An excellent continuation of the new Doctor Who comics series

(This post originally appeared on Glorified Love Letters.)

Talking about individual comics issues is somewhat difficult, for one does not want to spoil the story. However, let me continue to encourage you to look into the two new Doctor Who comics runs for both the Tenth and Eleventh Doctors with this brief look.

(For a basic background, do check out my thoughts on the first issues for both Doctors here.)

The Tenth Doctor and Gabriela are still fighting a strange creature in New York that has the ability to take on the warped appearance of familiar people, and Gabriela continues to be a capable woman. The Doctor features consistently in the story now, whereas in Issue #1, he didn’t appear until halfway through. Nick Abadzis explores themes of fear and expectations without hitting one over the head with a moral, and Elena Casagrande’s artwork continues to be very good:

Meanwhile, the Eleventh Doctor has whisked Alice away on an adventure, hoping to help her feel better, but since TARDIS usually has other plans, they land on a planet taken over by a theme park. All of the workers are strangely happy, and none of the patrons are complaining. Rokhandi is supposed to be full of natural splendor, and instead the Doctor is being offered free Rokhandi floss.

Al Ewing does a wonderful job writing Alice as a smart woman who is able to remind the Doctor of his gaps in human understanding. She doesn’t put up with him patronizing her conclusions, and it’s interesting to see the story talk about the unpleasant emotions we all have, playing off the happy-time Rokhandi World with Alice’s previously mentioned depression.

After the beauty of Alice X Zhang’s covers for both the Tenth and Eleventh Doctors’ first two issues, I’m still somewhat let down by the artwork within the Eleventh’s Doctor’s story. I know that the comics are not entirely beholden to getting his face exactly right, but when you have such an iconic figure — especially compared with the job done in the Tenth Doctor’s comics — I guess I just expected better. Alice and some of the scenery are drawn well, but I don’t know that I have the proper comic-art vocabulary to say what specifically I’m looking for. That said, the artwork could evolve over the story arc, and it’s not overly distracting in the meantime.

I think this might be the first time I’ve ever read a comics run starting with the first issue, as they were released, and I find myself impatient for more. How do the rest of you regular comics readers do it?

Full Disclosure: Titan Comics provided me with advanced review copies of these comics. I thank them for the gesture and I will continue to be fair with my reviews.