Review by Chlo Hickson
My favorite TARDIS team in a story that was set in Victorian London – I think I was always going to enjoy this Past Doctor Adventure.
Robert Perry and Mike Tucker’s Matrix is now fighting with their other book Illegal Alien for first place in my book collection. It’s an excellent page turner. From the opening pages, it’s clear that it’s a dark but fast paced novel.
Matrix is undoubtedly one of the darkest Doctor Who stories with some dark looks at not only the 7th Doctor and Ace but Victorian society throughout. This is mainly due to Jack the Ripper and his influence over this time period. The novel does contain quite a few references to the show’s mythology as well besides the characters I’ve mentioned including references to events throughout the 7th Doctor’s era and other stories including Genesis of the Daleks, The Caves of Androzani and The Trial of a Time Lord.
They arrive in a London that has little resemblance to what it should be, and the Doctor seems never to have existed. The sense of doom is reinforced by an encounter with Ian and Barbara who apparently don’t know who Susan is or met the first Doctor as they should have.
The Doctor goes through one hell of a psychological, mental and emotional battering, and to top it all off he has his identity stolen.
I can understand why someone would resist reading a book that dwells on the evil inside the Doctor. For years he has been a beacon of hope and who are the writers to suggest that underneath his pacifistic façade lies a cruel and unprincipled being? That’s simplifying it but as the last few pages of Matrix reveal, the Doctor does still have some of his dark side inside of him. Personally, I love the idea that the Doctor is just as flawed as the rest of us when it comes to succumbing to his dark side. After all the evil he has defeated you’d think his conscience would twinge. Death surrounds him, his adventures are full of them, quite a few of them wouldn’t have happened if he didn’t show up. It’s an interesting idea and one that the writers focus on to disturb the reader, when the Doctor turns on Ace and threatens to kill her it might honestly be the most frightening moment in the series.
Some of the most frightening scenes in Doctor Who occur when it seems like the Doctor’s gone bad, either through possession – seen in The Invisible Enemy – or corruption – seen in The Invasion of Time – or both. But the scene where the Doctor attacks Ace is gut-wrenching.
The 7th Doctor is the ideal incarnation to do this with because he is capable of being the scariest out of all his other selves. The Doctor wiping out the Daleks, manipulating his companion to face her fears and taking on the biggest baddies with little more than his will – the Gods of Ragnarok, Fenric …). He’s the eternal thinker, ignoring causalities in the face of the greater good. To see him get outwitted early on is terrifying. As something unseen takes over the TARDIS, the Doctor’s own sanctuary, and taunts him out.
The Doctor for the most part is missing and in his place is an amnesiac called Johnny.
Johnny becomes a character of vulnerability, being attacked by several Londoners for his apparent unintelligence and hobo appearance. He is spat on for being different, which is a major theme of these sections of the book. He is taken in by Joseph Liebermann who is Jewish.
When the Doctor is in the book, it is clear that he’s a man at war with himself as his darker side threatens to unleash itself. Eventually it does and it makes for one of the most shocking pieces of Doctor Who media I’ve seen. It seems appropriate that the seventh Doctor, who is known for his dark nature, should be the one to battle his darkness once and for all.
The Doctor carries out most of the Jack the Ripper murders – occasionally it is his alter-ego – but the Doctor does actually commit murder in order to set the timeline straight. He tells Ace, ‘Five woman – those particular woman – had to die. Simply because that is the way it happened’ Hearing him justify himself for outright murder was honestly horrible.
The Doctor’s darkness would be revisited by New-Who with the War Doctor and the Time Lord Victorious, both are effective.
The dark tone of the book is unrelenting as Ace ends up abandoned on the unforgiving streets of London in 1888. Much of the book is focused on Ace as she tries to come to terms with being homeless and penniless in Victorian London with little hope of seeing the Doctor and the TARDIS again.
This is more of an Ace adventure then it is for the Doctor as he disappears early on. This gives the reader a great insight into Ace as a character as she tries just to survive without the Doctor or anyone else to help.
Ace spends most of the novel undergoing various levels of assault and humiliation going from a boarding house, to an estate as a servant, to a freak show, and finally to prison to be hanged. This story also turns Ace into a murderer, killing the elderly woman who she works for in self defense and triggering the Cheetah Virus from the TV story Survival. For the rest of the novel, she has to fight off her animal instincts to keep her humanity intact.
Joseph Liebermann is an intelligent man who is attempting to overcome the prejudices of the time. Liebermann has a long life, living well into the 1960s and eventually working at Coal Hill school.
Liebermann is the only character who shows some sense of humanity, and somehow manages to keep his optimism throughout his entire life being torn to pieces in front of him.
All the characterisations are well constructed, and the plot is never predictable.
Jacques Malacroix plays a sizable role during Ace’s time away from the Doctor and becomes the victim of an appropriate and deserved piece of irony. He’s a character who uses manipulation, physical and emotional abuse, and just plain torture to get his “freaks” to become co-dependent on him. Reading the sections of the book he’s in is like reading a story of domestic abuse. All the so called “freaks” in his circus shadow the all too real shows that were around during this time period.
On the subject of the “freaks”, the reader knows that they are just people, but the writers emphasise the way their differences are exploited to fascinate and disgust the “normal people”. It does make for some uncomfortable reading.
The highlights of the supporting characters are Ian Chesterton, Barbara Wright and Jack the Ripper. The writers handle all three of these characters well.
The novel’s villain, who becomes obvious as the story goes on, makes a very effective appearance however and gives us some fantastically dramatic scenes as well.
This Doctor Who take on the identity of the unknown serial killer is perfect, though an understanding of the Classic series is sort’ve vital.
It’s a very dark novel, has a nice sense of horror and also does a good job at both addressing the loose ends from the TV show and respecting the continuity. This is a novel that takes the Whoniverse and pushes its boundaries. It’s probably one of the absolute best Doctor Who novels honestly. The Doctor and Ace are pushed to their very limits and the reader is there with them on one hell of an emotional rollercoaster.
This is Doctor Who at it’s best, frightening the hell out of people while telling a brilliant story in the process.