Night Flight to Nowhere

"One day he would get himself a companion who didn't talk so much."

Writer: Unknown
Format: Short Story
Released: August 1982
Printed in: Doctor Who Annual 1983

Featuring: Fifth Doctor

Synopsis

Tegan has convinced the Doctor to bring her to Heathrow Airport to catch up with her best friend from stewardess training, but she finds that Julie Harris is not acting of her own free will. She's due to steward a flight chartered by Rupert Masters of the Masters Corporation...

Verdict

Night Flight to Nowhere was a very decent way to conclude my reading of the 1983 Doctor Who Annual! Any story featuring the Master is usually a good way to lure me in and I was delighted that he appeared in a brand new adventure with the Fifth Doctor that was actually produced at the time of his era. The historian in me kind of views this as a primary source and for me to not have explored it until now made for delightful reading. I was bitterly disappointed to find that my copy of the Annual, purchased on eBay some time ago, had the last two pages of this story ripped out which left me with somewhat of a tarnished feel. I really wish I had checked when I bought it some time ago, but thankfully my girlfriend's Scribd subscription allowed me to complete the story in its whole. The plot is an audacious one with the Master essentially hijacking a plane and its crew, as well as several of the world's best-positioned people who he could do with what he pleased. I was quite stunned at how similar the story was to Aliens of London/World War Three with his ultimate aim something resembling a future Slitheen plan. Why didn't the Master take credit for the plan when he announced the reopening of Downing Street in The Sound of Drums? It's certainly something I'd expect him to do, but I do question how seriously Russell T Davies would have taken the Doctor Who Annuals. Their questionability continued in the usual form of the illustrations with the Master looking something like an older version of Roger Delgado's incarnation. Now, there's nothing at all wrong with that and I would love to get more adventures with that version of the Master before it all collapsed in The Deadly Assassin, and we did get that with A Doorway to Hell, but I'll assume here that it wasn't the intention. I'll ignore intentions though and say that the Fifth Doctor has met the first on screen Master. I like the thought of that. I thought Tegan did well as companion but I couldn't help but laugh, probably for the wrong reasons, at the Doctor's line about her that I just had to use as my opening quote for the adventure. Their relationship really is rather unique in Doctor Who history and this is just another element to add to what is a disdainful past and time together. Nyssa didn't have much to do in this story which was a shame but I liked how she seemed so normal compared to Tegan. The Master's painfully obvious disguise for the corporation was magnificent and exactly what I'd hope for at this time in the character's chronology so that was terrific. I thought we could have learned a little more about the plane's intended destination of the Master's domain through the gash in the sky which was a little bit of a shame, and I felt a little let down about the ending. I can fully appreciate the word restraints but the Doctor just shifting everyone into the TARDIS, which didn't seem possible with the minimal time left before entering the gash, seemed a little cheap to me. It was too easy and it didn't have the Doctor deal with the Master. He knew he'd come back though which was fantastic. Overall though, I still really liked this tale and thought the plan of the Master was excellent and would be better served in a story that had the capabilities to expand upon it.

Rating: 7/10