The Arboreals

"Can't you hear the forest growing?"

Writer: Marc Platt

Format: Short Story

Released: June 2015

Printed in: The Scientific Secrets of Doctor Who 11

Featuring: First Doctor, Susan

Synopsis

The Doctor and Susan have recently left Gallifrey and are travelling the universe. The TARDIS has materialised as a tree, and that's just the start of blending things in with the environment. People want to become one with their surroundings and there seems no stopping them. 

Verdict

The Arboreals was a somewhat decent story to keep my reading of The Scientific Secrets of Doctor Who on track, but there’s no doubting that it could have been a little better in my eyes. It was certainly an intriguing little tale and quite unique, but it didn’t do an overly huge amount to gage the interest over its incredibly short ten pages. That really is not much room to play with and I fully appreciate that, but there was a lot of potential here with the fact that it was set prior to the events of An Unearthly Child. I loved at the end that we got a glimpse of the chameleon circuit actually working with the Doctor trying to find the keyhole for the TARDIS key in a tree! That damn bark! There could have been a bit more fun had with that and I can almost imagine some occasions where the First Doctor would be quite agitated by some of the disguises taken on by his ship to blend in with the surroundings. I’d love more of that but it is difficult to place too much prior to the events that we saw on television, but we got some much welcomed additions here. I know the adventure was only a short one, but I just felt like not a huge amount happened. Considering the high quality of the collection so far, and that’s not at all to say that I’m judging this story against those that have come before it in the book, it’s definitely possible to tell a good adventure over a short word count. I mean, this did tell a good one but my point is that it could have been great. Much better. I thought the characterisation of the First Doctor was nothing more than okay and when I read the first couple of lines I was thrilled to be reunited with Susan and her grandfather travelling alone together. That really excited me but it never quite got going somehow. Even the characterisation of Susan didn’t quite feel right, but I do think that might be attributable to the fact that at this point in chronology, she might not have developed into the character we know her to be once Ian and Barbara come along on the TARDIS travels. I quite liked Bethan as a character and the shock and almost outrage that she had when she found the Doctor and Susan was very good. But where were their enviro suits! They’d be goners without them. They were an intriguing little element in themselves given that Susan quite struggled to maintain being her normal self once she put one on. She was weighed down by it and that’s not solely because it was just a bit heavier than she was. The Doctor scaring and upsetting Bethan by being inquisitive during a time and setting that something had clearly gone very badly wrong was good and it took Susan to make him realise what he was doing. As soft and lovely as the First Doctor is, I’m sill unconvinced that at this point in chronology that’s what he would have done. I can’t imagine him being so kind in the likes of The Daleks or Marco Polo. But alas, it was a nice little moment regardless. The concept of a people becoming at one with their environment was a really interesting concept and I can’t quite understand why it wasn’t the firm focus of the story. It’s such a good idea and could have so much potential if drip-fed over a longer period of time, even in a story of this nature instead of just booming in out of nowhere. I found it awfully funny that the Doctor claimed to be rather envious of those that had crashed on the ship and had new fates. This was almost certainly very early days in the TARDIS for the Doctor because I really am struggling to believe that he wouldn’t rather be travelling all of time and space! What is there possibly to be envious of? That was an amusing moment. This isn’t a problem with the story but more so the format of the book itself as things still weren’t resolved on the last page, but when you can see that the story is ending within the next couple of paragraphs, it loses its impact a tad which was a bit of a shame. Overall though, this was a decent story with a great idea but it just needed a little more and was probably a victim of its own format. Thankfully thus far, a rarity in the collection!

Rating: 6/10