Warriors of the Deep

Target novelisation Doctor Who - Warriors of the Deep

Author	Terrance Dicks
Published	1984
ISBN	0 426 19561 2
First Edition Cover	Alistair Pearson

Back cover blurb: When the TARDIS materialises on Earth in the year 2084, the Doctor meets an old enemy - the Sea Devils. Once the masters of this planet, they are now forced to live in the murky depths of the sea. But their intention is to reclaim their position of domination... This will entail the infiltration of Earth's defence systems and the provocation of another World War, more terrible than any yet experienced, to bring about the complete annihilation of the human race. Not only is the first stage of the Sea Devils' attack successful, their associates in this dastardly plan are the sinister Silurians, also known to the Doctor of old.

• Doctor Who and the Revenge of the Sea Monsters! by Andrew Feryok

Doctor Who and the Revenge of the Sea Monsters! by Andrew Feryok 21/3/07

It had been unwise of the ape-primitives to venture beneath the seas, thought Icthar. Now a terrible vengeance awaited them. It was time for them to relinquish their rule over the planet Earth, to make way for their superiors. the time of the Silurians and of the Sea Devils had come again.
- Chapter 4, page 46

Once again, I survived the experience although my self-esteem is now out of the corner and going into severe therapy. Granted, it's not exactly a bad adaptation of the television story. In fact, without the limitations of the BBC budget, the story is given a real chance to flex its dramatic muscles in a way it could never do on screen. For instance, the eyesore known as the Myrka is now a terrifying dragon whose destructive rampage through the sea base is actually one of the most exciting parts of the book! The sea base still lacks the claustrophic feel it needed and never got in either version, but at least the airlock door falling on Tegan's leg feels more realistic and dramatic through the descriptions prompting my imagination. However, this still comes out as a rather bland adventure.

Without the restrictions of the wooden actors and actresses, the characters actually gain some drama to them. The traitor Nilson is shown to be a crazed fanatic who converted to the philosophies of the other power bloc and is planning to defect. Doctor Solow is enormously improved, shown as a professional woman who has been brainwashed by Nilson but still has some doubts as to the morality of what she is doing. This is something that was always present in the dialogue of the original episode but was never allowed to shine through due to the actress portraying Solow. And Dicks had the mercy to play down Solow's karate kicking the Myrka. Rather than have her kick it and die, the Myrka merely hits her with its tail, electrocuting her, and sending her flying down the corridor. Commander Vorshak and Maddox, the sync-operator, come across as the strong characters they were on screen, but Preston and Bulic remain faceless and continue to lack personality of any kind.

The regulars come across well in the story. Dicks gets inside the head of both the Doctor and Turlough. We don't learn anything that we couldn't deduce from the television story already, but it helps in bringing out character traits in Turlough so that he is a much stronger character. The Doctor is wonderful to read and gets all the best lines. My two favorites are: when he holds the bridge hostage for the first time and states "gentleman, we seem to have a problem," or when he explains to Tegan what the ultra-violet light gun will do, "I'm planning to bring a little sunshine back into the Myrka's life!" However, once the Doctor rescues Tegan from the retreating Nilson using the ultra-violet light gun, his troublesome moral stance comes to the fore. I discussed my issues with his moral stance in my review of the telelvision episode, but the way Dicks writes him, the Doctor seems to almost be in denial of the entire situation. He's faced with an inevitable decision and can see that although the humans in this time period are hardly honorable, the Silurians on the base are about to willingly betray thier deepest beliefs and destroy humanity for the sake of power and supremacy. Since Dicks can make us privy to Tegan and Turlough's thoughts, we see thier trust of the Doctor wavering as they begin to wonder whether he is a bit unhinged trying to save the Silurians.

Prose-wise, the story is pretty good. It's not as well written as The Caves of Androzani, and characters have a habit of addressing each other by thier full names in every sentence they utter for no reason whatsoever. The story gets off to a slow start as Dicks tries to build up some tension around the politics on the base. But the story really doesn't start to kick in until the Doctor holds the bridge hostage for the first time and the Silurian battle cruiser appears. I've noticed that Dicks' strength as a writer for Target novels is that he is very good at writing action stories. When there is a lot of running up and down corridors, monsters attack, and soldiers shooting and dying in combat, Dicks is masterful at capturing the pace of the action, making the story fly by. He manages to make the Silurians, Sea Devils, and Myrka feel like an unstoppable force which is only hindered by the Doctor's unique efforts. As mentioned before, once the Doctor rescues Tegan from Nilson, the story continues on a fast pace, but loses a lot of credibility and believability. It is rather ironic that the aspects of the story most reviled on the television end up being the most enjoyable aspects of the novel!

Overall, the story is about average for the Target novels and for Terrance Dicks. It is certainly not as bland as his adaptation of State of Decay, but lacks a lot of the gravity and terror of The Caves of Androzani (although that is more due to the story material itself). The Silurians' only character trait is arrogance and the Sea Devils have zero personality at all. The Myrka has a remarkable personality all its own and the story has an action-packed middle that is surrounded by a boring political drama and dubious moral dilemma. On the whole, not bad but not good. A middle of the road story that will entertain if you stick through it. 5/10