It’s been a while since the DWM comic strip has popped up in the marathon. The last featured story was The Road to Hell in the early 17th century. That too was the 8th Doctor and here he is back again,  travelling solo, visiting early Victorian London.


He’s just enjoying Victorian nightlife (a recent trend due to the invention of gas lamps) when he witnesses an attack by Spring Heeled Jack.

Aiding a young Essex woman, Penny Chapman, he eventually discovers all is not as it seems. As monsters explode from the gas lamps, he discovers that Penny is really an alien called Morjanus and that Jack is tasked with hunting her down. A blast from Jack’s psychic force wipes Morjanus from her mind, leaving only Penny whom the Doctor takes home leaving Jack to guard London (although from what is not made clear).

The DWM strips are rarely disappointing. This is a shorter than usual  story at only 3 parts but still satisfies. Practically the entire story happens at night lending itself to some delightfully moody and effective illustrations of Victorian London. The frames are populated  by a variety of posh and poor Victorians and the depiction of Jack is goblin-like and effective. I also liked the supporting character of Inspector Arnold Porter, particularly when his dour, sarcastic demeanour disappears in the face of his constable’s death and he screams at the watching crowds to run for their lives.

The 8th Doctor is well drawn and characterised. Penny is a fun companion (before her true identity is revealed) and I remember at the time of publication, thinking she would make good companion material for the solo 8th Doctor – I was sure at least until the final part that she was going to step aboard the TARDIS at the close of the story. Apparently, the writers also thought the same but, ultimately, she was passed over for Destrii who was considered to have more potential. What’s interesting, of course, is both Penny/Morjanus and Destrii are both alien criminal-style characters and I can imagine Penny’s loss of memory about her real identity would have been something that would have featured in future stories (and is something which featured to some extent in another alien criminal companion, Majenta in the 10th Doctor’s strips, when her involvement in the Crimson Hand organisation was revealed). I believe there may also be another abandoned aspect to Penny as well, which is the fact that the stories of Jack were printed, in Victorian times, in what were termed ‘Penny Dreadfuls’. This is an aspect of the story writer Scott Gray considered and then ultimately abandoned to make the story work.

Historically there are no figures but 1840 was indeed the year the gaslights were introduced to the streets of London.

Whilst Jack is an interesting character I did find the back story to him and Morjanus a little vague. He is described as a Hunter and is supposedly at war with Morjanus’ people, but there is no motivation given for that war and aside from Morjanus releasing the Pyrodines on innocent bystanders, there isn’t any real reason given for why the Doctor would side with Jack rather than Morjanus. Her past is left particularly vague – why is she on Earth; how did she get there; what  had she done to be hunted down?

However, the atmosphere of the story helps it along and its good to finally see a visual depiction of the 19th century London, in my marathon after so many audio adventures and one TV story – The Mark of the Rani which was set ‘oop North’.