Doctor Who and the Creature from the Pit

"No one comes out of the Pit alive."

Writer: David Fisher

Format: Novel

Released: January 1981

Series: Target 11

Featuring: Fourth Doctor, Romana II, K9

Synopsis 

The planet Chloris is very fertile, but metal is in short supply, and has therefore become extremely valuable.

A huge creature, with most unusual physical properties, arrives from an alien planet which can provide Chloris with metal from its own unlimited supplies, in exchange for chlorophyll. 

However, the ruthless Lady Adrasta has been able to exploit the shortages of metal to her own advantage, and has no wish to see the situation change.

The Doctor and Romana land on Chloris just as the creature's alien masters begin to lose patience over their ambassador's long absence.

The action the aliens decide to take will have devastating consequences for Chloris, unless something is done to prevent it...

Verdict 

The Creature from the Pit was a great novelisation! I was a little trepidatious prior to reading which is probably wrong of me but this story doesn’t have the best of reputations. It’s probably harsh as from my memory the negativity is down to the special effects and not the actual story, but in the televised version it really is difficult to ignore the visuals. They’re always going to have a big impact on the viewer’s enjoyment of an adventure, but alas here there were no such issues as the prose did a really good job in presenting the Creature! It would later be revealed as a Tythonian and honestly from that point forward I think I kind of reached a ceiling when it came to my rating for this story. I was loving things in the first half when the Creature was nameless and not communicating. I know we did need to reach a point of that being the opposite, but it was fantastic to build up the Creature and the mystery behind it. I loved how well the scale and size of it was presented and it really was hard to comprehend. It also seemed obscure in shape and quite odd which just helped with the representation of it being enormous and very alien. I liked the humour that came from the Doctor and Romana in the TARDIS with the latter wanting to install a distress call device that the former had been ignoring for over a decade. He was already busy enough to answer calls and put in technology sent to him from the Time Lords! Their relationship really is staggeringly good and it was captured on the page here brilliantly. I think they have to go down as the best TARDIS pairing and having K9 there to compliment them is just a delight. It really is a dream team. The Doctor was whacky as ever here for the fourth incarnation and the moment when threatened after seeing the engineer thrown to his death and he just jumps down to the Pit is phenomenal. That’s the Doctor at his barmy best. I thought Lady Adrasta was a superb character and positioned perfectly as a villain. I liked as we learned more about her history with the Tythonians and how she was a master of politics. I was a huge fan of hers and she really didn’t mess about when it came to showing off and flaunting her control. She wasn’t phased by the Doctor and Romana and actually was quick to try and utilise their talents. The Doctor displayed knowledge of the mysterious shell structure and Romana was close with K9 who was incredibly value by being all metal. The scarcity of metal on the planet was interesting and it showed that Chloris wasn’t doing so well in terms of technological development. They just didn’t have the materials and the forest couldn’t be held back. That was evident. Madame Karela was a fantastic character too as the assistant to Adrasta and the way she took control and even killed Torvin to show she meant business was excellent. The Doctor was surprisingly violent in this book as not only did he use physical altercation on more than one occasion, but he also talked and trick Adrasta to her death at the Creature’s hands. That was presented very suddenly and it took me back as I wasn’t expecting that with still two chapters to come. Naming the Creature as Erato seemed to take away some of the mystique and allure of it which was a shame, and I do feel if the book ended slightly earlier with an alternate ending we could be looking at a higher rating! The science behind the neutron star threat was slightly far fetched, but the size of Erato was once again evident by the fact he could wrap an exploding star in aluminium. Hell, his people could build a spaceship in just over an hour! That was impressive and even surprised the Doctor. I thought the two penultimate chapters once Adrasta was dead felt a little like we were dragging the story out as despite the title, she was the main story in my eyes. Her fascination with K9 was fun and she didn’t hold Romana in much regard which was amusing, but she needed her if she wanted control of the TARDIS. She aimed to bring metal from ten past to solve their current problems which was good, but she’d never get that opportunity. I thought the ending of the lucky number gag was decent and as a whole this was a book I really enjoyed! I thought it started brilliantly and whilst I wouldn’t say it petered off, it certainly levelled out. Overall, a fine read and much improved with the imagination taking over from 1970s special effects!

Rating: 8/10