soviet era nuclear naval base has been abandoned, The town surrounding it is surviving essentially at a subsistence level, There is something far more dangerous than the radiation leaking from the subs, It's been there quite a long time sending out a message for help, which Captain Jack inadvertently answers forcing him, Rose and the Doctor to ride in for the rescue.
Though their Russian is perfect, at least one person knows that there's more to the arrival of the threesome than their cover story implies.
I love Doctor Who with a ridiculous passion but that being said, this book left so much to be desired, Because Eccleston was only the Doctor for a short time, these stories are precious, After all, who doesn't want a bit more of the Fantastic Unfortunately, this book is almost painful to read, It's a scantpages and yet felt like a tome that was never going to come to an end, This is the first of the Doctor Who books that I almost gave a DNF rating,
When the Doctor, Rose and Captain Jack arrive, they discover one young man dead and his girlfriend Valeria drained of her youth.
She is nothing but a husk, with no ability to communicate and absolutely incapable of taking care of herself, Because this is not the first time something like this has happened, townspeople have become suspicious and actually blame Vourdalk a vampire from Russian folklore.
That sounds interesting doesn't it Naturally, it cannot possibly be Vourdalk as we discover when the Doctor begins investigating, Nope, it's all about aliens, glowing blue blobs and zombies, It seems some people decided that they want to live forever, The story takes a massive turn and feels like a bad rip off of Stephen King's Tommy Knockers, Since King already told this story and brilliantly at that, inserting the Doctor does nothing but remind us that we're reading an author with less than half the talent of King.
The story quickly turns from an intelligent investigation to the Doctor, Rose and Jack running from the blue blobs, and setting shit on fire.
That's when it absolutely lost me because it felt like a complete bait and switch, Yes, I get that as much as the Doctor is a super brilliant Time Lord, he spends a good deal of time running and dodging to get away from the bed guys but that usually comes with a coherent story which The Deviant Strain greatly lacked.
In terms of characterisation it was absolutely off, Yes, I can picture Captain Jack running into combat and working to save someone he saw as vulnerable and need of his help, My question however
is where did my smiling, flirtatious Jack go He was absolutely generic, Even though The Deviant Strain is set before Torchwood, there should still be some sense of who Captain Jack is, This character is such a cardboard cut out with no personality that he really could have been anyone with the name Captain Jack tacked on for fan service.
Then there's Rose, who runs around tossing herself at anything that looks dangerous, She's like a fish out of water, I didn't recognise her at all, She seemed to be there so that the Doctor could explain what is going on, Yes, I realise that this is the main function of the companion in the Who universe, however each companion has a personality that is distinct.
Rose just ran and threw herself at stuff without trying to figure out the big picture or even giving the Doctor a sense of humanity which is something that she was really good at.
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Пять звезд! не за ценность данной книги в мировой литературе, а за то, что придя домой, усталая и голодная, я всего лишь хотела посмотреть ее начало и на несколько часов выпала из жизни! Браво! Кажется, для меня это станет удаленными сценами сериала Доктор Кто : This is yet another Doctor Who novel I've really enjoyed reading, It may be a little "dumbed down" and Rose may be slightly off but this could have easily be adapted into a televised story for the main series.
I think Whovians would enjoy this in general though it does depend on one's tastes and opinions,.
Do not listen to the audio book if you actually care about the characters sounding remotely like their television counterparts,
I don't mean accents, Rather, there's so very much that can be done with cadence and emphasis alone and this reader hits alllll the wrong notes, It took me out of the story over and over as I found myself trying to remember which Doctor was I supposed to be picturing again That sounds tenish, or threeish, or twoish.
no it's a nine story Ugh, Too airy vague for NINE, Wait, Rose! She shouldn't sound that damselish, Highly distracting.
The story itself was average but has some interesting moments for Capt, Jack. A perfectly creepy Ninth Doctor story set in the chillingly creepy abandoned Soviet naval base,
With this being the first of the recent batch of NSA that tied into the second half of Ecclestons only series as The Doctor, meaning Captain Jack is also aboard the TARDIS.
I always prefer three people aboard this ship and they are all utilised perfectly,
As soon as they arrive at the base the time travellers meet Colonel Levin, suspicion arise especially with Jacks American accent!
The group are soon thrust into a mystery as a body has been found by a local stone circle and is in a bad state.
A really strong adventure that has some really scary effective moments during the second half of the novel as the alien involvement is discovered and the unique plan has been revealed.
Theres a good Bad Wolf mention,
For a TARDIS team that wasnt onscreen that long, its great that we have these additional adventures, this was written so well, you can ask my friends aka sitelinkmaya how scared i was during the first half of the book, i couldnt even pick up the book in the evening without getting paranoid, the second half was a fast read, though, it was super amazing and super unexpected, I did a nonspoiler review for my "Doctor Who" podcast here: sitelink thenerdparty. com/timeands
All in all, I liked this combination Ninth Doctor, Rose, and Captain Jack, It's not often I get a Captain Jack story, preTorchwood i, e. , can still die. I think there was a good premise, but it's an action story, which can sometimes be difficult to capture in narrative form, I think it gets bogged down in action/ths through the book, So it is not a bad story by any means, but I don't know if I would recommend it, If you are a diehard Ninth Doctor era fan, I think you will enjoy it, The Novrosk Peninsula: the Soviet naval base has been abandoned, the nuclear submarines are rusting and rotting, Cold, isolated, forgotten. Until the Russian Special Forces arrive and discover that the Doctor and his companions are here too,
This was a strange one for sure, strange in writing and story, As at times it didn't feel like a DW story more like a generic creature feature that just so happens to involve, the Doctor, Jack, and Rose.
The story is all over the place, but despite all that I can't sit here and say that i didn't enjoy myself, as the concepts for this story was there, huge floating jelly fish monsters, zombie soviet soldiers and empty human skin sacks, all set in the frozen depths of Russia.
Everything was there, but it just didn't mesh for me, the story is good, but as a DW story it just doesn't fit, it felt like the author tried to mash to odd jigsaw pieces together and tried to call it art.
Sadly i wasn't fooled, so yes as a spooky creature feature this is good, but add DW sci fi on top and it doesn't work.
This could of been because i listened to the audiobook version of this story which has a terrible narrator i wouldn't reccomend that if i had read the book i might feel differently, I don't know maybe I'll try this in physical copy one day down the line, but for now im happy to move on to the next DW adventure, as even the show has its weaklink episodes.
./Stars GoodReads
/Jelly blobs Everybody but everybody assumes that the BBC "dumbed down" its Doctor Who novels for the new series, presumably to appeal to younger readers.
"The Deviant Strain" is no exception,
However, the story's panache lies in its brooding atmosphere and the everlingering dread that there's something verily lying just under the surface of the frozen Russian setting.
The characters aren't particularly fleshed out, but we don't need them to be "The Deviant Strain" is, after all, a creature feature, and strives to be nothing else.
The problem is not just with the insipid characterization of Captain Jack this was written, after all, pre"Torchwood", but with the way the action takes adegree turn from an atmospheric thriller to a standard runabout with zombies and blobs.
Talking zombies, mind you. There's also a badly predictable whodunnit in there and plenty of running through corridors in a scientific research base that has a seemingly endless supply of.
. . well, corridors.
Overall, not as bad as what some of the other reviewers have written about it, but "The Deviant Strain" has probably already lost itself in the quagmire of mediocrity that are the BBC NSAs in the last nine years.
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Experience Doctor Who: The Deviant Strain Generated By Justin Richards Format Digital Edition
Justin Richards