3rd February 2010

This second book is just as good as the first, although that is partly because the first half of this volume is the text of the first book, just without the scripts. The second half is brand new and covers the time from the end of the first book to the end of Russell T Davies' tenure at Doctor Who in the form of an e-mail exchange between Davies and journalist Ben Cook.

For someone dropping into this without having read the first part there are a few places where the first half doesn't make sense. In the original, scripts in progress were included at the points where Davies sent them to Cook, but to save space these have been removed from this volume. The text still makes reference to these extracts though, and no notes have been added to explain where they were meant to be.

Honestly, I didn't find the second half to be as enjoyable as the first. The two authors seem to be more comfortable with each other and Ben is less 'invisible' than before. The discussion tends to be less about writing Doctor Who and more of a biography of Davies - both his history and day-to-day life. The e-mails become longer and longer throughout, which isn't a bad thing but loses some of the informality of the original book.

Overall though it's still a good book. It's absolutely huge, and addictive reading - it almost makes you feel like you are part of the conversation and actually know the participants. I'm just hoping that the story doesn't stop here, and that Ben can continue to correspond with Davies though his next projects, or with Steven Moffat who has taken over Doctor Who.

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20th January 2009

This is not the least good book in the entire space-time continuum. I have really, really, really, enjoyed this one.

'The Untold Story of the BBC series' is what the cover says this book is, but I don't think that quite does it justice. This contains the daily thoughts and feelings of Russell T Davies, the genius behind the new Doctor Who. This is the story of a year in the life of Davies, a man with the craziest life livable, and it's actually truly comforting to know that he's a real person after all - and not some sort of alien genius writer sent to earth to lull us into some sort of TV slavery.

But I digress. Reading this is like seeing the whole of Series Four evolve from the roughest ideas into the finished product. And although you know it will all be okay in the end, the correspondence still generates an urgency and building tension as Russel's deadlines get closer and closer before he has started writing.

In my head, Doctor Who's production was perfect. All the stories were planned out way in advance, the scripts written long before filming commenced. But now I know the truth of it is far more exciting than that - and no one knows how it is going to end until the last possible minute!

My only quibble with this tome is the length of some of the script extracts. These are first drafts of four of Russell's scripts reproduced, bit by bit as they were written. In hindsight though they are vital to the plot - to see how the ideas changed from the beginning to the finished product on our screens.

I can only hope that Russell and Ben continue to communicate, and that they feel it appropriate to publish again! Also, the hints of Who to come are tantalizing... and annoying knowing it's still another year before series five.

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