The Dr Who Annual 1966: The Lost Ones

The Dr Who Annual 1966
"The Lost Ones"
Written by [unknown]
Published: September 1965
Read: 22nd September 2016

What's It All About

When I read where the Tardis had landed today, I must admit that I groaned. Yes, it's Dr Who's first visit to the planet Vortis and he is seen set upon by the Menoptera. However, we don't get a rehash of The Web Planet, nor do we get a rip-roaring page-turner of an adventure. Instead, this story really looks into scientific curiosity as the Doctor is intrigued at these enormous insects, and the Menoptera in turn, are fascinated by the Doctor. Of course, when the Doctor is imprisoned and threatened with being dissected (as he was in "The Sons of the Crab") I started to think we were going to get a rehash of the previous story albeit with the Menoptera instead of the Yend of Wengrol.

Enter the eight-foot giant soldiers who rescue the Doctor and carry him off to their crashed spaceship. Here, we are once again given over to scientific and historical curiosity as the soldiers are identified as being from the city-state of Atlantis! The Doctor correctly surmises that he has travelled thousands of years back in time, and he theorises on the history of these Atlanteans, that they were able to travel the stars and colonised other universes before they turned on themselves leading to the destruction of Atlantis. The soldiers repeated references to the Greek gods, also lead the Doctor to suspect that survivors moved out to Ancient Greece and Ancient Egypt, spreading their myths and shaping humanity.

Summing Up

To sum up, then, this was a story that was short on action, yet provided some intriguing insights into the make-up of the inhabitants of Vortis, as well as providing us (yet another!!!) theory for what fate befell Atlantis and the Atlanteans. There was only one stand-out scene for me in this story, where Dr Who was forced to remove all of his clothes in order to prove that he wasn't an insect! That certainly wouldn't have happened had this story had appeared on television, and with good reason, but I could certainly see Hartnell injecting all his defiance and will into it and not losing his dignity. To top it all off, we have another downbeat ending with Dr Who leaving the Atlanteans battling it out with thousands of Zarbi and larvae guns. Dry but interesting.

6/10

Continuity Corner

• Dr Who invented the Atmospheric Density Jackets (The Web Planet) for use in the eventuality that an accident deprived him of oxygen.
• This is Dr Who's first visit to the planet Vortis, as he has never met Menoptera or Zarbi before.
• Dr Who once again confirms that he is from the planet Earth ("The Sons of the Crab").
• The Zarbi served as companions and workers for the Menoptera for millions of years. The Menoptera were forced into exile when a Zarbi queen evolved that was different to any other: she was ambitious and set about equipping the Zarbi with weapons. The Menoptera were forced to evacuate to one of the orbiting moons aboard a sole spacecraft.
• Dr Who hypothesises that the giant Atlanteans colonists on Earth must have settled in Ancient Greece, Egypt, and Crete where they forgot their noble origins, devolving into savagery, yet still worshipping their gods.

The Dr Who Annual 1966: "The Sons of the Crab"

The Dr Who Annual 1966
"The Sons of the Crab"
Written by [unknown]
Published: September 1965

What's It All About

"The Sons of the Crab" sees the Dr Who, who describes himself as a human scientist from the planet Earth, taking his TARDIS beyond the Milky Way Galaxy for the first time and landing on the planet Wengrol in the Crab Nebula. 

After being captured and being poked a prodded like a lab specimen, Dr Who is sent before the planet's leader and learns that the inhabitants of the planet are continually mutating thanks to the deadly radiation of a new star that entered their system. While the leader foresees no cure to their mutations, the leader looks to Dr Who to take hundreds of test tubes containing their "children" and seed them on another world.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Having read several of the 1970s Tom Baker era annuals in the past, I was very uncertain about visiting these annuals but was actually quite surprised at the rather in-depth story that we were getting here. It's rather unusual for an annual that would be aimed at children to tackle the themes of eugenics and to have such a terrible ending that saw the test tubes become unviable once the TARDIS dematerialized.

Unfortunately, while this was a rather in-depth story, the prose didn't exactly set me alight, it was very, very dry. That's not to say there was some good characterization for Dr Who, especially when his dander was up when he was being poked and prodded. 

Could it work as a Doctor Who story?

Despite the fact that Dr Who refers to himself as a human from the planet Earth, I could easily see this story slotting into the regular Doctor Who continuity. Unlike many of the upcoming stories, especially from the TV Comic era, Dr Who doesn't act rashly or commit any violent actions and indeed seeks out to preserve life at the very end of the story.

If we were to look at this story as a Doctor Who story, then it would have to be placed very early within "Season 0" as the TARDIS hasn't been further than the Crab Nebula prior to this story. As for Susan's absence, some timelines suggest that the Doctor had dropped Susan off somewhere while he found a suitable place for them to settle. However, I don't consider this very likely, suggesting that Susan was inside the TARDIS all the time. It wouldn't be out of character for the Doctor to perhaps lock the internal door and keep Susan safe while he explored. Either that or she was asleep. 

6/10

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"The Lost Ones"