Quick, call John Cage!
Creative Staff:
Story: Nick Abadzis
Art: Giorgia Sposito
Colors: Arianna Florean with Azzurra Florean
Letters: Richard Starkings and Comicraft’s Jimmy Betancourt
What They Say:
Exhausted from their ‘battle’ with the Wishing Well Witch, and from the attack in the Vortex, the Doctor, Gabby, and Cindy are taking a well-earned break in New Orleans…
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
As much as I’ve enjoyed Doctor Who: The Tenth Doctor, I’ve felt like the last three issues have been off. In general, the comic feels like it’s been spinning its wheels, putting plot points and characters into motion, but not paying enough attention to the story being told in the issue. Thankfully, that’s changed with issue 2.11 (really awkward numbering system there). Nick Abadzis and crew have come up with a real corker.
After their many travels and adventures, the Doctor, Gabby, and Cindy take a well-deserved rest in New Orleans during the Jazz Age. For once, the TARDIS goes when and where the Doctor wants, and the three spend two weeks enjoying the city and the music.
Rather, Gabby and Cindy have spent three weeks enjoying the city and the music. The Doctor has squirreled himself away in the TARDIS doing God knows what. He only leaves his blue box once a day so he can join the girls for dinner, and he only does that because Gabby forces him.
The Doctor understandably has a great deal on his mind. The encounter with the Wishing Well Witch left he rattled when he discovered that the “witch” was actually the discorporate forms of Time Lord children who somehow became lost when looking into the temporal schism. Their very existence frightens and confuses the Doctor, and their presence hints at some larger game afoot.
A smaller, but important, game is also afoot in New Orleans. While Gabby enjoys the scenery, Cindy falls hard for a jazzman named Roscoe. Everything seems hunky-dory until Roscoe’s ex, Paradisa, comes to him with glowing red eyes and asks him for “help.” Whatever help she required sapped Roscoe of his musical ability. Thankfully, his new girlfriend knows a certain Doctor who is quite good when it comes to all things sonic.
The creature behind it all is related to a monster the Doctor and Gabby met in a previous adventure: the Nocturne. The Nocturne are conceptual beings with no physical form, and it looks like this branch of the Nocturne family tree wants to use musicians as a way to funnel a great deal of power and shape it into a form. Can the Doctor and his companions save Roscoe and the other musicians, or will the Jazz Age give birth to something horrible? Only time and the next issue can tell!
I really enjoyed this issue. For whatever reason, I felt like this issue fired on almost all cylinders. It certainly felt more self-contained—possibly an odd statement considering this is the first part of the story, but you get my drift—and didn’t feel like the writer was moving pieces on a board. That increased my enjoyment immeasurably.
The issue also makes good use of previous story and character points, such as Gabby’s music box, the importance of music in general, and the existence of conceptual creatures. The comic uses those elements in a way that supports the story and they don’t overwhelm it at all.
Plus, the Doctor, Gabby, and Cindy seem more like their old selves. The weird tension between Gabby and Cindy has disappeared, and the three function like friends again, despite the Doctor’s preoccupation with what he learned fighting the Wishing Well Witch.
It helps that Giorgia Sposito (who I assume is the correct artist since her name was written in the comic) and Arianna and Azzurra Florean do a great job bringing Jazz Age New Orleans to life from the color to the architecture to the clothes.
As much as I enjoyed this comic, there were a couple of hiccups. Although the art was strong, I was confused by one sequence when Gabby gets attacked by a man with a trumpet. At first I thought she was seeing him through an open door, but in the next panel, he’s making some sort of sonic attack against her that blows a hole in the wall. The Doctor is also present in that panel despite the fact that he was looking in a different room just one panel previous. It seems like there’s a panel missing, maybe even two where Gabby closes the door and the Doctor moves to get her out of the way of the blast. Whatever the reason, it definitely didn’t make sense visually.
There’s also an odd typo or mistranslation near the end when the Doctor says “It’s using the magicians as conduits….” It should be “musicians,” not “magicians.” I’m sure I just seem nit-picky, but these things should be caught before printing.
In Summary:
Despite my nit-picking, I enjoyed this issue quite a bit. Unlike the previous three issues, 2.11 feels like a self-contained story. The mystery immediately engaged me, and I felt like the characters were acting more like themselves. I’m looking forward to seeing what happens next with “The Jazz Monster, Part 2.” Dr. Josh gives this a….
Grade: B
Age Rating: N/A
Released By: Titan Comics
Release Date: June 15th, 2016
MSRP: $3.99
