The Therovian Quest

"We'll soon have a cure for your people."

Writer: Neville Main

Format: Comic Strip

Released: January-February 1965

Printed in: TV Comic 684-689

Featuring: First Doctor, John, Gillian

Synopsis

A seemingly incurable disease is gradually wakening the people of Theros. The Doctor and his grandchildren travel with Grig, a Therovian astronaut to the planet Ixon, where a moss grows that might provide an antidote.

Verdict

The Therovian Quest was a terrific little comic strip! I am delighted to be able to get stuck right in with the original comic strip from TV Comic and you can expect to see these comic strip adventures featuring prominently in my blog over the coming months. I'm delighted to have access and it's just incredible to be able to cover them to be honest. This follows on nicely from The Klepton Parasites without recalling much at all about that tale, but that's good because it serves as an easy jumping on point. We get the TARDIS referred to as such for the first time in the comic run and I love the TARDIS interior scenes we get here. The scale of the story is actually pretty incredible considering it takes place across just twelve pages but we do some serious travelling! From Theros to Ixon and an asteroid in between, the Doctor and his grandchildren willingly leave the TARDIS very far from home and that actually served nicely into the resolution and what they got out of their part in curing Grig's people. The Therovians were an intriguing people and I was quite struck by their appearance. The artwork was impressive and they did seem to stand out on the page which I liked. I also think that's true of the Doctor here because his pose is pretty demanding and it's good that he takes centre stage when it comes to attention. I still think there's room for improvement where John and Gillian are concerned as companions because I don't think they offer a great deal when it comes to dealing with threats or potential issues, but I do enjoy them at the start of stories when things are being setup. It's an intriguing dynamic but this is still very much early days so I'm intrigued to see where things go from here. I thought the threats in this story coming from more 'normal' sources in the form of a giant lizard was good and those kind of things always feel more problematic. What can the Doctor do to defeat them? They act on instinct and there's not a grand plan to thwart. The Doctor was required for his expertise here though but to be honest he didn't have much of a choice with Grig having a gun in hand. He was delighted to have assistance though and there was trouble back home. Venturing across the cosmos and eventually to Ixon was good stuff, but I must say this story could have been even better if we actually got a bit of detail about the disease that had ravaged the Therovian people. The panel of the Doctor examining the disease was laughable in how little it depicted! I do wonder if my nostalgic and just joyous nature of being able to read these stories will wain, but I admit there's probably some bias in that regard when it comes to my rating. But I feel like it's allowed and part of the enjoyment I have in reading the story is what they were doing with the comic strip and not just solely the story quality. It's such a fascinating read. The quest concept works well and the moss retrieval was almost taxed when it came to Ixon which I liked. Get the Doctor and company to find it from the centre of the planet which was the most dangerous place on offer, and then make the Therovians pay for it! I thought that was wonderfully dastardly. The escape to the ship was good and I liked that when the moss did as the legend advertised and cured the people, the Therovians offered the Doctor something back in return. He would of course venture back to the TARDIS and onto more adventures which rounded things out very nicely. Overall, a great comic strip adventure! 

Rating: 8/10