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 By Rob McCow |
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What’s the story called? Train-Flight The Collector Doctor Who Magazine's Train-Flight lasted from issue #159-161 from April 1990 to June 1990. A return trip was scheduled for June 1993 when the strip was reprinted in The Mark of Mandragora collected comics in full colour. John Ridgway provided an additional portrait of the Doctor and a Kalik for the reprint. The World Shapers Script – Andrew Donkin and Graham S Brand Art – John Ridgway Letters – Glib Editor – John Freeman "With thanks to LONDON BUSES and BRITISH RAIL for reference material." Fellow Travellers Do I have to tell you who Sarah Jane Smith is? Oh, I suppose I do. Sarah Jane Smith was a companion of the fourth Doctor. She's a self-assured, confident journalist with a softer, more sensitive, screaming side. She’s got her own spin off series, The Sarah Jane Adventures and you can find out everything about her at the Beeb website. In this story she’s still living in her South Croydon house as seen in The Five Doctors. She’s a bit annoyed about the Doctor leaving her, but soon gets over it. She gives off a nice scream every time that she is attacked by the Kaliks. Sarah’s clothes are not so much polyester as polymorphic. In part one she wears a pullover and blouse with smart trousers and a jacket. In part two the blouse and pullover become a polo neck with a bead necklace. The Doctor’s contemporary companion Ace has apparently been left in the Cretaceous period. The Deal The Doctor visits Sarah Jane Smith at her house in South Croydon. He offers to take her to see Oscar Petersen at the Albert Hall and Sarah agrees, but refuses to go in the TARDIS. Instead they take the train.
When the train they are on stops in a tunnel, the Doctor suspects that something unusual has happened – a transmat has been used. Sarah tells him he's being silly, but the Doctor forces the door open and leads Sarah outside. The tunnel wall turns out to be an illusion covering up the reality. In actual fact, the shocking truth is that they are in a tunnel! Although it's an organic, twisting tunnel with giant broken cocoons everywhere. They explore and find dozens of empty buses in a large chamber. They explore one of the buses and find a skeletal hand encased in slime that covers the walls. Suddenly, the bus lurches. It is being pushed out towards an opening into space, hundreds of miles above the Earth! They leap off the bus as it passes through a membrane into space.
The Doctor and Sarah head to the centre of the ship in search of answers. On the way Sarah thanks the Doctor for sending her a rose and for K-9. The Doctor apologises for bundling her out of the TARDIS and Sarah admits that she missed him. They find the centre of the ship and the Doctor sees that it is being run by Kaliks, a race of upright standing insect creatures. The Kaliks that the Doctor met before were peace-loving vegetarians. Suddenly they are confronted by the Kaliks. The Kalik tells the Doctor that he offends their quest. These Kaliks have broken away from their leaders to hunt inferior beings and sell them to the black market as red meat.
They let the Doctor and Sarah go so that they can hunt them. The leader takes his hunting sword and prepares to lead his insect-men after them. On the run, the Doctor and Sarah find their way into the Kalik hatchery. Kalik young grab at them from under the water. They escape by pulling them out of the fluid; the hatchlings' skins are still soft and they panic in the open air. Before they leave, the Doctor tells Sarah they should cover themselves in the fluid to mask their scent.
The Doctor and Sarah create a diversion by setting fire to the dry, broken cocoons they found earlier. As the Kalik hive fills with smoke, they head to the control centre where the Doctor accesses the organic controls. Sarah distracts some Kalik that are about to kill him and runs. The Kalik chase her and catch her, but just before they kill her they all stop still. The Doctor arrives and explains that he adjusted the hypnotic control they used to control the humans to work on the Kaliks' brains. He contacts the Kalik hives and tells them to round up these butchers. The Doctor sets the transmat to return the train to Earth. To save time he sets the controls for the Royal Albert Hall Station. Sarah points out to him too late that there is no such station. The train lands on the steps of the Albert Hall and the Doctor and Sarah move away quietly. TV Action At the time of Train Flight, Doctor Who was well cancelled with no hope of return. Sarah Jane Smith last appeared in the 1983 knees-up, the Five Doctors. Her next Doctor Who TV appearance would be in Dimensions in Time in 1993. Her character in Train Flight is slightly different from her TV persona. Although she’s still resourceful and smart, she seems more bitter and less humorous than before. Interestingly, this ties in well to how the character was portrayed in the 2006 story, School Reunion. The Doctor claims that he has always wanted to drive a train in the TV story Black Orchid. The Doctor travels on a small train in The Mysterious Planet. The Doctor has been down to the London Underground before but only in circumstances when London has been totally evacuated, such as in The Web of Fear and Invasion of the Dinosaurs. The Kaliks use a semi-organic ship, similar to the ones seen in Terror of The Zygons and Battlefield. There was a character called ‘Kalik’ in the Doctor Who TV story, Carnival of Monsters. 4-Dimensional Vistas After some adequate but uninspiring efforts from John Ridgway, Train Flight marks a return to form. Oddly, it's his renditions of the London trains and buses that stand out. They are gloriously detailed with painstaking care. It's especially impressive when the Doctor and Sarah Jane come across dozens of buses on board the Kalik ship. The image of the Tube Train on the steps of the Royal Albert Hall is also wonderfully accurate and creates a strange juxtaposition. The Kaliks and their ship are quite impressive too, it's a great idea to have an organic ship in the comic strip. There's no real reason for it to be organic, but it looks fantastic. The Kaliks are great, upright chitinous bugs with nasty long tongues. There had been a number of bug-like monsters in the comic strip around this time, but the Kaliks stand out as the cream of the crop. Although they do look a bit like Zarbi.
End of The Line In the late eighties, there had been a lot of demand for the Doctor's popular companion Ace to be included in the comic strip. So it was quite a surprise when it was even more popular companion Sarah Jane Smith who turned up to accompany the seventh Doctor in Train Flight. As it turns out, it was a great choice. The seventh Doctor works very well alongside Sarah's character and you get a sense that if they had attempted this on TV, McCoy would have portrayed the Doctor's regret and sadness at leaving Sarah very well. The story itself is thoroughly enjoyable. The concept of mysterious goings-on outside the darkened train window would appeal to anyone who's been stuck on the London Underground between stations. The tunnels of the Tube are utterly dark and mysterious, yet at the same time they're also completely mundane, because thousands of people use them every day. The moment where the Doctor is peering out of the window trying to see what's beyond the tunnel wall is very evocative and a classic example of Doctor Who making the every day into something fantastical. The Kalik morality is fairly interesting; they are a breakaway faction wanted by their own government for rejecting vegetarianism. Their attitude towards hunting lower life forms also suggests severe neurosis, like insectoid fox-hunting toffs from space. The second two parts don't live up to the promise of the first and although it's a runaround, for good solid Doctor Who comic strip adventure Train Flight is well worth the trip. Follow That TARDIS! Writer Andrew Donkin apparently has an honours degree in 'Nuclear Physics and Psychology' according to his website. He has written over thirty children's novels and various comics. A prologue to Train-Flight written by Andrew W. Donkin and Graham S. Brand appeared in the Doctor Who Drabble (Drabble Who?). It was called ‘Sarah’s Hurt’. Loads of long letters were published in DWM regarding Time Flight. Simon Leng from Lancaster attempted to claim a ‘Marvel No-Prize’ for spotting Sarah’s changing outfit in the story. Colon and bracket lover, Clive Webb of Wembdon in Bridgwater had more to say. Much more! "Just a few lines on the recent comic strips in DWM. Firstly, I’d welcome John Ridgway’s recent return as marking one of some permanence. Ridgway is THE Doctor Who artist: his broody, dark-shadowed material always reminds me of classic late fifties/early sixties black and white science fiction films. I think this was particularly true of Hunger From The Ends of Time. It’s certainly time to maintain a degree of continuity with the strip. The sharply contrasting artwork and scripts (in both style and, admittedly, quality) over the last twenty issues or so has left it looking very patchy when it comes to re-reading it later. Collectively, we’ve seen very little development of the Doctor’s character outside what we already know from the tv series. "Speaking of characterization, I’m very reluctant at the inclusion of Sarah Jane Smith in the latest, Train-Flight. It’s early days yet (Episode Two has yet to appear) but please don’t revive old characters simply for a pleasant trip down memory lane. Grant Morrison’s self-sacrifice of Jamie (The World Shapers, issues 127-129) is an example of what can be done (though I’m not advocating bringing back old characters simply to kill them off from the Whoniverse!) "Incidentally, the Doctor’s thought process I becoming a little too simple. The typical scene has been using a character as a sounding board for the Doctor’s theories about a particular death ray/alien species. Let’s see the Doctor debating with himself a little more often. Also, please drop the ‘B’ Movie ish exclamation marks from the comic strip titles. They bring back all that’s worse about 1950s sf (surely you’re not actually trying to ape this genre?) "OK, enough moaning. I hope you take some of my comments to heart. The strip’s on the up again after the severe disappointment of Invaders From Gantac! And Nemesis of The Daleks (bringing back another old character just to kill him off: a very predictable tale this one). Please! No epics that lose all trace of characterisation a the expense of exterminating destruction. Nemesis had nothing to do with what Doctor Who is about: it was little more than a reject Star Wars strip. Stairway to Heaven, Hunger and the first episode of Train-Flight (great title! This is what we need!) have all been good reading. Gerry Dolan is the only other artist to really capture McCoy’s features." Kalik is also a type of beer brewed in the Bahamas. There are some interesting working drawings for this story here plus the interview I got most of my facts from. New Zealand – Rocks!!!
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