The Rival Robots

"Every Zheng contains a neutron bomb in his brain. They're going to blow us all up!"

Writer: Unknown 

Format: Comic Strip

Released: September 1977

Printed in: Doctor Who Annual 1978

Featuring: Fourth Doctor, Sarah

Synopsis 

The Fourth Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith arrive in the midst of a fierce rivalry between two robot factions - the Yeng and the Domos. With the rivalry getting ever heated and Sarah being kidnapped, what lays in store for the Doctor?

Verdict 

The Rival Robots was a pretty average comic strip story sadly as I had high hopes of it being at least pretty good. Well in saying that, it was decent in parts but as a whole the story just seemed to want to do too much in the short allocation of pages it had in this 1978 edition of the Doctor Who Annual. After my recent reading of the 2016 Annual which I really was not a fan of, I was delighted to see this little gem being sold on eBay for a mere £3 which included postage and packaging. How could I not purchase it? It adds to my slowly growing collection of Classic era Annuals and now sits nicely alongside my 1980 and 1983 editions. I have noticed that quite a lot of the latter years of the Classic era have pretty cheap Annuals so as I get through the content I will be sure to contribute to the growing collection. I do love the Classic Annuals because they're just so much better than the modern ones we have been getting recently. The audience it pitches too is just fantastic and I firmly believe that text stories is absolutely the way to go. Can we please be rid of all the recent monster files and children quizzes and what have you. It's aimed at such a small portion of the overall Doctor Who audience which I think is a real shame because they could just be so much more! I do feel strongly about this because collecting the Annuals every year is a tradition and despite the quality of recent ones which really annoys me, I will contribute to collect because they're just part of my overall collection right now. That collection is slightly scattered at the moment sadly due to my studying for a degree but it will join back together nicely in the near future. When this Annual arrived I was overjoyed by its good condition which is testament to the previous owner as it has nearly been forty years now since this hit the shelves on the high street. It's wonderful how after all this time people are still enjoying the content and there's even lunatics like me blogging about the stories individually! I will continue to do that. I think I've been blogging for so long now and I've built up such an accumulation of entries that it wouldn't ever feel right doing a Doctor Who story and then not giving my verdict on it here! The story itself could have been better and sadly I thought the artwork of Sarah was appalling. It didn't resemble her at all which was a real shame. In a comic strip, especially in one as short as this, I think artwork is crucial and it really can have a big effect on the way a story is perceived. The characterisation of Tom Baker's Fourth Doctor was actually really good which I'm glad to say and there were some of his traits cropping up which is always a good sign. The arrival of Olak seemed rather sudden and strange as I would have liked at least a little backdrop explaining who he was and what his connection was on the planet. The rivalry between the two sets of robots was interesting though considering that was the title of the comic strip adventure, I was expecting it to be a tad more fierce. I did enjoy the revelation that every Yeng had a neutron bomb in their brain I must admit. That provided an exciting climax which more than saved the story from a disastrous rating. It certainly had its positives and that was absolutely one of them. The Doctor talking himself out of the explosive countdown was the highlight of the comic strip in my opinion. It was something he had demonstrated many times before and would go on to do countless more times in his future. Talk. It was always his answer of getting out of problems and there's rarely, if any, times where it doesn't work. The reunion with Sarah seemed a bit too easy and although the story did have its highlights, it just seemed a bit rushed and jumbled at times. Overall, good in parts but sadly too inconsistent. 

Rating: 6/10