By Scott & David Tipton with Tony Lee
Pencils by Gordon Purcell, colours by J.K. Woodward
Is the alliance between the Borg and the Cybermen as firm as it should be?
Something doesn’t seem right about this issue: there are places where the art isn’t up to the standard of the earlier instalments (a couple of really duff images of Matt Smith and Whoopi Goldberg, notably); where the dialogue doesn’t sit right for the characters (Will Riker is the case in point here) or needed another read through (the Cybermen and the Borg are joining forces: we know because we’re told three times within two paragraphs!); and the plot seems to just jump in a different direction.
Obviously for the end of part four – i.e. the cliffhanger at the end of the first trade paperback – there needs to be something dramatic, and we certainly get that here, but I suspect that it’s the sort of cliffhanger which is immediately countermanded by events in the first couple of pages of the next issue.
That’s not to say that everything falls apart: there’s some nice gentle sparring between the Doctor and Guinan, and the dialogue between the Ponds reflects their ease with the danger that surrounds the Time Lord. But overall, this is a disappointment.
Verdict: Hopefully a blip rather than an indication of things to come. 5/10
Paul Simpson
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