<< 1 >>
Rating: 
Summary: A Search Best Left Abandoned
Review: A quick cheap paperback written to cash in on two unique mid-1980s American phenomena -- the "Choose Your Own Adventure" books, and "Doctor Who".(By way of introduction, The "Find Your Fate" series seems to fetishize action-adventure heroes. The ads at the back of "Search for the Doctor" advertise similar "Find Your Fate" stories featuring G.I. Joe and James Bond. These were written by R.L. "Goosebumps" Stine, to boot.) "Search" is authored (in the loosest sense of the word) by David Martin, who wrote several DW TV adventures in the '70s. It also makes no sense. From Los Angeles in the year 2056 (why?), to a space lab called "FERN" (indee), to the return of villains from two different Martin-penned DW serials (all the better with which to lure first-time readers, no doubt), "Search" is a boring and confusing morass. The Doctor is hardly to be seen, there's hardly any decision-making to be had, and the story only has one successful conclusion. Basically, as both a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure, and as a Doctor Who story, "Search for the Doctor" fails gloriously. It's easy to see why they didn't print too many more of these. And why copies are so hard to find. If you should see one, save your fifty cents and call your mom instead.
Rating:
Summary: A Search Best Left Abandoned
Review: A quick cheap paperback written to cash in on two unique mid-1980s American phenomena -- the "Choose Your Own Adventure" books, and "Doctor Who". (By way of introduction, The "Find Your Fate" series seems to fetishize action-adventure heroes. The ads at the back of "Search for the Doctor" advertise similar "Find Your Fate" stories featuring G.I. Joe and James Bond. These were written by R.L. "Goosebumps" Stine, to boot.) "Search" is authored (in the loosest sense of the word) by David Martin, who wrote several DW TV adventures in the '70s. It also makes no sense. From Los Angeles in the year 2056 (why?), to a space lab called "FERN" (indee), to the return of villains from two different Martin-penned DW serials (all the better with which to lure first-time readers, no doubt), "Search" is a boring and confusing morass. The Doctor is hardly to be seen, there's hardly any decision-making to be had, and the story only has one successful conclusion. Basically, as both a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure, and as a Doctor Who story, "Search for the Doctor" fails gloriously. It's easy to see why they didn't print too many more of these. And why copies are so hard to find. If you should see one, save your fifty cents and call your mom instead.
<< 1 >>
| 
