Technical Hitch

"He's been alone in his dream for some time now..."

Writer: Dan Abnett
Format: Comic Strip
Released: 4th November 1989
Printed in: The Incredible Hulk Presents 5

Featuring: Seventh Doctor

Synopsis

The Seventh Doctor continues his lonesome travels and arrives in a most peculiar place. He is greeted by a strange individual who is overjoyed to have some company. All he wants to do is play some games, but something isn't right...

Verdict

Technical Hitch was not the greatest of stories, I have to be honest. It continued my reading of the Nemesis of the Daleks graphic novel which I am glad to be reading a bit more often now but I do feel like the idea of five page stories could go on to hurt the content the more I read so I will be sceptical when it comes to reading future stories from this collection. I really do think that the absence of a companion is hurting things but even then when I come to think about the format, the desire to do mostly standalone stories tells me that there isn't really that much room for one to be present. It's a paradox! With just five pages to play with, I am very surprised that things haven't gone the way of Hunger from the Ends of Time! and have more stories spread over one part. Anyway, this story was just a bit weird I thought and not much at all actually happened. The Doctor arrived and was greeted by Admiral Vayle who was overjoyed to see him. The Doctor was quite taken aback by how excited Vayle was and as you would expect, he wanted to know what was going on. Vayle told him the whole scenario in a simple sentence which I found quite quick and it really was just as simple as there were others with him in the past and now there weren't any others anymore. Even for a five page comic story, I thought this was far too simplistic and it really was difficult to find some major highlights. I did like that the Doctor wanted to help as soon as he knew there was a problem but even then the resolution seemed a little bit too easy. I know the conclusion was pretty much in the story's title but it was quite underwhelming which was a shame. When the Doctor located the circuitry beneath the grass, the resulting shock or transportation that happened didn't make much sense because even some distance away from where the Doctor arrived, the TARDIS somehow managed to board the Da Gama ship as well. There was no explanation for that and it just didn't really make much sense. Not a lot else happened and the Doctor simply solved things by telling the computer voice onboard the ship that there was a problem with the technicalities that allowed Vayle to have artificial friends. The computer simply corrected the technical hitch and the Doctor was on his merry way. He had given Vayle his friends back which was a nice touch but as a whole, this story wasn't the greatest. I am well aware that the page limit is a huge factor in that but there have been great stories that have managed to work in the five page limit in this collection thus far. Overall, improvements are needed!

Rating: 5/10