By Rob McCow

Changes
 

The Collector

Changes was published in DWM #118 to #119, in the chilly months of November and December, 1986. It’ll get reprinted for the first time by the end of 2008, I’ll wager.
 

The World Shapers

Script – Grant Morrison

Art – John Ridgway (apologies, I’ve been spelling his name wrong for about 5 months now).

Letters – Annie Halfacree

Editor – Sheila Cranna
 

Fellow Travellers

As it’s set entirely in the TARDIS, this story focuses heavily on Frobisher and Peri. Frobisher has a better knowledge of the TARDIS’s layout and secrets than Peri does, but he’s still baffled by most of the details. Peri’s sense of adventure leads her and Frobisher to explore, but soon enough she’s terrified out of her wits and calling for the Doctor.

Frobisher keeps a cool head through most of the story. He’s recovering from his mono-morphia and uses his shape-shifting ability to turn into a lion and a miniature brontosaurus. His knowledge of shape-shifting comes in very useful when the Doctor and he are presented with two Peris.

What a nightmare!
 

The Deal

Peri and Frobisher are going through the Doctor’s old belongings on board the TARDIS. The Doctor arrives and tells them there is an intruder on board. He tells them to stay put while he finds it. Peri and Frobisher soon get bored and head off to look for it.

The Doctor is looking in the gardens, but he doesn’t see the alien spying on him and copying his body shape.

In the memory vaults of the TARDIS, Peri stumbles into a recreation of one of the worlds the TARDIS has visited and is separated from Frobisher, but finds the Doctor.

Frobisher also finds the Doctor but not in the recreation, he is repairing some part of the TARDIS.

In the recreation, the Doctor changes into a giant insectoid, looming behind Peri.

She's quite aware of what she's going through

In the TARDIS zoo, the Doctor and Frobisher find a case broken from the inside. The Doctor realises that one of the creatures must have been a shape-shifter and the fact that it is draining the TARDIS energy means it must be a Kymbra Chimera. They head for the secondary control room – where they find two versions of Peri!

Frobisher spots that the necklace of one of them is fused into its flesh, so it must be the shapeshifter. He turns into a lion and attacks it while the Doctor and Peri try to find a way to get rid of the Chimera. At first though, the Doctor is only able to activate the tea dispenser. Just as it looks like Frobisher is losing the battle, the Doctor opens a disposal whorl in the control room and sucks the Chimera into space. Peri grabs Frobisher by the foot, saving him from the same fate.
 

This is a real Bidmead-style exploration of the TARDIS, much like Castrovalva or Frontios. There’s a glimpse of Bessie, the yellow jalopy that belonged to the Third Doctor, alongside the outfits of the 4^th, 5^th and (probably) 2^nd Doctors. The denouement takes place in the secondary control room, which is the wood-panelled room seen during the middle of Tom Baker’s run as the Doctor. The sixth Doctor claims that he should have refitted it after that business with the Mandragora Helix.

There’s reference to the Doctor having influenced Shakespeare, as in the Tom Baker story City of Death. The TARDIS exists in a state of Temporal Grace, but here it’s clearly stated that ‘while the engines are running, no violent act can be accomplished within its confines’. This concept was first described in Hand of Fear, but later contradicted in Earthshock and specifically in Arc of Infinity. This comic strip provides a sensible explanation why it works at some times and not others!

The TARDIS has a zoo, where animals are kept in recreations of their own habitats until he can relocate them somewhere suitable. It’s a bit reminiscent of the CET Machine from Nightmare of Eden, although the Doctor doesn’t need to shrink the creatures down to fit them in. It seems slightly out of character for the Doctor to be keeping a zoo, although it does hark back to Tom Baker’s unused idea of having a refugee flock of sheep on board the TARDIS.

Doctor Wholittle
 

4-Dimensional Vistas

For a story set entirely on the TARDIS, Ridgway does an excellent job of getting away with drawing a mere nine roundels in part one. Ridgway’s TARDIS is much more interesting than the white corridors of the TV version. It’s full of impossible rooms, greenhouses, and surreal landscapes.

Better still is the Kymbra Chimera. One of Ridgway’s greatest strengths is drawing fantasy creatures and the Chimera gives him a real opportunity to show off. There’s a marvellous insectoid creature at the end of part one and some bizarre transformations of Peri and the Doctor as the Chimera assumes their shapes. The battle between Frobisher and the Chimera is spectacular, with the two transforming into lions and robot dinosaurs, trying to get the upper hand.

Fans of roundels will be pleased to note that in part two, there are dozens of roundels in the secondary control room. The detailing is spot on, down to the shaving mirror on the console and the handrails around the entrance.

This story was published at the same time as Mindwarp and Terror of the Vervoids were being shown on TV. In those stories, Peri had her brain scooped out by an amphibious slug and was replaced by Melanie Bush, played by Bonnie Langford. Indignity isn’t a strong enough word.
 

End of The Line

This story is a bit of a runaround, as the main characters get split up, meet each other again and get impersonated before flushing the Chimera out into space. There’s not much more to it than that. The characterisation is a bit weak as well, particularly for poor old Peri. After her initial glimmer of adventure she just wails for the Doctor.

Not that any of that matters. The TARDIS is the star of this story and it’s never looked better. There are surprisingly lush gardens, an enormous library and a room made up of discs suspended over a bottomless drop. It’s wonderful to see the TARDIS interior looking so huge. There are plenty of whimsical touches but it still looks mysterious and slightly menacing.

The Kymbra Chimera is a great foe as well, matching Frobisher for his shape-shifting skill. The idea of a powerful intruder stalking the inhabitants of the TARDIS would always be good value for money. This is a fight for control on the Doctor’s strange but magnificent home ground. There are also some good humorous touches to this story that give it a lot of charm.
 

Follow That TARDIS!

John Ridgway said in his interview with DWM that it was terrible for him to draw Peri after she’d been killed off on TV. He found himself drawing a beautiful young woman, full of the joys of life, knowing that she was going to meet a hideous end.

Paul Cockburn of Edinburgh had this to say: The eight pages illustrated by John Ridgway each month are the first I turn to, even if they are now (and for quite some time) stuck in the back of the magazine. And I must admit that, at present, I like what I find. The idea of alternating script-writers has worked quite well, though my favourite story so far is Jamie Delano’s Time Bomb.

The present story Changes has produced some really nice ideas; though I can’t help wondering if the next (Mike Collins’ Profits of Doom) will be forced to feature Mel as a companion – a problem when you include the TV assistants in the strips – since I’d like to still be able to at least read the Doctor Who story strip without cringing at Bonnie Lanford’s character.

In the Doctor’s store room there are a huge number of interesting items including: A Dalek Construction Kit; Cricket bat; Little Bo-Peep Model; Clockwork Soldier; Mr.Punch; Egg Timer; A collection of Dr. Who Annuals and an Eagle Annual; A Dinky Toy; Cuckoo Clock; A Rocking Horse; A 78RPM Record of Bill Hailey; Mecanno; A globe; National Geographic Magazine with that Penguin family on the cover; A bugle; A model pyramid; A toy cart; A Map of Barsoom; An umbrella; Jelly Babies; A picture of the Doctor by Van Gogh; A model rocket; and a picture of the Doctor and Michelangelo; signed.

This if the first appearance of the Secondary Control Room in the comic. It would reappear later in the seventh Doctor comic strip, The Mark Of Mandragora. The Mandragora Helix energy is obviously dormant during this story.

The seventh Doctor comic strip Cat Litter would heavily ‘borrow’ the TARDIS rooms from this story.

Grant Morrison went on to write the graphic novel Arkham Asylum, a Gotham City hospital drama. It sold at least half-a-million copies. http://www.grant-morrison.com/