Citation Needed

"If the incident that awakened me no longer happened, how do its consequences still exist?"

Writer: Jacqueline Rayner

Format: Short Story

Released: October 2019

Printed in: The Target Storybook 13

Featuring: Eleventh Doctor, Twelfth Doctor, Thirteenth Doctor, Yaz, Ryan, Graham

Synopsis

"We're all stories in the end..."

In this exciting collection you'll find all-new stories spinning off from some of your favourite Doctor Who moments across the history of the series.

Discover what happened next, what went on before, and what occurred off-screen in an inventive selection of sequels, side-trips, foreshadowings and first-hand accounts – and look forward too, with a brand new adventure for the Thirteenth Doctor.

Each story expands in thrilling ways upon aspects of Doctor Who's enduring legend. With contributions from show luminaries past and present – including Colin Baker, Matthew Waterhouse, Vinay Patel, Joy Wilkinson and Terrance Dicks – The Target Storybook is a once-in-a-lifetime tour around the wonders of the Whoniverse.

Verdict

Citation Needed was a decent and very unique adventure to continue my reading through The Target Storybook! This was definitely an audacious and different format for a short story and I like that there was some experimentation on display as I think if there is anywhere to try something like that, it would be as part of a collection such as this one. I don't think I would be able to maintain my interest for a whole book, but for around thirty pages this worked well. It reminded me a little of The Last Dodo with the way we got a lot of definitions and information from the Encyclopaedia Gallifreya and the fact that the entire story was told from the perspective of this book was incredible! It's so strange and weird to think about and I like how it's kind of explained from my opening quote which is something fun to try and wrap your head around. While I did enjoy the story and its uniqueness, I must say that I think this is a bad use of the Eleventh Doctor in the book as a whole as it quickly stems into a Thirteenth Doctor adventure! Ordinarily, that would be absolutely fine and judging solely on the story I thought that worked really well but I just think it's a shame that we are not going to get more of a focus on the Eleventh Doctor. The illustration that started this story adorning him was brilliant though and I enjoyed the Gallifreya's entries on bow ties and how this current Doctor thought they were cool. The Encyclopaedia going through a number of different incarnations of the Doctor and their entries was fun and I love how the confusion surrounding the Meta-Crisis Doctor of Journey's End was addressed on more than occasion, but I was surprised that we didn't hark back to the War Doctor as well as I think that's really where the numbering confusion stems. The Gallifreya experiencing the events of The Name of the Doctor and getting bored of 'Doctor who?' being said throughout time was amusing and I quite enjoyed how it took more than attempt of sleeping through eternity before that was finished. Well, things got even longer when we had gone through a regeneration and we were experiencing the events of Heaven Sent through the Encyclopaedia with the Doctor constantly dying over and over again for four-and-a-half billion years. I also liked how Clara was causing issues given her nature as the impossible girl and the links to Silver Nemesis and Blood and Ice were fantastic continuity. The reaction of shock from the Gallifreya when we experienced another regeneration and this time the Thirteenth Doctor entered the fold was fun and I liked how this provided a pronoun problem. Did past entries need to be altered? That was certainly an unenviable task! The inclusion of Yaz, Ryan and Graham and their arrival as the fam was good and I liked how we even had references to The Ghost Monument and Rosa. What I wasn't expecting was the involvement of T'zim Sha and the Ux with an apparent link into The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos. That was very good and I liked how the definitions could be used as a statement when it came to describing certain elements of a species or character. We quickly delved into a fun moment where the Gallifreya used its own chameleon abilities to disguise itself as tizer and use Graham's thirst for food as a way to communicate with and warn the Doctor. Things ended a little abruptly given the links to televised episodes, but as a whole this was a good and unique Doctor Who story. 

Rating: 7/10