The 1978 Annual

World Distributors The Sea of Faces The 1978 Annual

Published	1977
SBN	7235 0412 1

Starring the fourth Doctor and Sarah

• The Mystery of the Annual by Noe Geric

The Mystery of the Annual by Noe Geric 28/4/20

The oddest thing with the annuals is that no writers are credited for the stories. I checked on the internet and didn't find anything. And I can guess why nobody wanted to be credited for this, as it is the oddest thing I've read in my life!

The concept is really interesting and could've made something truly good! A world over-populated where everybody now lives in a dream. But, as usual with the annuals, the idea is wasted. The whole thing just feels weird: there's no real character, the Doctor seems to be alone all along, and the illustrations are really strange.

I really don't like that style of drawing; the actions are incomprehensible! And, like in every other annual, Sarah Jane doesn't looks like Elisabeth Sladen. The Doctor bears few similarities with Tom Baker, and it adds no atmosphere/no idea of what the world is looking like.

The descriptions are really basic, and the writer spends all his word count on useless things. Sarah Jane is sidelined, as she is asleep for half of the story. I don't get why the annuals always waste her in a dream or a cave or even once she is present all along but don't do anything and is barely mentioned. The Doctor spends the whole story wandering around. He spends four days on the planet's moon and a lot of time trying to escape.

Of course, nothing really interesting happens. The ''He waited four hours/ten days'' just feels like it's here to give the impression that the adventure is longer than six pages. No sense of drama is here, and once the mystery is explained (after page four), nothing really happens.

Of course, the sort of ending I hate happens: the companion asks to Doctor what happened, and we get all the explanations like this, in a dull exposition scene with the Doctor explaining and Sarah asking. The story ends on a little twist that was mentioned some pages earlier - What if all this was the Doctor's dream? - but it doesn't feel right.

This was an interesting concept wasted with the Doctor wandering on a dead moon. This is the longest story of the annual, but it feels empty. The others had fewer pages to develop their idea, but they were better. I give it 3/10, because some parts were really intriguing.

Oh, and I'd like to know who wrote this one, because it's odd that no authors are credited! Or is that the illustrator who wrote it? Who knows!