That's All Right, Mama

"Did she just call you Elvis?"

Writer: Paul Magrs

Format: Short Story

Released: December 2019

Printed in: Star Tales 02

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

Synopsis

"Even though they're gone from the world, they're never gone from me."

The Doctor is many things – curious, funny, brave, protective of her friends... and a shameless namedropper. While she and her companions battled aliens and travelled across the universe, the Doctor hinted at a host of previous, untold adventures with the great and the good: we discovered she got her sunglasses from Pythagoras (or was it Audrey Hepburn?); lent a mobile phone to Elvis; had an encounter with Amelia Earhart where she discovered that a pencil-thick spider web can stop a plane; had a 'wet weekend' with Harry Houdini, learning how to escape from chains underwater; and more.

In this collection of new stories, Star Tales takes you on a rip-roaring ride through history, from 500BC to the swinging 60s, going deeper into the Doctor's notorious name-dropping and revealing the truth behind these anecdotes.

Verdict

That's All Right, Mama was another very good short story to continue Star Tales along very nicely! We got to learn of the time the Doctor leant a mobile phone to Elvis Presley who then in turn leant it to Frank Sinatra, but I really wasn't expecting to encounter Elvis at different points of his life. Starting off with him in school was really interesting and I loved the reaction of the Tenth Doctor when he discovered just who he had asked to keep the Drahvin communication devices safe as he got them off planet and off his trail. The very mention of the Drahvins was wonderful and I would have absolutely loved for them to appear. I was really hoping that we might have gotten an encounter with the Thirteenth Doctor because of the Time Lord now being female, but alas it wasn't to be. Maybe that's a potentially exciting adventure for the future? I can but wish. I liked the format of the story with cameos for each of the three previous incarnations of the Doctor with them all just admitting to being quite forgetful in not remembering to come back and take the communication devices back from the Presley family. As Elvis increased his fame, it meant he was away from home for long periods of time which meant that the communication devices were a godsend. I liked that the Doctor hadn't actually told them what they were or how they worked and it was actually down to Elvis and Gladys who worked it all out. They were magic! Elvis fully believing in magic was brilliant and it was just heartbreaking to see that he was always talking to his mum on the day she died. It was quite intriguing that Gladys seemed to know that it was her final days and I'm not sure why but I believe that you know when it is time. The way in which she had no problem in believing that Elvis was ringing her from the future was terrific as she got to experience her son's life in one day. She knew all he was up to and just how successful he had become which was a nice thought. Yaz seemed to really like the whole story which was good to see. The involvement of the Eleventh Doctor was good and it took me by surprise to be honest that he had arrived because I was fully expecting a full adventure for the Tenth Doctor! I figured the format was going to be different from Chasing the Dawn but I was wrong. I probably should have expected it with the book cover as this was going to be very current with the television series and deal with the name dropping that has been so frequent with the Thirteenth Doctor. Once the Twelfth Doctor arrived at the door of the Presley household, I knew where things were going and from about halfway on we had a full adventure with Team TARDIS. I was very shocked by the fact that to the companions, Elvis was still very much alive and living in Graceland in 2018! That took the Doctor back. She knew she had to fix things and patch up the timelines. I liked the continuity with Series 11 and how it was established that this adventure took place right after Arachnids in the UK which led to a good moment from Ryan in not liking the mention of the Web of Time for obvious reasons. What we then got was an emotional tale of a loving relationship between mother and son. The Doctor convincing Elvis to take the communicator from his younger self after the first time he contacted his mother from the future in army barracks must have been a very difficult moment, but Elvis trusted the Doctor and that was nice to see. I would have liked Yaz's question about her memories being altered to be properly addressed as their entire celebrity history had altered quite drastically, along with mentions of wars that shouldn't be happening! Alas, that wasn't addressed but as a whole this was another great little story!

Rating: 8/10