Doctor Who and the Iron Legion

"I fear Neo-Rome will never be free."

Writer: Alan Barnes (Adapted from Pat Mills & John Wagner)

Format: Audio 

Released: March 2019

Series: Comic Strip Adaptations 1.01

Featuring: Fourth Doctor

Synopsis

1979 AD! Led by the terrible General Ironicus, the mighty Iron Legion – robot veterans of the Eternal War – have come, seen and conquered the English village of Stockbridge! 

Caught up in the mayhem, the Doctor pursues the Legion back through the great Dimension Duct to their place of origin – an alternative Earth where Rome never fell...

But can he survive the horrors of the gladiatorial Hyp-Arena long enough to uncover the terrifying secret at the heart of the Galactic Roman Empire?

Verdict

Doctor Who and the Iron Legion was an ambitious and unique take on the comic strip adventure of the same name! I must admit that I was massively excited by the announcement of the Comic Strip Adaptations a few years ago, but unfortunately this wasn't quite all I anticipated it to be. I love the idea of bringing comic strips to life and giving a voice to a number of characters we previously only saw speech bubbles for, but I think the nature of the story and its proximity to the comic strip format meant it couldn't really get going to a massively high standard on audio. I was surprised that it was a two-hour release as that is a lot of expansion on a comic strip story, even a particularly large one, but it flows relatively well and is padded out enough to warrant the time. I like how it seemed to almost take a Target books approach and provide some expansion on the original tale, specifically in naming the village as Stockbridge. That's just excellent and it's nice to think that the village now features in a variation of the very first Doctor Who Magazine strip. I thought Tom Baker was great as the Fourth Doctor and he excels in this kind of adventure where he doesn't need to be too serious and injects a lot of comedy. That was a highlight for sure. It was a little odd to have him without a companion, but some of the guest cast like Doug and Viv make up for that. They were a fun pair and I loved their reactions to finding out they had parallel versions of themselves and them being Roman ancestors to explain how they could impersonate television personalities with ease. That actually turned out to be crucial to the end of the plot. I must admit that I didn't remember a huge amount from the comic strip story as it has been over five years since I read it, but I do recall the scale of the story being really ambitious. I must admit that with the absence of artwork I felt that was something missing and it was actually a crucial component of the comic strip. Having an alternate dimension where Rome never fell is screaming for visuals as mixing the likes of Ironicus and Vesuvius with somewhat modern and futuristic settings is a wonderful combination, but we just didn't have that blend complementing each other here in the way it perhaps ought to. I thought Morris was a terrific character and I really enjoyed his interactions with the Doctor, along with the whole robotic nature of the Iron Legion. The secret of the Empress being murdered and having an imposter felt like it perhaps came a little late, and that put Adolphus in a tricky situation considering he'd been lied to all along! The use of modern gods and Magog in particular as the enemies for the story was decent, and I thought she was a fun villain until taking her natural form which all sounded a bit silly and hokey. It was a pretty simple resolution in the end by having her ejected into an empty dimension from the TARDIS, but after a whacky two hours full of funky background music and lots of effort to bring the comic strip format to audio as much as possible, that was probably a welcomed resolution. Overall, a fun idea for series and I look forward to listening to the next one, but despite the story being excellent in comic I don't think it was quite suited to audio in the same way. 

Rating: 6/10