic landmarks in Doctor Who (Aliens of London and The Invasion), was magnificent. I liked the reference to The Chains of Olympus with the Doctor typically referring to Rory as Roranicus. I think the Doctor's going to like that one! The appearance of good old Boris Johnson in a Doctor Who comic strip was excellent (again, on today of all days!) as that really was not expected! The artwork was actually terrific of the mayor of London. The cliffhanger was decent with people being literally translated into walking words. Well, just the same word repeated. Monos. Everywhere people turned there was Monos. Everywhere people spoke it was Monos. The same word over and over, and Amy was caught in the middle. The reference to the TARDIS food machine, something that I adored back in the era of the First Doctor, was wonderful. I loved how Judy was dyslexic and couldn't read that all of the words were Monos! I loved that revelation. The Doctor's reaction to discovering that was great to see. Despite all the doom and gloom, there was somehow quite a happy atmosphere I found. That was until the rather fancy spaceship was entered and the Doctor came face to face with a necrotist. This seemed to be a little preview of what would become the Eleventh Doctor's swansong in comic strip format, The Blood of Azrael. The artwork wasn't quite as disturbing as it was in that story but any necrotist can't be a good thing. The way the Doctor and Rory ended up defeating the evil artist was good but I wasn't convinced on the amount of jumbled dialogue that came from the TARDIS translation being scrambled. That hurt the story I felt. But overall, a very good little adventure with a nice lead in to the next story and the graphic novel's finale. 

Rating: 8/10