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 By Rob McCow |
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What’s the story called? The World Shapers The Collector Issues #127 - #129 of Doctor Who Magazine contained the The World Shapers. Nobody has ever reprinted it for fears that it will drive the Universe into complete madness, but Panini Comics have it pencilled in for a May 2008 release. Better stock up on sedatives. The World Shapers Script – Grant Morrison Art – John Ridgeway Inks – Tim Perkins Letters – Richard Starkings Editor – Sheila Cranna Fellow Travellers Three companions join the Doctor in his quest battle to destroy the Worldshaper machine. There’s Peri the American, Frobisher the Penguin and, for one time only, Jamie McCrimmon, the Scottish piper who originally joined the second Doctor on his adventures. The Doctor decides to pick up Jamie to help him remember the details of Planet 14, but finds that Jamie isn’t quite the same man. Returned to eighteenth century Scotland by the Time Lords, Jamie has become a bitter old man who lives alone in a cottage on a hill. The locals look on him as mad, with his tails of monsters and trips to the moon. Jamie is ashamed at his old age, but is relieved to see the Doctor. He has wild hair and a large beard, he still wears his kilt about the cottage and carries a claymore.
Neither Peri or Frobisher have much to do in this story. They are in tow behind the Doctor for most of parts one and two, but spend part three in the TARDIS. The ageing effect of Planet 14 causes Frobisher’s feathers to moult and Peri’s hair and fingernails to grow long. Peri thinks that the TARDIS they find on Planet 14 is beautiful. Peri thinks that the inhabitants of Marinus sound like a punk concert line-up. In eighteenth century Scotland, Peri is passed off as a Spanish Conjurer and Frobisher is described as a ‘Fabulous Talking Beast From The Orient’. If the Highlanders of Scotland can accept a talking penguin in their midst, then so should you. The Deal The Doctor, Peri and Frobisher follow a distress call to the wet world of Marinus, where they find an abandoned TARDIS and a dying Time Lord. The Time Lord dies and quickly dissolves into his component molecules, but not before whispering ‘Planet 14’ into the Doctor’s ear. They board the abandoned TARDIS, which is chatting away to the Doctor’s own space-time craft. The Doctor interrupts and demands to know what’s going on. The TARDIS was sent by the High Council to investigate temporal disturbances. Peri notices that Frobisher’s feathers are moulting and that her own hair and fingernails are growing. They all run through the rain back to the Doctor’s TARDIS. In order to help remember the details of where he heard about Planet 14, the Doctor decides to find Jamie. As the two TARDISes leave, they are watched by shadowy figures.
A spaceship lands on Marinus, piloted by Maxilla and Deedrun, who are Engineers repairing the Worldshaper machines. They mark off their previous visit as Planet 13. The Doctor tells the local Highlanders that they are a band of Spanish Conjurers and that Frobisher is a ‘Fabulous Talking Beast from the Orient’. A man named Dugald leads them to Mad Jamie’s cottage. Jamie tells them to go away and only opens the door when the Doctor announces himself. Jamie is ashamed, the Doctor has arrived forty years later than he planned and Jamie is an old man. The Doctor asks him about Planet 14. Jamie remembers that the Cyber Controller mentioned the place. Concerned at the mention of Cybermen, the Doctor decides to head off in the TARDIS. Jamie begs to go with him and he agrees. The Doctor presents the TARDIS’s dematerialisation as a magic trick for the Highlanders. On board the TARDIS, Jamie explains that the Time Lords’ attempt to wipe his memory failed because the Doctor taught him ‘a few wee tricks’. He never forgot anything. *Resist the urge to scream now.* They return to Marinus one week after they left, but find that it has dried out in their absence. They encounter one of the Engineers, who desperately tells them ‘its all gone wrong’, then collapses. Then they are chased back to the TARDIS by the Voord – who have partly turned into Cybermen! *Hold that scream back.* The Engineer, Maxilla, explains that the Worldshaper machines are used to artificially accelerate time and cause rapid environmental changes on uninhabited planets. But Planet 14 was inhabited by the Voord, who used the machine to rapid-evolve into Cybermen. The Doctor realises they have to destroy the Worldshaper, because it could be used as a planet-destroying weapon. The Doctor, Jamie and Maxilla head to the Worldshaper machine, but the Cyber-Voord kill Maxilla. The future Cyber Controller tells them that the machine is hidden behind a protective field. The Controller orders his two soldiers to burn the Doctor and his friends. Jamie decapitates one of the Cyber-Voord with his Claymore and the Doctor performs a stunning kick that incapacitates another. Before the Doctor can stop him, Jamie rushes up to the Worldshaper and plunges his Claymore through the field, destroying the machine but ageing himself to death in the process. As the planet is engulfed in accelerated time the Doctor runs back to the TARDIS.
When the turbulence subsides the Doctor, Peri and Frobisher venture out to find a small multitude of Time Lords. The Doctor is cross, because Planet 14 has become Mondas, home of the Cybermen and the Time Lords won’t do anything about it. They order him to leave.
After the Doctor has gone, the two Time Lords discuss that the Cybermen will one day lead the Universe to a new era of peace and understanding, saving all sentient life.*Now you can scream.* TV Action You know who’s got it all? The World Shapers, that’s who’ve got it all. This story directly references The Keys of Marinus, The Invasion and The Tenth Planet. Peri has met Jamie before in The Two Doctors and this is also alluded to. The Doctor recognises Mondas, but outside of the BF audio Spare Parts, I don’t think he’s ever been there. Although Mondas got pretty close to Earth in The Tenth Planet, so perhaps he snuck out onto the Antarctic wastes with a pair of binoculars. The Time Lords seen at the end of their story wear their traditional Gallifreyan garb, with those huge peacock-like collars. There are even security guards the same as in Arc of Infinity and The Five Doctors. These Time Lords are not like the ludicrous incompetents of Trial or The Five Doctors, though, they are more similar to the detached and all-powerful beings from The War Games. There is no way that the TV show could have attempted to do this story. Even after Attack of The Cybermen. Although the style is probably closer to the TV show than anything we’ve had for a while, with bucket loads of continuity, the TARDIS hopping about all over the place and plenty of physical violence in the denouement. 4-Dimensional Vistas Once again, Tim Perkins’ inks squash the idiosyncrasy out of John Ridgway’s pencil style. Everything seems more blotched and rushed than usual. Despite that, there are some wonderful moments. The creature design is brilliant. The little Engineers are cute and unthreatening, but the Cyber-Voord look magnificent. Each one has a different ratio of Voord parts to Cybermen parts, meaning that they all look individual and interesting. There are a couple of gross-out deaths as well, first when the elderly Time Lord dissolves and also when Jamie ages to death. The landscapes and backdrops are very impressive as well. In the first part, the TARDIS lands on an enormous bridge across an ocean, where they encounter a wonderfully spiky and crystalline TARDIS. The highlands of Scotland are rainswept and wild. When they revisit Planet 14, they find a dramatically barren landscape. The effect of the accelerated time in part three is also spectacular in a swirly kind of way. End of The Line You couldn’t make it up. This is Attack of The Cybermen squared, a thoroughly bonkers continuity fest that defies all reason. The logic of the Doctor going to visit Jamie is shaky. Not only has Jamie had his memory wiped by the Time Lords, the Doctor also arrives 40 years too late. Jamie may have retained his memories, but there’s no way the Doctor could have known that. It couldn’t be any more bizarre if they’d decided that the vaporised remains Adric would be able to help. In a story about Lord Cranleigh. However, it’s not unimaginative. Bringing back Jamie, the Time Lords, the Cybermen and the Voord could have been done in a much more perfunctory way. Eventually, the core of the tale is revealed to be Jamie’s sacrifice against powerful forces that are beyond understanding. The concept of the World Shapers is interesting too, with their poorly maintained machines and hard-worked Engineers. It would have been good to have seen a bit more of them. Even if The World Shapers wasn’t railroaded with back references, it still wouldn’t be great. The problem with the actual story is that there are two and a half episodes of build up and exposition with a little adventure at the end. It feels like a five-part story that has been cut short. The World Shapers might have been a thrilling read at the time, but it doesn’t seem nearly so exciting now. Follow That TARDIS! The World Shapers features the first appearance of the Voord since the 1966 Doctor Who Annual. The Doctor describes the Voord as a race of amphibious assassins. The Voord have not turned up in the comic strip since. Unless you count the Cybermen, which very few do. The World Shapers is generally considered to be ‘Outside the Canon’. It was not referenced in the regular one-page comic strip ‘Cybermen’ which detailed the origins of the Cybermen. Nor was it mentioned in David Banks’ wonderful book ‘Cybermen’, even though that book covers every other comic strip appearance up to its date of publish. This is the last regular comic strip story to feature the Sixth Doctor and Peri. Added to the ‘Vworp! Vworp!’ materialisation sound effect is the work ‘SHUNK!’ The World Shapers escaped without much comment on the letters pages, but Steven Gray of Dartford in Kent liked to say: ‘I would like to say how much I enjoyed the comic strip story, The Worldshapers, and that as stated by Trevor Gensch (DWM Issue 130), it is a valuable part of the magazine.’ The Cybermen would reappear in the comic strip in the story ‘The Good Soldier’.
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