The Face of the Enemy

"They weren't bound to the TARDIS any more."

Writer: David A. McIntee

Format: Novel

Released: January 1998

Series: PDA 07

Featuring: Brigadier, Ian, Barbara

Synopsis

The Doctor and Jo have gone off in the TARDIS, leaving the Brigadier and UNIT facing a deadly mystery – and a moral dilemma...

Robbery and murder are on the increase in Britain as disputes between underworld gangs escalate into open warfare on the streets. The Master seems inextricably linked to the chaos – despite the fact he is safely under lock and key.

Meanwhile UNIT is called in when a plane missing in strange circumstances is rediscovered – contaminated with radiation and particle damage that cannot possibly have occurred on Earth. 

As the mystery deepens, what little light they can shed on the matter leads the Brigadier to believe that with the Doctor away, Earth's only hope may lie with its greatest enemy..

Verdict

The Face of the Enemy was a very good novel and a unique read to say the least! It seems slightly out of place in the Past Doctors Adventures range given that the Doctor is not appearing in this book outside of the opening and closing couple of pages, but it's a great chance to explore the Doctor Who universe when the Doctor isn't around. It brings a lovely amalgamation of characters together and we end up with a lot of intriguing happenings. I like how the scene was set in the opening chapter of the robbery of Magnum Bank which I thought was very exciting and even though we knew that the Master was going to be involved, keeping him hidden until 55 pages in worked well and it made his arrival have an impact. UNIT taking the lead in the book was wonderful and I'm surprised that this didn't spawn a further range of adventures for the organisation! The Brigadier really did shine without the Doctor and even though the scientific advisor had swanned off in the TARDIS with Jo, his lack of presence was very much felt which I liked. But they couldn't just wait around with what was happening! I thought the role of that bank robbery and the Master losing money in the millions was good but the bravado of the Delgado incarnation was captured in the prose wonderfully well. I was really impressed with how well he was written and I loved just how calm he was throughout! The arrivals of Ian and Barbra into the story were wonderful and I think it's a lovely idea to bring them back into the fold a decade or so after they returned from their travels in the TARDIS during the The Chase. There were countless references to a number of their televised adventures which was great and right up my ally, and I also loved just how much they were in love. I think it's crazy that the pair were never explicitly depicted as being together on screen but at least here we get to know that they are married and have a son called John. Their reaction to finding that the Doctor had a job at UNIT was terrific and I would have loved to have seen their face when they learned this. The story taking place concurrently with The Curse of Peladon was a really clever idea and whilst I love the opportunity this book presented through its setting, it was a shame that the Doctor didn't get to be reunited with Ian and Barbara. Those two were fantastic throughout and I thought the moment where Barbara's death was faked was spectacular. His reaction to that was understandably distraught and the fact that he was suicidal and nearly followed through on that was incredibly powerful. The fact that it was the Master that talked him out of it was incredible as well! However, the Master showed how callous he could be when it came to him being told that the body wasn't actually Barbara, but he didn't tell Ian that fact because he wanted to harness his desire for revenger against Boucher and co. For a lead villain of the Conclave, which was brilliant organisation in of itself, Kyle was tremendous. I was really impressed with her throughout and she was a great character to go up against the Master. Her knowledge of him and his previous aliases was really good and presented a fun dynamic and it was really nice to know that we had a very knowledgeable villain. The links this story had with Inferno and it essentially being a sequel was excellent and something I didn't see coming. It was a really impressive way to explain the doppelgänger situation that was happening and the political links worked well as well. The description of the Earth from the parallel universe that the Doctor narrowly escaped from after the Inferno Poroject went wrong was superb and I really liked how the few survivors from that disaster wanted to take their place on this universe's Earth, but also to take out their counterparts. That was a really fun concept. I thought the likes of Benton and Yates had strong showings in the book, but it was all about the Brigadier for me. He was marvellous and had wonderfully strong feelings against the Master. His imprisonment and having this placed between The Daemons and The Sea Devils was marvellous. Everything worked out well. The deaths of Grant and Boucher at the hands of the Master extended his position as a great villain and the impact they had was felt in a big way. The death of Boucher in particular was quite something after Ian showed what he believed to be his wife's killer mercy. The little epilogue at the end with the Doctor and Jo returning from Peladon was fun and the Brigadier not explaining the events of the previous week or so was great stuff. Overall, a very good novel! 

Rating: 8/10