A bit of weak tea.
Creative Staff:
Story: Robbie Morrison
Art: Daniel Indro
Colors: Slamet Mujiono
Letters: Richard Starkings and Comicraft’s Jimmy Betancourt
What They Say:
Earth is under attack from an ancient species who yoked suns and spanned galaxies before we’d even evolved opposable thumbs. Cities are tumbling under their assault, people are dying in droves… and only two people in the universe can save us. But first the Doctor and Clara must save themselves! Burning with fury forged in the heart of stars, armed with technology beyond human comprehension, composed of a fleet of unstoppable warships… the Hyperions have returned at last. Welcome to the Hyperion War…Welcome to the last days of Earth!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Hyperios rises and Earth falls.
A spaceship crash lands on Earth, destroying a space station and destroying the Windmere Lake District in England. Kate Stewart and UNIT are on the scene, trying to assess the situation while at the same time trying to contact The Doctor. It doesn’t go well. More ships land and an ominous message is broadcast across the world: Hyperios rises.
The Doctor does arrive, Clara by his side, an unspecified time later. They find London a burnt-out hellhole covered in ash. The two become separated in a pretty funny and character-appropriate way, and both discover the truth: something terrible has decimated humanity, and the ash is alive.
And that’s pretty much it. “The Hyperion Empire” is the first of a four-part story and this issue exists mainly to set the stage, making it a somewhat unsatisfying read. It’s always hard to balance exposition with action and drama in a first issue, and this one errs a bit too much on the side of exposition for my taste. The Doctor and Clara don’t even show up until halfway through the issue, and it’s only when they arrive that the story really takes off.
Morrison has a real knack for writing these characters. There’s a great back-and-forth that goes on between The Doctor and Clara that really captures the spirit of comradery they share. Really, their interactions were the best part of the story, and it’s a shame that it only lasted for a couple of pages.
It is a well-drawn book, though. Daniel Indro handles the art and Slamet Mujiono takes care of the colors and they do a fine job on this issue. Indro does particularly well with body language and facial expressions. His Doctor and Clara do look like Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman, but not slavishly so; not to the point where it looks like a headshot was Xeroxed onto the page.
In Summary:
Doctor Who: The Twelfth Doctor #13 sets the stage for what’s to come, but as a standalone issue, it’s weak tea. It takes too much time getting to the story, giving us pages about astronauts who will eventually die, or two fishermen fishing at the wrong place at the wrong time. The idea is to build up the tragedy, but it just feels like wasted space. I’m sure that the next issue will pick up. Dr. Josh gives this a…
Grade: C+
Age Rating: N/A
Released By: Titan Comics
Release Date: October 21st, 2015
MSRP: $3.99
