The Highgate Horror Part 1

"A vampire. In Highgate cemetery? Seriously?"

Writer: Mark Wright 

Format: Comic Strip

Released: 15th October 2015

Printed in: DWM 492

Featuring: Twelfth Doctor, Clara 

Synopsis 

In 1972, the Doctor and Clara find themselves in Highgate cemetery. There they meet a startled woman called Jess. Why was she there? To track down a vampire of course...

Verdict 

The Highgate Horror started off this brand new comic strip adventure in tremendous style! It really did have a magnificent atmosphere throughout with the added bonus of fantastic artwork! I'll get to the comic strip in depth a bit later on but first it's a brand new edition of Doctor Who Magazine! I always look forward to a new edition of DWM and this week was no different with it being my first one purchased whilst at university. It looks set to be another superb edition and before writing this I have read a little bit. Before yesterday's broadcast of The Girl Who Died, I did read the preview and as you can guess from my blog entry and rating of that story, I was not left disappointed. I'm going to keep the other three previews until the day of broadcast so the information remains fresh in my mind. Steven Moffat's column was as comedic as ever though I must admit I loved how he took up nearly all his allotted space by talking rather wonderfully about The Magician's Apprentice/The Witch's Familiar. It's such a good series opener that I imagine will be talked about for quite some time actually. Gallifrey Guardian was excellent as always and following on from last night's episode I've wrote in for the first time since winning a copy of The Good Soldier for my praise of Blood and Ice. I'm looking forward to seeing what Jacqueline Rayner has to talk about this month in the always sublime Relative Dimensions. She really needs to pen a TV episode in my opinion! I'm not usually a fan of The Fact of Fiction but seeing once again how this issue wraps up The War Games I might have to give it a read as that is, and probably always will be, my all time favourite Doctor Who serial. The continuation of the Kate Walshe interview should be good as I enjoyed part one and I imagine the Toby Whithouse interview will be just as good! The DWM Review is always great when the new series is on television but I must admit I actually prefer the Coming Soon segment of the magazine! Thankfully DWM gave us the extra 8 pages free of charge because charging over £5 for a magazine would be hugely unfair in my opinion. It irks me enough when they charge £5.99 for the inclusion of a poster, of which they are always too big. I absolutely agreed with Tom Spilsbury's comments about the viewing figures for the series opener and although I was left stunned by the unannounced return of Davros, had he been announced beforehand or included in the title then my excitement for the series would have been increased tenfold. The Back to Skaro feature though looks set to be good! Wotcha! is always a comical finish to the magazine as well. Now then, back to the comic strip story and after a very successful culmination of Spirits of the Jungle, this new instalment started superbly! It looks set to be phenomenal which from just one part is always a good sign. The characterisation of Peter Capaldi's Twelfth Doctor wasn't quite up to scratch but it wasn't miles away so that wasn't too bad. However, for possibly the first time in the pages of DWM, Clara's characterisation was perfect! Mark Wright really nailed her down to a tee and it certainly fitted in with Series 9 very nicely. Jess was a good character and I liked her interaction with the TARDIS pairing. The threat of a vampire looks set to be more than intriguing, especially as towards the end there wasn't just the one! I also thought the cliffhanger was one of the best in recent comic strip memory. Somehow, the TARDIS was just another tombstone! We weren't on Trenzalore were we? No, it's far too early for that. But with the Doctor seriously weakened, Clara unsure what to do and the TARDIS no help, how will they escape the oncoming threat of the Highgate vampires? I can't wait to find out next issue! No rating yet, but upon the story's conclusion I'm sure it'll be a good one if this part is anything to go by.