Friday 2 July 2010

DW: The TARDIS Handbook

An odd cash in item. This is a book about the TARDIS, and covers all sorts of aspects of it, as well as Time Lords and the Doctor... and yet is clearly a tie in to the series. The Eleventh Doctor stories (up to Vampires in Venice) are summarised, and the 2010 TARDIS is very much the TARDIS referred to whenever nothing specific is mentioned.

Which isn't to say there isn't interesting stuff here. We get a history of what's happened to the TARDIS. We get a list of the TARDIS components (although I'm sure Jon Preddle might be able to identify errors). A look at the outer shells (this, and more, is from in-continuity and a production view). And a look at the new TARDIS console with various controls identified. There's a lot here that's useful.

There's also some weird aspects. Do we need to know which companions are stowaways? Or the first impressions of companions? Or the different regenerations of the Doctor?

But the tie-in aspect means it's going to get outdated fairly quickly. There's probably stuff in the latter episodes of series 5 that need to be added. Still, while it lasts, it's a useful reference guide.

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