DOCTOR WHO SPECIAL!

L
IA
IC
FF
O
N
U
%
0
10
THE THE
HUNGER TOMORROW
GAMES PEOPLE
THE BALLAD OF HOMO SUPERIOR
SONGBIRDS AT 50
AND SNAKES
SCOTT
GOOD PILGRIM
OMENS
DESIGNING
EXCLUSIVE! TAKES OFF
GAIMAN’S
WORLD STRANGER
THINGS
THE FIRST
SHADOW

TATE, TENNANT & RUSSELL T DAVIES

RETURN OF THE DREAM TEAM!

INTERVIEWS! ON-SET ACCESS! FIRST LOOK PHOTOS!

HP LOVECRAFT | FOR ALL MANKIND | THANKSGIVING | SECRET WARS | INVINCIBLE

THE LAZARUS PROJECT | THE ENFIELD HAUNTING | TREASURY OF BRITISH COMICS
 SFX 372 CONTENTS

58

50

22

FEATURES 50 STRANGER SUBSCRIBE REVIEWS

22 RUSSELL T
THINGS
The First Shadow falls in
Hawkins… and the West End.
NOW & SAVE! 88 THE EXORCIST:
Head to pag
DAVIES e 20 BELIEVER
Back where he belongs. In SFX. 58 THE HUNGER for details Whatever possessed them?
GAMES
30 DAVID The first spots of Snow, if you 92 THE FALL OF
TENNANT catch our drift. THE HOUSE OF
So does Fourteen count as
RED ALERT USHER
Tennant’s Extra? 64 SCOTT PILGRIM Mike Flanagan gets Poe-faced.
TAKES OFF
36 DOCTOR WHO When we watch it, we kinda 8 INVINCIBLE 96 HELLRAISER
PRODUCERS feel like we’re on drugs. It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s QUARTET OF
Going deep on the Meep. Robert Kirkman! TORMENT
78 THE A sinister box worth opening.
42 TALES OF THE TOMORROW 10 THE ENFIELD
TARDIS PEOPLE HAUNTING 102 THE FUTURE
It’s time to fire up the Time- Celebrating 50 years of the Catherine Tate experiences the The Power author Naomi
Space Visualiser! Homo superior. zeitgeist of the poltergeist. Alderman takes on tomorrow.

12 FOR ALL 108 ULTIMATE

MANKIND INVASION
42 It’s T-minus season four for the
alternate-history show.
Remaking the Marvel universe.

14 TREASURY OF REGULARS
BRITISH COMICS
All your Christmases are coming 112 BLASTERMIND
at once. This issue’s quiz is cryptid
rather than cryptic.
16 A CALL TO
CTHULHU 114 TOTAL RECALL
Hey, kids! Fancy some ancient Celebrating the 40th of the
cosmic horror? 20th in the 60th.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 3

 GET IN TOUCH!

DECEMBER 2023 | Issue 372

First Contact
Future PLC, Quay House, The Ambury, Bath BA1 1UA

Editor
Darren Scott
[email protected]
Deputy Editor Art Editor Production Editor
Ian Berriman Jonathan Coates Ed Ricketts
Hailing Frequencies Open! ian.berriman@
futurenet.com
jonathan.coates@
futurenet.com
ed.ricketts@
futurenet.com

Editor-at-large US Editor
Nick Setchfield Tara Bennett

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Rodney Dive
Robert MacDonald Loved reading the retrospective article on Director of Group Finance
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Ultraviolet in SFX 370. I’d forgotten Philip Quast played a
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4 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 WELCOME

“Don’t worry,
I’m quite the
screamer.

Rants & Raves Now there’s

a spoiler for
you!”

Inside the SFX hive mind

Captain’s Log
DARREN SCOTT EDITOR
RAVES
In case it needs saying, writing about Doctor
Who for this issue was an utter joy.
Loved the latest season of Creepshow, I
could watch it all year round. I’m also really
enjoying Goosebumps.
Great news for the writers – now, let’s see
the actors sorted too!
RANTS
Multi-million dollar productions with next to
no publicity – what’s the point?
I firmly debunk Ian’s review of the “Time And
The Rani” soundtrack on page 111.

IAN BERRIMAN DEPUTY EDITOR

RAVES
The long wait for more Doctor Who is nearly
over! I re-read “The Star Beast” in preparation.
Wonder if the TV viewers of 2023 will guess
that it’s REDACTED
New four-part Sky Arts documentary
Wonderland Gothic (premiering at 9pm on
7 November) is essential viewing for anyone
who dresses entirely in black.
Bit late to the party here, but fans of Stuart
Gordon should check out Naked Theater &
Uncensored Horror, a memoir by the late
director (available from FAB Press).
RANTS
“Debunking” involves actually providing Doctor Who has – as I’ve often said – helped shape
some evidence…
the life I know and love. Not only have I made
JONATHAN COATES ART EDITOR wonderful friends because of the show, but it’s
RAVES inadvertently responsible for getting me into
Had to psyche myself up for another Star journalism and putting me on the path that led to
Wars series, but Ahsoka was worth it – best
thing they’ve done since The Mandalorian editing this very magazine. It opened the doors to so
season two in my opinion. many other shows, films, books, comics and worlds
inbetween – it was my gateway to unashamedly
ED RICKETTS PRODUCTION EDITOR
RAVES loving many genres. While Doctor Who celebrates
I’m not a diehard Doctor Who fan by any turning 60 this month, I didn’t want to spend time
means, but by god am I looking forward to
“Wild Blue Yonder”. I do not know what
looking back in this issue. We’ve been doing that all
happens, and I’m all the more excited for it. year and there’s weighty tomes and websites (and
RANTS apparently magazines?) slavishly recording such
The first 20 minutes of Cobweb were good.
The first 25 minutes of No One Will Save You details in great depth. There’s more Classic series
were good. stuff to come from us, but what I want to do right
The first 6m 55s of Evil Dead Rise were
good. I’ve seen it all before, horror filmmakers.
now is look forward: to new adventures, to a new era,
to celebrate every little new morsel we possibly can.
NICK SETCHFIELD EDITOR-AT-LARGE As ever, do be mindful of things you might consider
RAVES
A treat to see Charlie Higson talking about
to be a spoiler before the new episodes air – you have
all things 007 at Topping & Co in Bath. Let’s been warned!
hope he gets a shot at another James Bond But wow, what an issue this has been! A lot of love
novel or two.
RIP and very hard work has gone into bringing you the
Sad to hear of the passing of David exclusive content and goodies inside (check out the
McCallum. So brilliantly alien in Sapphire And
Steel, but forever The Invisible Man to me.
downloads on pages 86 and 115). Please help support
print publications by not sharing anything online that
TARA BENNETT US EDITOR official SFX channels haven’t already posted. We’d
RAVES
Really enjoying the Apple TV+ series
like to still be around to give you the same treatment
Monarch: Legacy Of Monsters. A clever tying for Ncuti’s era – and what a ride that’s going to be!
together of all the film mythologies, with great Here’s to the next 60 years…
new characters. Plus both Russells (Kurt and
Wyatt) are excellent.
Blue Eye Samurai is a gorgeous, intense and
very bloody adult animated saga, that’s well
worth watching.
© BBC

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 5

 DECEMBER
2023
NEWS //// INTERVIEWS //// INSIGHT //// DOWNLOADS!

15

RETURN TO
BATTLEWORLD
Tom DeFalco’s back for a new
chapter in Marvel’s epic
Secret Wars

8
INVINCIBLE
10
THE ENFIELD
12
FOR ALL
It’s been a while, HAUNTING MANKIND
but season two of Catherine Tate in Find out what’s next
Robert Kirkman’s a new supernatural for humanity as the
Prime Video series is stage play based on alternate universe
finally here. real-life events. sci-fi continues.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 7

 CREATOR EXCLUSIVE
At the end of season one, Mark was warned

Son Of A Gun
by Allen the Alien (Seth Rogen) that the
Viltrumites are out there in the universe, and
they’ll be coming for Earth. He then teased that
the Coalition of Planets might be their saving
grace. Kirkman confirms the Coalition will be a
“huge part” of season two and beyond.
Robert Kirkman reveals what’s next for “It’s something that we’re going to get to see.
There’s a glimpse of Thaedus, the leader of the
18-rated animated series Invincible WORDS: TARA BENNETT Coalition of Planets, in our teaser trailer, and
I’m super-excited that Peter Cullen is playing
WHAT WAS THE BIGGEST WTF fallout of Nolan’s betrayal of Mark and his wife, him,” Kirkman says, clearly delighted to have
moment that fledgling superhero Mark Debbie (Sandra Oh) – but also of Earth. “Nolan coaxed the Optimus Prime voice actor to
Grayson (Steven Yeun) experienced by was the strongest superhero on Earth and was Invincible. “Being able to work with an
the first season finale of Invincible? No the last line of defence if something really bad absolute legend is great. If you want a sense of
question, it was finding out that his dad Nolan happened, so he was absolutely essential to the authority in the galaxy, you can’t do better.”
– the omnipotent superhero Omni-Man (JK functioning of Earth in this crazy superhero The Coalition and its representation of many
Simmons) – is actually a first-wave alien agent universe.” alien species will broaden Mark’s world, with
for the barbaric Viltrum Empire. And, yes, that
majorly sucks for Mark, and for Earth, as they Um, sir?
collectively watched Omni-Man fly off into You’ve still got
space and disappear. your anti-
The long-awaited “what happens next” for snore thing on.
Grayson in Prime Video’s animated adaptation
of Robert Kirkman’s Image comic is finally
here, after an 18-month production delay.
Kirkman promises Red Alert that it will have
been worth the wait.
“We dive in right from where season one left
off,” Kirkman says, referring to the emotional

8 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 Barriers? It’s
health and
safety gone
mad.

“You’re a big
man, but…
you’re out
of shape?”

an array of new characters. One of them is the

portal-hopping bad guy, Angstrom Levy.
“Sterling K Brown was a big one, because I
couldn’t conceive of anyone else being Levy,”
Kirkman says of luring the actor.
“Then we happened to be working on the
Renfield movie when we started casting season
two, and from the minute I met Ben Schwartz, “Choose a
I was like, ‘Would he play Shapesmith? Can we portal! (One of
make that happen?’” Turns out they did, as them leads to
Schwartz will voice the Martian who disguises death.)”
himself as human astronaut Rus Livingston.
Other new additions include undisclosed
characters voiced by Chloe Bennet, Lea
There’s a glimpse of steps forward and four steps back’ situations
when it comes to his growing and maturing.
Thompson, Cliff Curtis and Daveed Diggs. Thaedus, the leader of Season to season, I feel like as we adapt the
How all these new characters will impact
Grayson and Earth is still hush-hush, but
the Coalition of Planets, comics, that’s kind of built in.”
So too are the big milestone moments in
Kirkman does confirm that Invincible’s in our teaser trailer Grayson’s life as a superhero and young man.
two-season pick-up was a “godsend” and has “When we’re trying to figure out what we’re
allowed he and fellow showrunner Simon Theoretically, if we’re fortunate enough to going to do with a season of Invincible, it starts
Racioppa to chart out the show’s progression get season four, you’re not going to see that with finding the finale,” Kirkman says.
in a way they could not previously. between season three and four either, so that’s “What’s really important to me, personally,
“Being able to plan two seasons at once, really exciting.” is that we leave every season with this massive
instead of just one, is killer,” he says. “There’s a Asked how they’re pacing out the comic event where people don’t know where they go
giant gap between season one and two that was book arc of Grayson’s story into a TV season from here, saying, ‘I can’t wait for it! This
unavoidable because of the pandemic and all equivalent, Kirkman teases that they’ve plotted is insane!’”.
kinds of other factors. But we’re not going to out a “fairly steady progression” of Mark’s
see that between season two and three. development. “I love that there’s a lot of ‘three Invincible is on Prime Video from 3 November.

In the 2011 film Paul, Simon Pegg’s comic book fan Graeme wears an Invincible T-shirt at one point.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 9

 WRITER EXCLUSIVE

Stage
Presence
A poltergeist comes to the West End
in The Enfield Haunting WORDS: NICK SETCHFIELD

“IT’S NOT A GHOST my life investigating these events.’

story,” insists Paul Unwin, I definitely felt my understanding
writer of The Enfield of the world had changed. At times
Haunting. “It’s a true story.” I felt really quite uneasy.”
Opening in the West End this Lockdown saw Unwin return to
month, the play is inspired by one the story. “I thought, ‘Actually,
of Britain’s most disturbing and there’s something here’, and went
enduring cases of apparent back to my notes and my memory
paranormal activity. In the late of that day. Could I do a play that
1970s a North London council was very intense, very dramatic,
house was home to an alleged very theatrical and which didn’t
poltergeist. The family at 284 necessarily give you the answer to
Green Street reported furniture what happened in Enfield but
and objects moving of their own which certainly distilled some of
accord. Daughter Janet was it? I had to find the centre of the
recorded speaking for hours in story. That took a bit of time.”
an unsettling growl, said to be That emotional core is brought
channelling the spirit of a dead to the stage with Catherine Tate as
man. One photo even purports to Peggy Hodgson, the single mother
show the girl levitating.

TH EY’R E H ERE
It was the peak
As Unwin tells Red Alert, his of Jimmy Savile
interest in these uncanny events
was sparked by an encounter with
and Peter
writer and parapsychologist Guy Sutcliffe
Lyon Playfair, who originally
investigated the case. struggling to protect her children
“My agent said, ‘You should from the distressing goings-on.
go and see this guy, he’s Shameless’s David Threlfall plays
extraordinary,’” says Unwin, who Maurice Grosse, the ghost hunter
co-created Casualty. “I went to his who takes on the case.
basement flat in Earl’s Court, “They both said exactly the
around eight years ago now. I was same thing: ‘We don’t want to do
pretty sceptical, to be honest, a ghost story.’ What they said they
when I walked in, but the liked about the script was that it’s
atmosphere in his flat was slightly funny, and it’s moving, and it’s
weird. He was a very intense man. about characters. There is
We talked a lot about the world of poltergeist activity in it and it’s
the paranormal, poltergeists in about a lot of weird things going
particular, and moved on to the on. But it’s not a ghost story! Catherine Tate
Enfield story as the afternoon “This is a lost family story. and David
went on. They’re in real trouble and the Threlfall in full
“What really struck me was mother is a lioness. She’s trying to ’70s mode.
how he took no prisoners in terms hold the whole thing together.
of scepticism. It was ‘You either Catherine is breathtaking in this
believe this or you don’t. I’ve spent part. Everyone thinks of her as a

10 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 comedian, and truthfully there are
some funny moments, but her
quality of emotion is just beyond
what you can imagine with those
kids. David, what he’s revealing in
this character, who’s both the
nicest guy in the world but also
NEWS
does something, I think, quite WARP
HIGH-SPEED
bad… It’s quite emotional, it’s
quite charged.” INFORMATION
For Unwin, the play is a chance
This deal is
to explore the darker currents of getting better
the 1970s while holding a mirror all the time…
to our own times. Disney’s Star
Wars: Lando
“That period I remember really series now being
well,” he says. “It was the peak of retooled for the
Jimmy Savile and the awfulness of big screen.
Gaspar Noé
Peter Sutcliffe and those murders,
adapting William
and the long, weird, hot summer Burroughs’s 1961
of 1976. So it really does look like novel The Soft
something from that period, but Machine as a
movie.
it’s also about now. We’re in a Jason Blum
time where what is true, what is targeting Spawn
real and what is collective fantasy for a 2025
release.
is right back on our emotional How To Train
radar. There’s just this world of Your Dragon’s
noise and bollocks. So it’s a period Chris Sanders
directing The
play about a family in that time,
Wild Robot for
but it really does talk about DreamWorks
collective hysteria. Animation.
“It’s about an embattled family. Romeo Must
Die’s Andrzej
It’s not a posh house, Bartkowiak
it’s not posh people. helming
A real working class supernatural
thriller The
London family, who Dire Wolf.
are under a lot of Miramax
pressure. And the secure TV rights
to the Halloween
pressure does all this
franchise
stuff to them. And after bid
then something war.
happens which fucks James
Gunn
their minds – and our reveals
minds as well.” DC
If Unwin wants Studios
movies set to
proof of the afterlife, be mostly filmed
he’s still waiting. at Leavesden
“I did say to Guy Studios in the
UK.
Lyon Playfair ‘You’re
Blumhouse
quite a lot older than I eyeing the
am, therefore you’re Friday The 13th
closer to dying. It franchise for a
“back to basics”
would be interesting reboot.
when you do die to Paramount
come back and haunt Animation
adapting the
me, because that Superworld
would really prove it.’” book series by
Playfair died in 2018. “Nothing’s husband and
wife Yarrow and
happened,” Unwin admits.
Carrie Cheney.
Marc Webb
The Enfield Haunting is at The replacing Scott
Ambassadors Theatre, London Derrickson as
director of
from 30 November. Visit Bermuda
enfieldhauntingplay.com. Triangle movie
Bermuda.
Spinning
ALAMY

The events also inspired 2016’s The Conjuring 2 and 2015 TV series The Enfield Haunting. compasses ahoy!

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 11

 Krys Marshall
returns as
THOSE DISAPPOINTED astronaut
by humanity’s general Danielle Poole.
apathy towards space
exploration in 2023 should start
watching For All Mankind. Its alt-
history premise posits how the Executive producers Ben PRODUCER EXCLUSIVE
world might have been different if Nedivi and Matt Wolpert confirm

Noughties
the USSR had landed on the Moon to Red Alert that the new season
before the US. picks up eight years after that
With a fourth season arriving terrorist attack, in 2003; expect a
this month, the Apple TV+ series lot of alt-history changes tobe
continues to weave together revealed in their signature
insanely rich stories about the opening montage of historical,

By Nature
people pushing for exploration political, societal and pop culture
with the grandeur of what milestones. In particular, that
progressive global space programs tentative alliance to make Happy
might look like in action. Valley hospitable for human life is
In the season three finale, there revealed to be a stunning success.
was the ecstasy of North Korea, “We wondered what if that
NASA, the Soviets, and private initial cooperation for survival For All Mankind season four gets messy
company Helios coming together kept going, and it spread back to WORDS: TARA BENNETT
to make Happy Valley – the first Earth and made these Cold War
Mars colony – function. rivals start to work together in a
Then there was the more simpatico way?” Wolpert sort of blowback from progress, or inspired their approach to writing
counterpoint agony of the terrorist says of the bigger impact of the unanticipated consequences that arc.
attack that devastated the Johnson success on Mars. “Yet on the flip of that.” “It’s about that gold rush feeling
Space Center, taking the lives of side of that, a big part of Unsurprisingly, that means the when there’s a treasure out there,”
space program vanguards Karen our show has always commercialisation of space has Nedivi says of what asteroids
Baldwin (Shantel VanSanten) and been that on one arrived, which manifests in represent to all of the concerned
former astronaut Molly Cobb side, there’s the idea of asteroid mining. parties on Mars. “It’s a resource
(Sonya Walger). Plus, the surprise progress. Then Wolpert says John unlike any resource we’ve ever
flash-forward defection of NASA there’s the Huston’s adaptation of had, and we can go and grab it.
engineer Margo Madison (Wrenn reaction to The Treasure Of The Sierra Trying to mine an asteroid, the
Schmidt) to Russia in 2003. progress, the Madre very much impact that has both politically

12 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 It was an intriguing place to take
that character and see how she
deals with suddenly not having
any power, not having any agency
– how does she overcome that?”
Not wanting to spoil the fates
of some other fan-favourite
characters, Nedivi just says that
NEWS
audiences should be prepared for WARP
HIGH-SPEED
how dramatically some have aged,
and how others have changed INFORMATION
trajectories. But to also expect
Neil Gaiman
new faces who will carry on the confirms he’s
spirit of discovery. been hired to
“We wanted to open the show write season
three of Good
up this season, so we felt after this Omens. For now
many decades of space travel, it he’s the only
writer attached
We think of the to the season.
Netflix

Soviet Union as renewing

Castlevania:

one of our new Nocturne for a

second season.

worlds Vince
Gilligan’s new
sci-fi series for
Apple TV+ will
would open up to new kinds of reunite him with
people,” Nedivi explains. “The Better Call Saul’s
new character of Miles [Toby Rhea Seehorn
and already has
Kebbell] is really representative of
a two-season
that, along with Samantha [Tyner order.
Rushing]. Those two characters Live-action
represent the more blue-collar, version of
Masha videogame
everyday person coming to Mars, Cyberpunk 2077
Mashkova and and how different their in development,
Joel Kinnaman experiences are from the trained, set to feature an
blast off. all-new story
elitist astronauts that have been within the world
up there. The of the original
Tense tension you start game.
discussions to see, even in James
Gunn
in the control episode one, currently
room ahoy! explores that idea writing
that the experience the
second
they were season of
promised on Mars Peacemaker
maybe isn’t exactly – and plans to
begin production
what it ends up after he’s
being.” wrapped
With the For Superman:
Toby Kebbell is All Mankind alt- Legacy.
Netflix
the decidedly calendar gaining commissioning
non-boffin- fast on our real-life a sequel to Roar
like Miles. calendar, Wolpert Uthaug’s 2022
Norwegian
says they’ve got a horror Troll.
and economically on Earth is that we’re visiting,” he says of concrete ending in mind to close Paranormal
something we explore this season. setting major stories there. “We the series. “In the initial Activity heading
to London’s
That’s something we’re really were really intrigued by the idea of conversations about the show, we West End as a
intrigued with this year, in terms taking this woman, who from definitely mapped out an arc of stage production
of the promise of this resource, but season one we have seen be in the how far we thought we wanted to with a script by
Levi Holloway.
also the potential peril of it.” room where it happens, and work go. But I don’t think we’re there
And 1996’s
Back on Earth, Wolpert teases, her way up to running that room. yet,” he adds. “It’s a generational The Craft could
Margo Madison’s life in the Soviet She’s used to making all these story, so it can keep going.” be on its way to
Union will be a big part of season decisions, being the ‘buck stops Broadway as a
musical version…
four, too. “We think of the Soviet here’ person. And now she has no For All Mankind is on Apple TV+ Gabrielle Ruiz
Union as one of our new worlds voice, and no say in a strange land. from 10 November. returning as
T’Lyn for Lower
Decks season
GETTY

The first episode is titled “Glasnost”, after Mikhail Gorbachev’s concept of transparency with the world. five.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 13

 Along with humour strips Grimly Feendish and Frankie Stein, the book also contains The Exterminator from 1982’s Starlord annual.

CREATOR EXCLUSIVE
FROM WHOOPEE! TO give him a proper rogues’ gallery,”

Shocking
2000 AD and Battle, many says Furman. “With this in mind,
children down the years we wanted to bring him together
have looked forward to receiving with one of British comics’
an annual in their Christmas premiere anti-heroes and make
stocking. Now Rebellion are him part of a pantheon of classic
reviving the tradition with the characters. For various reasons,

Filler
first Treasury Of British Comics the Spider was a good fit, playing
Annual, which combines new – in a tongue-in-cheek way – into
stories with vintage strips such as that thing of the Leopard being
a Brian Bolland-drawn Spinball known as ‘the British Spider-
episode from the 1979 Action Man.’”
Annual and the Dave Gibbons- Emulating The Leopard From
illustrated “The Ghost Pilot” Rebellion’s Treasury Of British Comics Lime Street’s original illustrative
from 1975’s The Buster Book Of team of Mike Western and Eric
Scary Stories.
Annual revives retro festivities Bradbury, David Roach has teamed
“UK annuals were always a big WORDS: STEPHEN JEWELL up on “The Spider Vs The Leopard
part of my formative Christmases,” From Lime Street”’s art chores
recalls Simon Furman, who has with Mike Collins. “I wasn’t sure
written a special eight-pager if I’d have time to draw it all by
featuring the first meeting myself and I knew Mike would be
between the Leopard From Lime terrific at the action sequences in
Street and the Spider. “They were particular,” says Roach. “It was a
a mix of humour and action/ simple working relationship on
adventure titles like Buster, this one – Mike pencilled it, and
Whizzer & Chips, Lion, Valiant and I inked it.”
Smash! I was utterly immersed in Meanwhile, having previously
the worlds of the Spider, Adam revived Black Beth for several
Eterno, the Steel Claw, Janus titles, including 2021 one-shot
Stark and many more, so to Black Beth And The Devils Of
contribute to The Treasury Of Al-Kadesh, Alec Worley has
British Comics Annual is another reunited with artist DaNi on
big career bucket-list tick.” another tale of Scream!’s Red
The teenage Leopard From Sonja-esque swordswoman. “The
Lime Street, who originally graced story’s called ‘Death Carries Roses’
the pages of Buster from 1975 to and it has Beth falling foul of a
1986, may not appear to be in the cryptic clue while hunting for a
same league as evil super-genius rogue wizard,” he teases. “Conan
the Spider, who was a mainstay in is back and the entire genre feels
Lion throughout the late ’60s. like it’s been revitalised for a new
“It’s maybe not the most obvious generation. I love feeling like I’m a
match-up, but in his own recent part of that, as it’s a genre I’ve
strip in Monster Fun we’ve been Revel in your always loved.”
trying to pit Billy against proper, childhood (if
super-powered villains instead of you’re of a The Treasury Of British Comics
just crooks in a costume so as to certain age). Annual 2024 is out on 8 November.

14 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 Marvel’s first crossover miniseries was 1982’s Cosmic Champions, originally created to tie in with the 1980 Summer Olympics.

Pure
unlettered
artwork from
the first issue.

WRITER EXCLUSIVE

Between The Wars

coaster ride that they don’t
expect. We have twists and turns
that no one will see coming.”
Battleworld is told from the
perspective of Spider-Man and his
buddy, the Human Torch. “I have
Ahead of its 40th anniversary next year, Tom DeFalco returns to a certain familiarity with Pete
Parker and have always enjoyed
Secret Wars with Battleworld WORDS: STEPHEN JEWELL his relationship and interplay
with Johnny,” says DeFalco, who
FOUR DECADES AFTER have never even heard of the angst and some incredible insights delves further into how Spidey
editing the original series, original – and a story that will into the various characters.” first gains his alien costume,
Tom DeFalco is returning introduce new characters and Rather than taking the form of which in 1987 morphed into
to Marvel Super Heroes Secret concepts that will still be a contemporary continuation, Venom. “How could I not? The
Wars, scripting Battleworld, a new intriguing 40 years from now.” Battleworld is designed to slip symbiote has been around for
miniseries that fits directly into Initially conceived to coincide seamlessly between the pages of nearly 40 years now and there’s
the continuity of the 1984 with Mattel’s Secret Wars toy Jim Shooter and artists Mike still plenty to learn about it.”
12-parter. line, Secret Wars proved to be Zeck and Bob Layton’s maxi- While Battleworld promises
“Editor Mark Basso asked me if hugely influential, becoming one series. “The one advantage is that new revelations about the
I would be interested in doing a of the first line-wide crossover the basic scenario is already mysterious Beyonder, DeFalco
direct sequel – a sort of untold events as it tied in with titles such established,” says DeFalco. “As a will be introducing some new
story,” says DeFalco, who as Avengers, Fantastic Four and writer and reader, you have some villains. “Mattel produced a few
replaced Secret Wars writer Jim Uncanny X-Men. “Jim is a master idea where you’re going to start. action figures that did not appear
Shooter as Marvel Editor-in-Chief craftsman and set some pretty After that, anything goes! You in the original story, but we get to
in 1987. “The challenge of crafting high standards for me to try to have to play against your reader’s see them now,” he explains.
a tale that is directly tied into a match,” says DeFalco. “The expectations and take Artist Patrick Olliffe follows in
story that is 40 years old and also original story had it all: action, them on a wild roller the footsteps of his predecessors,
relevant for today’s reader – who Mike Zeck and Bob Layton. “Pat
may have heard of, but not read, is a gifted illustrator who can
the original Secret Wars – was draw anything,” he says. “He is
too great to pass up. also a skilled visual storyteller
“Mark and I wanted to do a who is a master at sequential
story that would be accessible action and angst.”
and, hopefully, entertaining to all
readers, to fans of the original Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars:
Secret Wars and the readers who The Human Battleworld is out 22 November.
Torch hangs
about with
Spidey. DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 15
 HP Lovecraft first wrote about Cthulhu in his short story “The Call Of Cthulhu”, which was published in a 1928 issue of Weird Tales.

AUTHOR EXCLUSIVE

A Monster sought his work out,” recalls

Konyu, who first embarked upon
A Call To Cthulhu as an escape
from a more demanding project.

Calls
“I was working on a longer
graphic novel, which was taking
a heavy toll with a seemingly
endless number of panels
stretching out ahead of me, so I
wanted to do something to break
HP Lovecraft’s Great Old One confronts that up,” he continues. “While
tidying my bookshelf, I came
his past in A Call To Cthulhu across some of my old HP
WORDS: STEPHEN JEWELL Lovecraft books and thought it
might be fun to illustrate some of
them without having to be a
Covert art, slave to sequential work.”
minus text, The 48-pager is described
for A Call To as “part comic book, part art
Cthulhu. book and part children’s
storybook”, and Konyu has
drawn on several different
artistic media. “The book
started off as an artbook,
gathering all those Lovecraft
illustrations into a single
WITH HIS WORK’S volume,” he explains. “But
deeply unsettling then I needed a narrative to
supernatural themes bind them together, leading
and his controversial to the Dr Seuss-ian text that
opinions, HP Lovecraft is accompanies the
not an author normally illustrations.
associated with a Young “Then finally I needed to
Adult audience. But Norm take us in and out of those
Konyu’s latest graphic novel sequences with a bit of a
A Call To Cthulhu centres on tale, so I brought the comic
the sinister leviathan that book pages in to accomplish
ranks as the American that.”
writer’s most famous It begins with Cthulhu
creation. But despite the receiving an unsolicited
Great Old One having first phone call in the middle of
appeared almost a century night. “It’s not the horror of
ago, Konyu hasn’t changed a cold call from a telesales
the beast much for a centre that we mere humans
contemporary readership. dread, but from someone
“Most horror stories are who wants to vent at
fairly timeless, but what Cthulhu about the horrors
does date Lovecraft’s work of the world he inhabits, and
is his heavy-going gothic about the sleep he had lost
style of writing, so I avoided over the stories,” says
that entirely,” Konyu tells Konyu. “From there, we
Red Alert. “His prose is launch into some of those
difficult enough for an adult tales, and I skip through a
to work through, so it has number of Lovecraft’s
almost no chance of being stories over the course of
palatable to a younger A Call To Cthulhu. I’ve included a
audience. Something I did discovered HP sort of glossary at the back to
need to include was a bit Lovecraft while at high highlight each of the stories
about the man and some of his school. “It was shortly after I involved, so in a way, the book is
troubling personal views, as that devoured the work of Stephen a bit of an HP Lovecraft taster.”
should not be avoided.” King, as I’d read someplace of
Hailing from Canada but now Lovecraft’s influence on King, and A Call To Cthulhu is out on
based in the UK, Konyu first not having heard of him before, I 14 November.

16 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

Almost all Jo Whiley
of Who is on hosted a
iPlayer! celebration.

Fancy some
tasty Big Finish
cover art?

Our Mr T with
Steffan Powell
for Unleashed.

A new 30-minute behind-the- include a set of three figures from

scenes series chronicling the “The Deadly Assassin”,
making of Doctor Who has been Daleks from “Remembrance
filmed for BBC Three and iPlayer. Of The Daleks” and two new
Doctor Who Unleashed is hosted by series Daleks.
Steffan Powell. BBC Radio 2
It was confirmed that Neil Davies said: “I’d coffee table documentaries The Classic
Patrick Harris will play the like to thank the tome features Years and The Modern
Toymaker in an upcoming BBC for all the hard imagery from 100 Years are now available,
anniversary episode. A new work to get this of its covers and is featuring new and archive
trailer was aired before Strictly massive back catalogue available this month. interviews with previous
Come Dancing on 23 September, under one roof, at long last. Silva Screen will release Doctors and
featuring new material from all And we’re determined this soundtracks for “Revenge Of showrunners.
three specials. won’t be a dusty museum – we The Cybermen” and “Time And Alex Pillai will direct
Doctor Who @ 60: A Musical have exciting plans to bring the The Rani” on 24 November (see block one of the second
Celebration – a concert recorded in back catalogue to life, with page 111). The latter also features Ncuti Gatwa season, and
Cardiff on 28 September – is now much more to be revealed!” demo versions of the 1987 theme. Peter Hoar will direct block two.
available on BBC Sounds and was A new archival website Both will later get vinyl releases. Composer Dominic Glynn is
also filmed for a future release dedicated to Doctor Who has been A new exhibition is now releasing a new EP, featuring
on iPlayer. launched at bbc.co.uk/doctorwho. open in London until reworked versions of music
Over 800 episodes of Doctor It will include interviews, 3 December. Regeneration At from “Survival”. The Survival
Who from 1963 to 1989, plus documents, audio and behind-the- Riverside is free and celebrates Remixes is out 24 November.
archive material, are now scenes material. In addition, six decades of the series. As the
available on BBC iPlayer. an estimated 25,000 prints, name suggests it’s at Riverside Doctor Who is on BBC One and
These include The Sarah Jane negatives, slides and digital images Studios, where many of the Disney+ later this month.
Adventures, Torchwood, Class from the archives have been early episodes were filmed.
and Doctor Who Confidential scanned at 8K resolution. New Doctor Who
and will have subtitles, audio Big Finish is releasing a new figures will shortly be
description and sign language book, The Art Of The Audio available from B&M
for the first time. Russell T Adventures. The hardback stores. These

Dominic Glynn arranged the iconic Doctor Who theme for season 23 in 1986.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 17

 A former 2000 AD designer, Pye Parr drew the stomach-churning Intestinauts for the Galaxy’s Greatest Comic.

Vrooming hell!
Petrol Head
screams off
the page.

CREATOR EXCLUSIVE in crafting a future-sport story.

“That wasn’t our goal, per se, but if

Need For Speed

people get excited about the races
of the Petrol Heads and their
individual rides and skill scores,
then great,” he says. “There’s a fun
bit in issue three where we go full
Rob Williams and Pye Parr are burning up we’d have a thrilling, dramatic computer game/action figures and
chase story,” Williams tells Red list the attributes of two of the
the rubber in Petrol Head Alert. “There’s a real dramatic Petrol Heads and what their
WORDS: STEPHEN JEWELL power to that, just making readers ‘special moves’ are.
care about our underdog heroes “It’s quite a fun idea where
and set a futuristic city after them we’re looking back on the Petrol
GROWING OUT OF shut down. Can the environment on a deadly race through an Heads’ classic races where they
some artwork of robots outside the city be saved? That’s incredible sci-fi landscape. You were designed and created to be
and futuristic cars Pye our key MacGuffin, as Petrol Head can feel the speed, the friction, the marketed to the population of our
Parr had put online, the post- meets a young girl called Lupa, crunch and boom of the crashes. future city, the O-Zone, so we get
apocalyptic automobile races of who might just have the key to the It’s just a senses-bashing comic. to be knowing, cynical toy
his and Rob Williams’s Petrol future of the human race in her But, of course, all that only creators.”
Head bring to mind films such as backpack.” works if you care about the Parr was in his element when it
Death Race 2000 and Mad Max. While Parr admires characters, and I think we came to Petrol Head’s future tech.
There’s an environmental antique jalopies, have that here.” “Rob’s only stipulation for Petrol
theme to the creator-owned Williams isn’t a “One of the things Head’s look was that he had to be
five-parter. “In the book’s world, motorsport fan, I really wanted to a bruiser and that his head was an
the environment has become drawing his inspiration capture in the race/ engine, so that took a bit of getting
deadly to humans, so the survivors instead from how chase scenes is the way right,” he says. “The initial
live in domed cities, and the city Katsuhiro Otomo cars move and sound on inspiration for the book came out
administrators run extreme sports depicts vehicle a track,” adds Parr. “How the of some posters I did to stop
events like the Petrol Head races movement in his classic weight shifts into the corners myself going mad in lockdown, so
to keep the population manga Akira. and your ears get pummelled the aesthetic was set and I just
entertained,” explains Williams. “I figured that if we as they go past, which was a carried on in that vein.”
“Doing this with gas-guzzling cars could do that – and Pye is bit of a challenge as comics
and robots is pretty dysfunctional, one of the few comic are both silent and static.” Petrol Head issue one is out on
so the Petrol Heads eventually get artists who can do that – Williams also wasn’t interested 8 November.

18 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 McCallum voiced Alfred in animated features, beginning with 2008’s Batman: Gotham Knight.

MARIANNE THE FINAL F RONTIE R

NEW AUTHOR

GORDON
MEET THE ACADEMIC

DAVID MCCALLUM
PUBLISHING EDITOR BEHIND
THE GILDED CROWN

1933-2023
Closing Channel D
WORDS: NICK SETCHFIELD

“THERE WAS THIS WONDERFUL everything from The Six Million Dollar Man to
enigmatic element which grew about Night Gallery, Babylon 5 to SeaQuest DSV.
Illya Kuryakin,” said David McCallum Long based in the US, he returned to Britain
of the role that made him a bona fide TV icon. for Sapphire & Steel in 1979, investigating
“It allowed everybody to have their own image fractures in time alongside Joanna Lumley.
of Illya, because basically none of the stories Cool to the point of callous, McCallum made
ever told you anything. And that in a way the besuited Steel the rare TV hero who had no
became the success of that character.” need or desire to be liked. It was a series he
Tell us about your protagonist.
Hellevir is a young woman with the Born in Glasgow, the son of classical relished, however cryptic the premise. “It
ability to enter Death and bargain for musicians, the enduringly boyish McCallum would be wonderful to do it all again just to
souls with the being who resides there. trained at RADA and acted on the radio before explain who the hell Sapphire and Steel really
When the Princess of the Chron dies earning a big-screen credit on 1957’s The Secret were,” he said in 2001.
and Hellevir must resurrect her, she
Place. A key role in The
finds herself in a world besieged by
threats, assassination attempts, Great Escape raised his
political intrigue and unexpected profile in 1963 before The
desire. Man From UNCLE made
him a pop star tier
How do her powers work?
Hellevir can barter parts of her body phenomenon a year later:
– and treasures – in exchange for the “Blond Beatle”,
bringing back the dead. She’s also one mobbed at public
of a small group of people who can appearances and
talk to spirits (such as of the hearth,
bombarded with fan mail.
the ivy leaf) and
animals; her familiar As Russian secret agent
is a raven. Kuryakin, an intense,
cerebral McCallum
How long did the proved the perfect Cold
book take to write?
I wrote it over the
War counterpoint to the
pandemic, when Madison Avenue
I felt trapped and slickness of co-star
useless; in Robert Vaughn’s
hindsight, I realise Napoleon Solo. Episodes
I poured my
anxieties into were repackaged as
Hellevir, through theatrical releases and the
her exploring my pair reunited for 1983’s
desire to be The Return Of The Man
proactive. She started as a character
without much agency, but by her
From UNCLE telemovie.
abilities became anything but useless. A prolific TV presence,
McCallum’s vaguely
Do you have to do much research? otherworldly vibe gave
Hellevir is a herbalist, so I enjoyed him an affinity for genre.
HARRY BENSON/EXPRESS/GETTY

delving into hedge-witchery. Much

plant lore forms the basis for our Early appearances in The
modern medicine; it’s all just applied Outer Limits were David
chemistry. I also found out a lot about followed by the lead in McCallum as
horrific medieval medical practices (for 1975’s The Invisible Man
example, hedgehog grease for a sore Illya Kuryakin
throat).
and guest-shots in in his heyday.
Any advice for budding authors?
Read as much as you can; reading is
training, it teaches you what you like or
dislike and what you want to emulate.
SHAWNA TRPCIC 1966-2023 JOE MATT 1963-2023
American costume designer for Firefly, Angel and American cartoonist best known for the
The Gilded Crown is out on 23 Star Wars: Ahsoka. four-time Harvey-nominated Peepshow.
November, published by HarperVoyager.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 19

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20 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

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Terms and conditions: JǣǔɎȇȒɎƏɮƏǣǼƏƫǼƺɯǣɎǝƏƳǣǕǣɎƏǼɀɖƫɀƬȸǣȵɎǣȒȇِ ǔǔƺȸƬǼȒɀƺɀ‫ ِבא׎אٖא׏ٖ׏ב‬ǔǔƺȸȒȵƺȇɎȒȇƺɯÈkɀɖƫɀƬȸǣƫƺȸɀȒȇǼɵِ¨ȸǣƬǣȇǕǣɀǕɖƏȸƏȇɎƺƺƳǔȒȸɎǝƺˡȸɀɎ‫א׏‬ȅȒȇɎǝɀƏȇƳɯƺɯǣǼǼȇȒɎǣǔɵɵȒɖǣȇƏƳɮƏȇƬƺȒǔƏȇɵȵȸǣƬƺ
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ȇȒɎɎǝƺɎƺȸȅȒǔɎǝƺɀɖƫɀƬȸǣȵɎǣȒȇِIȒȸǔɖǼǼɎƺȸȅɀƏȇƳƬȒȇƳǣɎǣȒȇɀًɮǣɀǣɎɯɯɯِȅƏǕƏɿǣȇƺɀƳǣȸƺƬɎِƬȒȅٖɎƺȸȅɀِIȒȸƺȇȷɖǣȸǣƺɀȵǼƺƏɀƺƬƏǼǼ‫גגڷي‬٢‫׎‬٣‫ِב׏׏׏בבב׎בב‬nǣȇƺɀƏȸƺȒȵƺȇxȒȇƳƏɵ‫ٮ‬IȸǣƳƏɵ‫ח‬Əȅ‫דٮ‬ȵȅJxÁȒȸƺȅƏǣǼǝƺǼȵ۬ȅƏǕƏɿǣȇƺɀƳǣȸƺƬɎِ
ƬȒȅِ!ƏǼǼɀɎȒ‫׎בב׎‬ȇɖȅƫƺȸɀɯǣǼǼƫƺƬǝƏȸǕƺƳƏɎȇȒȅȒȸƺɎǝƏȇƏȇƏɎǣȒȇƏǼǼƏȇƳǼǣȇƺƬƏǼǼًƏȇƳȅƏɵƫƺǣȇƬǼɖƳƺƳǣȇɵȒɖȸȵǝȒȇƺȵȸȒɮǣƳƺȸ‫ټ‬ɀƬƏǼǼƫɖȇƳǼƺِ

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 21

 RUSSELL T DAVIES

22 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 RUSSELL T DAVIES

RUSSELL T DAVIES
ON RETURNING TO DOCTOR
WHO – AND WHAT THE
FUTURE HOLDS
WORDS: DARREN SCOTT

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 23

 RUSSELL T DAVIES

E CAN’T TALK
about the
anniversary, the
return of David
Tennant, the future
of the series, the
spin-offs, before
addressing one of the
biggest comebacks in
sci-fi history. Everyone
knows where they were on 24 September 2021
when the news broke that Russell T Davies
was returning as Doctor Who’s showrunner.
To quote a certain Time Lord: “What?
What?! WHAT?!” Davies had given up the
reins in 2010 after a farewell tour to rival Cher.
But now – like the ageless diva herself – he was
back and spearheading the 60th anniversary
specials. “The original press release just said
that I was doing the specials,” Davies tells SFX,
“and I absolutely insisted on saying ‘and future
seasons to come’. Seasons plural, because I said
the future would look insecure otherwise. So I
was inserting those words into press releases
myself.”
He’s a man who cares for, nay loves Doctor
Who. He knows what fans think – he’s been
one his whole life. He knows how the machine
works. But this time he’s got an army and an
international streamer behind him. This is
RTD2 – but before we talk about the new era,
we need to take a step back…

HE IS RE TURN ING
It’s no wonder fandom was surprised – a
return was something Davies said he’d never
do. “That’s automatic, though, in fairness,” he
counters. “Even though I’d been dying to do
Doctor Who for years, ever since I left, I’d
automatically say I’m not because someone’s in
the job. You’d sound like an idiot if you’re on
the sidelines going, ‘I’d love to do it again!’
Actually, if I did want to do it again I’d phone
them up and say, ‘Can I write an episode?’
“The truth of it is that I’ve been inventing
Doctor Who stories since I was five. So it’s like

The Toymaker
is back! Neil
Patrick Harris
stars.

24 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 RUSSELL T DAVIES

second nature to me and that never stops. I have been a retrogressive step because of the
don’t think of stories for my job, I have this job learning from that. The whole point of moving
because I think of stories all the time. That’s on is the learning stuff,” he explains.
what I do all day long, every single day. “So when the BBC made contact with me
“There are certain stories we’re telling in the and said they were looking for streaming, and
season to come that have been playing in my that it would have a bigger budget, part of the
head for years. Season one, episode one is a joy for me was learning how to work with a
story I invented on the day I walked into Bad bigger budget.
Wolf for our first meeting. I went, ‘Oh, that’s a “I know we’re not allowed to talk money
good idea’. So there’s things I’ve been thinking but… all the shows I’ve ever worked on have
Just how different about for 20 years, there’s things I’ve been one-third of the budget of this. I worked on
is the Fourteenth thinking of for 40 years, there’s things I one show with about half the budget. It’s
Doctor? thought of yesterday. So what I’m saying is fascinating, there’s an awful lot to learn. Phil
“I wouldn’t expect vast
that it never stops.” [Collinson, producer]’s done Gentleman Jack
differences, because there’s The question, then, might be why give up with HBO, which is a good budget. Equally at
no way you bring back one the job in the first place? Anyone that’s the same time, Jane Tranter and Joel Collins
of the world’s most popular watched television since 2010 will already [also producers] have done His Dark Materials,
Doctors and make him be know the answer. “Oh, because I had other which is a bigger budget. So they’re learning
different! Outside fandom,
things to write. Also, it’s exhausting. It’s a how to make cuts and scale things down. So it’s
my sisters would be sitting
there going, ‘What the properly knackering job. But look at what I very interesting. We’ve all come to it with a lot
blinkin’ flip have you done?’ did afterwards. I did loads of stuff.” to learn, and a lot of passion, and that’s good.
“So it doesn’t make much Aside from that understatement – look at “At the risk of sounding sanctimonious, but
sense. But of course, you’re those awards! – he’s been in demand to do I really, really mean this – they were going to
talking about one of the other people’s “stuff” too. do this to the show anyway and I genuinely
world’s great actors who
doesn’t need me to feed
“I got asked to showrun a British Marvel thought, ‘It needs looking after.’
lines and cues and subtext show, but [they said] ‘We can’t tell you what it He chuckles. “Do you remember, before the
and meanings. You just hand is,’” he laughs loudly. “To this day, I watch them Paul McGann movie materialised, there was
it over to David, and of and I can’t work out which show that was talk of selling it to America, there were
course he’s naturally all over going to be. Obviously planning to make a rumours there would be a rapping TARDIS.
it, of course he’s got new
British Marvel show that I haven’t seen. Has Remember that? People said the TARDIS
spins and new depths to it.
When you get to work with that happened?” would have a voice and it would rap.”
someone like that, you don’t But there was only one British show that Potential spoiler for 2024! “Of course I’ve
need to worry.” held his heart(s): Doctor Who. Albeit with a done that. I do it very well!” he jokes. “We were
difference. “If I’d gone back to the old show, all terrified of an international version [in
with the old production methods, that would 1996]. So I had that instinctive terror of what

The Meep
from the first
special, “The
Star Beast”.

Catherine Tate
and David
Tennant. Do
they ever age?

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 25

 RUSSELL T DAVIES

Toymaker was. I thought he’d be a good villain,

that I’d have a laugh with him. I started writing
the script and I thought, ‘This is the best villain
ever created.’ So powerful. So funny. So
dangerous, so evil. I love him!” Neil Patrick
Harris, who plays Toymaker is, he says,
Jacqueline “phenomenal. Absolutely phenomenal.”
King, Karl Any such concerns arose largely before the
Collins and show’s new global home on Disney+ was
Yasmin Finney. secured, he stresses.
“Obviously, that was written before the What to expect from
might come. So it was genuinely a need to look streamer was decided. Bear in mind, a lot of the specials
after the show. Because it’s a very odd show, this went into production. It could have been
it’s very precise. Its rules are very strange and, Netflix, it could have been Amazon. It could’ve
like the British constitution, unwritten. We’re been anyone – you could say any name there THE STAR BEAST
“A lovely, exciting family
just discovering how unwritten constitutions that we went to. It’s our job to go to every film, very Pixar-based, even
are deadly now… after 200 years of democracy single streamer in the world. All of them were before Disney got involved
we’re realising how wrong it is. very interested. So I’m writing this knowing with this. I was going for
“So I thought, I felt needed. I absolutely did. that no matter where it went out it would go to that. It’s like a Bank Holiday
That’s the coverline – ‘I felt needed!’ says a bigger audience – [so] do you have to explain film. It’s lovely and exciting
and fun. The astonishing
Russell T Davies.” who the Toymaker is? thing is how it looks like the
Fans needn’t worry that he isn’t going to “I’ve got to say, in a science fiction setting, third act of the Donna Noble
stick around, either. “No, I’m planning season a great cosmic villain called the Toymaker story. You’d have sworn I
three now, there’s plans for season four. played by a big star kind of makes sense was always dying to write
Absolutely. Who knows? Who knows. I’m not anyway. Spider-Man could swing into an this final sequence of events.
Which I wasn’t. It wasn’t that
getting any younger.” apartment tomorrow and meet the Toymaker
until I came to do it.”
He chuckles when SFX asks if this basically and you’d go, ‘Oh, it’s that kind of villain.’ So he
makes him the new John Nathan-Turner, the makes sense enormously. WILD BLUE
producer of the last series of Classic Who. “There is a flashback. Let’s say it. There is YONDER
“I love JNT. I swear I would have given him a a flashback to Michael Gough [the original “Weird. It’s weird. That’ll
job. I would have made him part of the team. Toymaker], which is wonderful. It’s funny; do. The most astonishing
barricade you’ll ever see.”
He’d be head of international sales, he’d be when I handed in that script my agent went,
doing all that. I mean it. He would’ve absolutely ‘Ooh, I remember the Toymaker – played by THE GIGGLE
continued. Michael Gough’. So there’s a very powerful “It’s absolutely epic. It’s
“That’s part of bringing Mel back, part of memory of him. She’s not a science fiction slightly over the hour-long
what we’re doing with Bonnie Langford, was to fan at all. running time. It’s the only
one that we’ve had to push
right a wrong. I think, alright, she perhaps “So where we thought there’d possibly be
over an hour. They’re like 55,
wasn’t done brilliantly at the time. But I think resistance to old characters and old continuity 56 minutes; this is one hour,
memory has been a bit sour with her and a bit and adventures, there’s been none. As long as one minute.
bitter over her character. I want to put that there’s some nice clarity to it. They will ask, “It’s so full! It’s mad. I
right and have a better Mel and a proper Mel, a ‘Who’s this, who’s that?’ But they know equally absolutely adore special
Mel that John Nathan-Turner would be proud that fans will come on board for that. It’s been three. It’s David’s last
episode, obviously, it’s no
of. So he’s very much mentioned in lovely. It’s been really lovely.” He does a secret. That’s part of the fun.
conversation a lot of the time.” knowing laugh. “And other characters: dot And my god, we go for it.
dot dot,” he grins. And Donna’s last episode,
THOSE WONDERFUL TOYS Catherine’s last episode. We
Speaking of the past, Davies reveals that UN L EASH THE BEAST absolutely go for it. You get
to the special, you get
continuity did concern production initially. Famously, the first special, “The Star Beast”,
halfway through, it’s 30
“It’s been very interesting. How much of the began life as a Marvel comic in 1980. What minutes in and you can’t
past can we mention? Is it a blank slate? Can made Davies want to revisit it? believe it’s only been 30
you mention Tegan? Can you mention Susan? “I don’t think I gave it much thought, minutes. So much
Can you mention anything in the past? And it just popped into my head,” he happens in it.”
they’ve [Disney] been incredibly open about it. shrugs. “The whole point of the
THE FESTIVE
We’re living in a very fortunate age now where story is that the Doctor meets SPECIAL
the history of shows is respected, and Donna Noble again. So therefore it “It’s very
continuity’s respected. has to be on Earth, so therefore Christmassy.
“That’s helped, actually, if I can refer to she’s going to come across I wonder what
a past enemy, as long as I can justify it, like something alien and so day it’ll be
on…?”
bringing back the Toymaker. I wanted to do therefore it’s handy if she
that because he’s from the ’60s and it was the comes across one alien. She’s
60th anniversary, it just all made sense. not going to come across an
“My lord, one of the most exciting days of invading army, that’s going
my writing life was page one of ‘The Giggle’ to ruin the story. So it very
script, when I realised how brilliant the quickly starts to narrow

26 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 RUSSELL T DAVIES

The Toymaker
dances in
Broad Street,
Bristol.

“Oh, hi. Just

wondering
if you stock
balloons…?”

Kate Lethbridge
Stewart
(Jemma
Redgrave).

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 27

 RUSSELL T DAVIES

Yasmin Finney
as Rose meets
the Meep.
(Yes, Rose.)

itself down. ‘The Star Beast’ is very much ET.

It’s a traditional story. So to find that pattern
pre-existing in Doctor Who with [writer] Pat You can’t rewrite
Mills and [artist] Dave Gibbons attached… history, not one
We’re in an age of comic book adaptations, line… or can you?
little knowing – that was a Marvel product
then – that we’d be under the same banner as Given that Davies
Marvel. But it’s a great story. I was 16 years old established a new Who
mythology sans-Gallifrey
when that was published and I’ve always loved
prior to the 2005 series, how
it. To this day you can say ‘The Star Beast’ to a beholden does he feel to the
fan and they’ll know what it is. There’s not lore that’s been established
many properties you can do that with.” since he left?
But it also brings its own complications for “Oh, quite beholden
some fans: how can this version exist when it’s actually. I’m very well
behaved in that sense… I feel
already been a comic? completely free to make up
my own stuff. But I think it’s
With the build-up to very interesting that the only
piece of Doctor Who lore
these specials, there’s that’s never been held aloft The Toymaker,
and run with is Paul McGann
been a lot of invention having a human mother.
last played
by Michael
going on online “None of us can deal with
that. None of us cope with it Gough.
and it’s never been
“But that doesn’t bother me for a second,” mentioned since. I find that More laughter. “Nothing changes, really!
Davies insists. “It’s how there are two different really fascinating. That’s not There’s almost a danger of building it up too
a hint that I’m going to
versions of ‘Human Nature’ – and there are engage with it at all. It’s much. It’s a very great story. It won’t surprise
two different versions. And yet I don’t think amazing, isn’t it? Everything you that much. It’s great, it’s absolutely
I’ve ever seen anyone stand in the town centre else gets kind of absorbed. thrilling. I love it to death – I shouldn’t
and sob because the television version has “Let’s stare that question underplay it, should I? But if I fall into this
made the book not exist. They don’t. We’re right in the eye. I’m not pattern of going, ‘It’s the most unusual thing
going to unwrite my good
very clever. We balance all these different you’ve ever seen,’ you’ll sit there and go, ‘Oh,
friend Chris Chibnall’s work
versions,” he chuckles. on ‘The Timeless Children’. I’ve seen that before.’
When we meet in a Cardiff hotel in I’m not going to deny what “With the build-up to these three specials
September, he says they’re delivering the final he wrote. I’m going with it. in people’s minds, there’s been a lot of
version of second special “Wild Blue Yonder” It’s absolutely fine. It’s invention going on online. But I did say right at
the following day. “It has taken an awfully long canon, it happened. It was the beginning, these are,” he says, banging the
transmitted. You cannot
time to make,” he considers. “It’s funny, it’s one unwrite things, that would be table with each word, “three. Separate. Stories.
of those episodes where everyone sat there absolutely rude to a great “It’s very important to say, actually, you’re
saying, ‘Oh, I don’t know how to make this’ and colleague and a lovely not watching a three-part story. You can tune
guess how we made it? Green screen.” friend.” in for any one of these episodes and start from

28 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 RUSSELL T DAVIES

The
Fourteenth
Doctor’s sonic
screwdriver.

person who was last on the list was probably

Phil [Collinson], because he was producing
Nolly for me. I was thinking, ‘Well, I don’t want
to take the producer off my lovely show being
made in Manchester.’ What a weird business
position to be in!
“Daily, I was telling him all of our plans.
I think he just snapped and went, ‘Oh god, can’t
I produce it?’ and I was like, ‘Oh alright then’,”
he roars with laughter. “No! He’s one of the
nation’s top producers. I did wonder if he’d be
interested. There was a great moment when I
told him I was going back to Doctor Who and
he literally walked into my hallway and fell
onto his knees,” he laughs again.
“I partly assumed he’d think, ‘Oh, I’ve done
it already’. Once we asked him – once we
begged him – to do it, he raced. That was a
great day. Of course, taking it to [production
It’s only the company] Bad Wolf was automatic as well. It’s
blimmin’ new literally named after a Doctor Who thing. It is
Doctor, Ncuti weird how it all fell into the right place. The
Gatwa! fact that they made His Dark Materials in
Cardiff, and most of all because

IMAGES: © BBC STUDIOS / BAD WOLF, ALISTAIR HEAP, JAMES PARDON, ZOE MCCONNELL AND SALLY MAIS. VERITY AND RUSSELL PORTRAIT: ANDY SHORT, SONIC BY BEN BLACKALL
The late Verity they were coming to the end of
Lambert, that. So these vast studios were
original Who empty as we came along. The
producer. timing of it is really quite strange.”

WH O’S THE MAN?

That all feeds into the bigger
picture, with work now much
further ahead on Doctor Who and
the show being seen in more
countries than ever before.
“You might “What thrills Disney, actually,
find yourself not just the BBC, is to make it
revisiting a annually,” Davies says. “That’s
few...” quite a rare thing for streamers as
well. So that’s absolutely the plan.
a seizing of sonics. Not series 14, not season There are plans for spin-offs. Not the ones you
40 – controversial! Davies chuckles at our read about online all the time.
geekery. “What fun that is, to be controversial.” “But there are… it’s taking us a while to get
At this point Murray Gold walks over and says into the groove of production. There are big
hello. “Go away,” he tells his returning plans and equally, they’re not too big. I look at
composer. “Time is money, I’m selling the some of those [other] franchises and frankly,
show. I love you, darling!” I think you’re spreading yourself too much.
scratch. It’s more of a mini-season. That’s what This is, we say, a nice segue into getting the We’ve got to see how successful this is. There’s
it is, it’s a mini-season. I like that.” old band back together, which almost feels like also a certain amount of caution. I love it, I
There is, of course, a full new season, with a pipe dream. “We all worried,” Davies admits. think it’s brilliant, I’m so happy with it – who
Ncuti Gatwa’s Doctor, to come in 2024. “We worried since the day we agreed to do it, knows? Who knows how it’ll go down in those
“That’s where the Disney launch will really be because that’s part of making the show, but the 204 countries. So we’ll see.”
starting,” Davies explains. “Disney love these
specials, are dropping them and going to
support them, but the massive Disney launch
starts in REDACTED with season one. Nine new episodes a year:
“Because I think people are beginning to ask, Davies explains the change
‘Why is there no big Disney push behind this?’
That’s coming in REDACTED. “The numbers have gone down over the filled it with Doctor Who. Some of our sets
“Ooh, we’re not supposed to say REDACTED, years, partly because it’s so expensive. are standing sets, not just the TARDIS.
I don’t think we could make more episodes There’s some sets we’re always going to
are we? Next year, season one. Yes, we’re keep coming back to, which I love. So we’re
a year. But equally, I think spin-offs will
calling it season one.” allow more episodes per year, but it’s early gonna work out how to make it, which we
We’ll let you catch your breath – we imagine days. We need to work out production-wise are doing. That’s on its way, genuinely on
there’s a collective gasp, a clutching of anoraks, how and when – plus our studios are full, we its way.”

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 29

 DAVID TENNANT

AV ID T
D N A N HE
N T
T E C K A S ST I L L ,
A E
IS B OR . W EV E IT
T L I E
DOC ’T BE UGH W
CA N N THO O HIM
EV E OK E T LV ES
SP RSE TT
OU ARREN S
CO

S: D
RD
WO

30 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 DAVID TENNANT

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 31

 DAVID TENNANT

HEN SFX
catches up with
David Tennant at
Bad Wolf Studios in
Cardiff, it’s the day
after his birthday, and
he’s still a young
fanboy at heart(s). “I’m
going around taking
pictures of everything I
can,” he laughs. “I’ll probably have my phone
confiscated as I leave…”
A little bird tells us that he grabbed a few
selfies with the Wrarth Warriors on the set of
“The Star Beast”, the first of three anniversary THIS INTERVIEW
specials being released this month. “Oh, WAS CONDUCTED
always!” he says, scoffing jovially. “Oh, of PRIOR TO SAG-AFTRA
course. That’s day one…”
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. This
STRIKE ACTION
is April 2023. It’s before episode title reveals,
before trailers and Toymakers, and we’re still
in the time (Lord)-honoured
tradition of everything being
a secret. What we do know is that
Tennant is indeed back, back,
back! But he’s not the Tenth
Doctor. No, he’s not even the
Meta-Crisis Doctor. He’s the
Fourteenth Doctor – officially.
But did he ever think he’d ever be
playing any Doctor again?
“I think it would be
disingenuous to pretend I wasn’t “This is
entertaining that as a possibility, becoming
because there’s precedent for it,” something of
he admits. “I’ve done it for the a habit.”
50th anniversary of Doctor Who.
I suppose I might have been called back for a He’s talking, of course, about the 1980 Marvel
subsequent anniversary if I was still able to get Doctor Who comic strip of the same name from
in the suit and run around. Doctor Who Weekly.
“What I didn’t imagine is that I would be “It sort of makes perfect sense – Russell as
back as the Doctor for any length of time. I a long-term fan, and also that particular story,
suppose I imagined I might drop in on the way that it captures that particular world of Whatever’s
somebody else’s Doctor, as I had with Matt Doctor Who is sort of the world of Doctor Who happening,
[Smith] on the 50th, to be part of a celebratory that Russell is known for, I think,” he it’s not a good
guest cast. considers. thing.
“So no, I don’t think I ever really imagined “The way the Doctor interacts with a family
I’d be back in the way that Catherine [Tate] in modern-day Britain and the make-up of that says politely, before adding, “It sometimes felt
and I got to enjoy for these three episodes.” family, and how the extraterrestrial hits the like it wasn’t perhaps the most carefully
domestic. It sort of makes sense actually, as a produced piece of work. Then suddenly,
WH O AM I? starting point for a Russell T Davies Doctor Marvel Comics takes over and you had this
Three special episodes, and a brand new Who script. So after my initial surprise, I was world-class comic book artist beautifully
Doctor – but probably not the one you were duly thrilled, I think it’s fair to say.” creating these alien worlds and stories that are
expecting – with an old enemy, some familiar As a lifelong fan of the series, Tennant’s no so brilliantly written.
faces and an opening story that long-term Who stranger to the Meep or the Wrarth Warriors “So they were absolutely reminiscent of the
fans will probably recognise. that pursue him. TV show, but also had their own kind of reality
“I couldn’t believe, when I saw the first “I certainly have very vivid memories of that was so creative and exciting, that I think it
script, what it was adapted from,” Tennant those old Pat Mills/Dave Gibbons stories,” he was a really big moment when Doctor Who
says of “The Star Beast”. “Because, of course, recalls. “As someone who grew up with TV Weekly started with those comic strips.”
I recognised that immediately as a child of the Comic, where the Doctor Who comic strip – The story isn’t the only familiar thing, of
’70s and the ’80s. I knew exactly where the which was sort of what I got it for – never felt course – we recognise those teeth and that
source material lived and it was a deep joy.” like it truly captured the spirit of the show,” he face… “Well it did feel weirdly comfortable,”

32 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 DAVID TENNANT

Older and… You can’t

wiser? The park a TARDIS
Fourteenth there, pal.
Doctor. Regulations.

sort of okay. Having said that, it was wanting to

make sure that he moved as quickly and was
able to jump around just as much as 15 years
ago. I didn’t want that to be in the reviews:
‘You can see the joints creak.’
“But besides that, I was quite happy to let it
be filtered through 51-year-old me. Having said
that, the whole point in being back is that it
would be a slightly peculiar thing to have
reinvented the character or done anything
particularly differently.
“So it’s still recognisably the Doctor that I
was before, without a doubt, and that indeed is
“It’s alright, part of the story. The Doctor has found himself
it’s just regenerated into a form that he recognises.
the toast That’s a puzzle. So I can’t suddenly have a long
burning.” beard and a funny hat and an Atlantic accent.
That would be counterproductive to the story
Tennant says of stepping back into the we’re trying to tell.
character. “It did sort of swing back to life “Part of the point of the story is the Doctor is
quite easily. I think I wondered if it might feel a version of himself that he recognises. If it was
like more of a reach than it did. But at the same me playing the part in a completely different
time, I think I was happy for this version of the way, it would be a different story, I suppose.
Doctor to have new elements or a different It’s got to feel very reminiscent of the Tenth
flavour, because I’m 15 years older, and that’s Doctor even though it’s actually the

New Doctor, same voice, different

waistcoat. Why the tartan?
“We just kind of found the before, but it’s in a check way. So I’ll leave that up to you!
material. It wasn’t that it was pattern. As soon as we saw it… [It probably is – Scottish Ed.]
tartan, so much as it’s the We were just going through a “I’ve met a couple of people
colours that are in it because it’s book of fabrics and it pinged as fully kitted out in immaculate
very reminiscent of the brown being, like I said, the same but versions, and they’re getting
and blue stripe that I had.” different. That suddenly just details that I thought nobody
He stops. “We’re going quite made sense. So that’s where it would even notice. It hasn’t
deep here,” he deadpans. “It’s came from. I don’t even know if even really properly been on
very reminiscent of the brown it’s classed as a tartan. I’m not telly yet, so I don’t know how
and blue striped suit that I had sure. I haven’t checked either they manage it!”

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 33

 DAVID TENNANT

Director
Rachel Talalay
with Mr
Tennant.

Fourteenth.” Does that mean they have the

same personality? “Interestingly, when we
came to what the costume might be, there was
a debate about, ‘Is it exactly the same costume?
Is it a completely new costume, or is it sort of
the same but different?’ That’s sort of, I would
say, the same for all of it, from my point of
view,” he says of his take on the similarities
between the two Doctors. Donna Noble
“I think a dedicated viewer will know that (Catherine
I’m wearing a costume that’s actually quite Tate): she’s
different to the one I wore 15 years ago. The baaack.
casual viewer will see exactly the same clothes,
I suspect. That’s probably a good way of talking reveals. “I’ve been sneaky. I’ve been sniffing “I’ve got a
about the entire experience of coming back to around the studios today, and I may have crept bone to pick
it, I think.” on set at one point. God, he’s good casting. It’s with you,
very exciting to think about what’s gonna Doctor…”
A NEW WHO happen to the show when he takes over.”
We can’t, unfortunately, talk about the entire But before the show regenerates once more,
experience – that would just ruin things, we ask him to consider what the most
wouldn’t it? But we can ask about some of the significant change in the series has been since
new/old, ahem, new things. Like his new he first played the role.
TARDIS set, for example. “It’s just a bit bigger,” he shrugs. “It’s no
“I saw it in construction, because all my secret that [multiple production companies]
scenes in the TARDIS were kind of the last are involved and that allows us to tell stories on
thing I did. So when I arrived in Cardiff, it was a slightly bigger scale, it allows Russell to write
a building site. I would pass by the studio stories on a bigger scale. The studio set-up
where it was being built every few days and see they’ve got here in the Bad Wolf Studios is
it sort of lurch up and then in the final week breathtaking. I mean, it’s just vast. When I first
suddenly there were 400 people on it, painting did Doctor Who, we were in a little warehouse
and banging and clicking and connecting in Newport where the roof leaked. It feels like
things.
“It’s magnificent,” he stresses. “I have to say
we’ve come quite a long way.
“The essentials are still the same – they’re
It’s unlike any script
I’m very, very thrilled to be the first person to just the same as they were in 1963, and that’s that’s ever been written
fiddle with it.”
Then of course there’s Neil Patrick Harris
why I think the show is as tenacious as it is.
It’s got a central concept that is kind of
for Doctor Who in the
– now confirmed, months after our chat, as indestructible. 60 years it has existed
playing the Toymaker. “Oh he’s very good,”
Tennant enthuses. “I mean as an actor, W H O’ S WHO about these three specials that particularly
extraordinary, because he’s not just an actor. “Having said all that, it’s nice to see it have the stands out as new, exciting or innovative to
He’s also a singer and a dancer and a magician. resources which means it can compete globally their leading man.
He’s one of these people who’s not a triple with Marvel and Game Of Thrones and all these “I think what is remarkable about them is
threat, a quadruple threat, he’s a quintuple other high-end shows. that they are… certainly two and three are
threat. “It’s a joy to see this little show that used to scripts unlike anything I’ve seen on Doctor
“What’s brilliant about who he plays in this be done in a tiny studio in Lime Grove thriving. Who,” Tennant suggests. “After 60 years, to be
is that he gets to exploit all of his skill set. So he We did some incredible things on these three reinventing something as radically as Russell
was very entertaining on set with it, because he episodes that I was involved in, that were is managing to do I think is absolutely
has to do quite a lot of different stuff, and he certainly not something we could have remarkable,” he laughs.
does it with such flair. It was great. He was a afforded to have done 15 years ago, and “The first special actually has some things
joy to behold.” certainly not something that they would have I’ve never seen them do as well, but it’s more
There’s also the matter of another Doctor managed with William Hartnell 60 years ago.” recognisably the kind of Doctor Who that
about to explode into life… “I have managed to Aware we’re treading perilously close to Russell has always brilliantly done – again on a
admire, from afar, a little bit of Ncuti,” Tennant spoiler territory, we’re keen to know what it is sort of scale that we’ve never seen before, and

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 DAVID TENNANT

Neil Patrick
Harris as the
mysterious
Toymaker.

The Doctor Never not

with Yasmin looking iconic
Finney as stepping out
Rose (!). of the TARDIS.

If Patrick Stewart can run down a corridor

as Jean-Luc Picard at 82, we’re not taking any
excuses from Tennant.
“Oh, how nice. Maybe that should be my
goal, to have one last outing as the Doctor at 82.
I’ve got 30 years to wait.”
Now that it’s committed to print, the fans
obviously will hold him to that… “If I can still
do it in 30 years’ time I’ll be thrilled to do it.”
that’s the great unexpected joy there. to be that there are endless new ways to tell Enough of 2053 – how’s he planning on
“But then the second of the specials, I mean, stories about a Time Lord in a wooden box. celebrating this month, as a fan?
there’s not a script written for this show before It’s great!” He considers for a moment. “Maybe we
now [like it]. It’s unlike any script that’s ever He laughs when we ask the inevitable should have a street party. What day of the
been written for Doctor Who in the 60 years question for someone leaving the role of the week is the 23rd?” It’s a Thursday this year, we
that it has so far existed. Doctor: does he think he’ll ever play him again? tell him. “Is it? That’s not the right day of the
“It’s a completely new type of storytelling. “I think it would be disingenuous to imagine week. Can we change that?” A Bank Holiday
It’s just unrecognisable. I think that’s pretty that I might never be asked again because weekend for the 60th? “Well if they can have
remarkable after 60 years. history would indicate that it was always a one for the Coronation, they can have one for
“Things done in the third special take Doctor possibility. So I’m not going to say never this…”
Who to a place it has never gone before. That’s because I don’t think anyone would believe me. There is one thing his fan gene would like,
the thing – Russell wrote so many stories “That doesn’t mean I know that I ever will. however. “I’d like a fully-realised PlayStation 5
already, you think he would have exhausted his But I suppose until I can’t run down a corridor game where my kids could play as me as the
creative piggy bank, but he just seems to be on it’s always a possibility. But I promise to have Doctor. Except they wouldn’t! They’d be like,
fire, it seems to be pouring out of him, it seems no plans.” ‘No, we want to be Jodie!’”

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 DOCTOR WHO PRODUCERS

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 DOCTOR WHO PRODUCERS

THE PRODUCERS OF DOCTOR WHO DISCUSS

WHAT TO EXPECT FROM THE NEW EPISODES
WORDS: DARREN SCOTT

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 DOCTOR WHO PRODUCERS

HEN WE SIT
in executive
producer Phil
Collinson’s office
– adorned with
Dalek movie posters
– with fellow series
producer Vicki Delow,
the pair joke about being
like presenters Richard
and Judy as they decide where to be on the
sofa. As they settle down for a conversation
about the upcoming Doctor Who specials, we
note that watching over them from above, with
giant eyes, is an early prototype of the Meep’s
head… Ulp.

We should probably talk about the Meep

in the room.
Phil Collinson: You can imagine going from
that comic strip into the script to, “How are we
going to make the Meep?” Simply the amount
of time, the amount of pages of dialogue it had,
and how much it had to interact. It was just
bonkers. The prep for it was mad.
Vicki Delow: It was. I’d never done creatures
before, like this, practical creatures. So I didn’t
realise there’s a performer, and there’s the stuff
that comes with the performance and stuff that Producer Vicki
comes with the creature. There’s the building Delow recently
of the creature. It blew my mind a little bit. did His Dark
Materials.
What was it like when you first saw it finally
come to life?
VD: Aww. Neill Gorton, who runs Millennium
[FX], came in and did this whole thing where
he got the performer to hide behind a bin and
then called it out, in character, and oh my god,
it was lovely. She was able to move a lot better
than we imagined. She had to be very tiny and
to be in a crouching position. The performer’s
very small anyway, but she had to also crouch imagine it being a completely CGI creature. PC: It was the ambition, I suppose. Vicki’s just
and she had this big head on, and the That’s a feature film. been producing His Dark Materials. I’d come
animatronics that controlled it all. So it’s off the back of a period drama for BBC One and
quite a feat. You weren’t tempted to say, “Can we try HBO called Gentleman Jack. So we’ve both
PC: It was the first time we went, “Oh my god, ‘The Iron Legion’ instead?” been making big telly, but nothing really
it will actually work.” There were two PC: Well no, because it was the first script prepares you for this job. It’s the nature of it,
IMAGES: © BBC STUDIOS / BAD WOLF / PANINI. PORTRAITS: RAY BURMISTON

iterations of the Meep; we filmed with a person really, we weren’t going to be the ones who said the episodes changing all the time is the main
in a suit, running around acting, doing the no to the first script. It was one [Russell had] issue.
whole thing in a version like that [points to the always wanted and it just fitted so beautifully VD: It’s the weight of responsibility as well. We
prototype]. Then we had a chap on set who with the story with Donna’s return, with had a responsibility to bring it back and bring it
was doing the voice and acting opposite David [Yasmin Finney’s character] Rose. back in an incredibly ambitious way, and we
and Catherine. Then we’ve replaced the voice When you see it, it is gloriously apt. The way feel that every day when we’re trying to figure
subsequently with Miriam Margolyes. But we that Russell adapted that comic strip’s story, out how to do it.
did that way after we’d finished filming. retained all the best bits of it, but made it fit the
Then we’ve also done significant VFX work story of the return of Donna and her family, it’s David and Catherine are back. To what
to make the ears and eyes move and the mouth so clever. So we weren’t going to say no. We’ve extent will this feel like a return, and to
lip-sync with Miriam. So it’s been one of the never worked together before, but we’re cut what extent does it feel different?
most complicated creatures Doctor Who’s ever from the same cloth because we’re both a bit PC: In a sense it’s what Doctor Who does every
tackled, genuinely, since 1963. [Laughs] It’s no like, “Well, let’s have a challenge then because time the main character regenerates – it
accident that Beep the Meep never appeared in it’s boring without one.” completely reinvents itself. This show feels
the show because it’s just the most complicated very different to the show that was transmitted
bonkers. Because it plays such a massive part Apart from the Meep, what were the big the last time it was on. It is bigger, we’re
of the story, we couldn’t have even afforded to challenges you were facing? spending more money on it. So that brings us

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 DOCTOR WHO PRODUCERS

before will remember, and everything they

loved about them, they’ll bring with them into
our era. But also those who haven’t watched it
will see these two great characters and think,
“Oh, I really love them and want to see what’s
going on with them”, and therefore come with
us as well.
PC: I suppose for a bigger audience they are
a very good reintroduction into Russell T
Davies’s version of Doctor Who. They are the
very best comedians, they’re brilliant at playing
that, and he writes a lot of comedy in the
scripts. They’re brilliant at turning on a

We had a
responsibility to bring it
back in an incredibly
ambitious way
sixpence and breaking your heart, and he
breaks your heart at the end of these episodes.
So it is like bringing back the best in order for
you to move something forward.

How much of Doctor Who “legacy” can be

expected from these episodes to celebrate
the 60th anniversary?
PC: Obviously, for fans Beep the Meep is a big
thing that goes right back to early fandom – the
’70s and the beginning of that time when it felt
like Doctor Who started to turn from being a
show that people watched into being
magazines and toys and whatever, so there’s
definitely that in the first one.
Executive I think with David and Catherine, as I say,
producer Phil they’re very cleverly looking back but also
Collinson, huge looking forward. Then in special three, there’s
Who fan. tons of nostalgia. There’s UNIT, there’s a
fantastic big baddie coming back who looks
elevation in terms of production value and size. Lord, and he had to wipe her mind. That’s kind right back to the very early days of the show,
But it’s the same show – it’s got the same of all you need to know, and now you’re off. and he’s completely reinvented. It does feel like
music, the TARDIS arrives. Those two actors Crucially, you’re not going to watch it and a massive celebration.
are so brilliant that they literally just step back think, “Oh, this feels a bit old-fashioned,” Having said all of that, we all feel like the
in. What I love about it is you feel comfortable because it’s very much modern, faster, bigger, best way of celebrating something is making it
with them. You don’t have that little episode brasher. There are things that blow up in the feel brilliant and relevant today. It’s definitely a
where you think, “Do I like this Doctor?” same way that they always do, but probably very forward-looking show. There’ll be all sorts
There’s a certain amount of introduction to do bigger. of stuff going around the anniversary as well,
but we kind of cover it. It’s amazing how quick VD: What I hope is that people will watch the other things that celebrate, so there’s enough
you get it. She absorbed the power of the two of them and they’ll be their guiding lights in these three specials. There’s definitely
TARDIS into her brain, she became half Time through it. Those that have watched the show enough for it to feel like we’re celebrating the

“The Star Beast” draws on an eight-part what it seems? And why are the fearsome
1980 Marvel comic strip from Doctor Who Wrarth Warriors pursuing him? SPOILERS!
Weekly. Written by 2000 AD co-creator Pat The Meep popped up in four more strips in
Mills and drawn by Dave Gibbons (later of the ’90s (most notably 1996 sequel “Star Beast
Watchmen fame), it sees kids in a northern II”), plus a Sixth Doctor audio (2002);
town taking in a cuddly alien furball after its producers Big Finish also adapted “The Star
spaceship crashes on Earth. But is everything Beast” in 2019.

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 DOCTOR WHO PRODUCERS

At least the Watch out for

Toymaker the Wrarth
always makes Warriors in
an effort. special one.

whole history of the show without it being all skyscraper, a part of the London skyline. In a
five Doctors coming together to defeat the Marvel Universe kind of way, we were trying
Master or whatever. to create that kind of thing for Doctor Who
now. UNIT is part of London and people know
Was that a very conscious decision? what it is and the fighting of aliens, it happens
PC: It’s all definitely about wanting to look now. We built this amazing set for it, and the
forward, but as I think Russell does so way they are brought into that set in special
brilliantly, it’s not looking forward without three is by a helicopter. So we helicopter them
forgetting where you came from. Because you in and the TARDIS gets dropped down and it’s
just can’t with this show. He flies around in a just massive.
blue box and, like I say, the enemy they face is Murray Gold’s music’s going, and then
someone who goes right back to almost the there’s a huge sequence upon this helipad
genesis of the show – so it’s definitely there. that’s surrounded by greenscreens and it’s the
It’s just not multi-Doctors. I love multi-Doctor biggest special effects I’ve ever done. Then to Sylvia Noble
shows. But we don’t need to do it, it’s been see that translated into what it’s turned into (Donna’s
done. now on screen is just amazing. This is my mum) and
favourite show in the world. So to be part of Shaun Temple.
Are there any breathtaking moments you making it even bigger, it’s just a massive thrill,
can speak about? all of it. PC: Well, it’s bigger, a lot bigger.
VD: I can’t talk about the one I really want to VD: I’ve thought of one: filming on the TARDIS VD: It’s sort of like a cathedral. It takes your
talk about! There was one rehearsal that we did for the first time. Honestly, I watched this breath away, both on screen when it first
for something that blew my mind. I really show as a kid. You never imagine you’re appears because of the way we’ve shot it, but
enjoyed all the night stuff that we did for actually going to be working on the thing that also, when you walk into it, you feel it. You
special one, “The Star Beast”. you watch on the telly. It’s amazing. It’s physically feel it. I know that’s a bit
PC: There’s a massive battle in a steelworks amazing. overdramatic, but you do. When you walk
and on the street that was huge and a lot of fun in, you physically feel it.
to do. We’ve got a brand new headquarters for What was the thinking behind the new
UNIT. We built this amazing UNIT set, it’s a TARDIS interior? Not much is known about the second

This powerful eternal being (played by Williams’s Sixth Doctor script “The Nightmare
Michael Gough) debuted in 1966 story “The Fair” had the Toymaker plotting world
Celestial Toymaker”, abducting the TARDIS domination using an arcade game that feeds
crew to his realm and forcing the First Doctor’s on human souls, from a base inside Blackpool’s
companions to play a series of dangerous “Space Mountain” ride. When the series was
games. Only one of four episodes still survives. axed, the script was shelved. It was later
He was originally set to return in 1986. Graham novelised, and adapted for audio by Big Finish.

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 DOCTOR WHO PRODUCERS

Everyone
loves a
Toymaker,
don’t they?

Ruth Madeley
(Shirley) was
in Years And
Years.

ground. We’ve come back to make this show in

a way it’s not been done before. We’ve come
back to make the sort of drama that people will
stop and talk about at the watercooler or
Oh dear… online. It’s exciting and groundbreaking, and
Donna’s not no one’s worked like this. The way we made
happy. As episode two, it’s a roller coaster and it will be
usual. amazing.
VD: It was terrifying for us to make! We
episode, “Wild Blue Yonder”. Can you talk Virtually every shot is a VFX shot. It’s a feat all learned so much from it, that episode above
about that without spoilers? of its own, and once it’s transmitted you’ll be anything else. It taught us how to prep for this
PC: It’s hard to do. It’s genuinely unlike any able to write reams and issues, and there are so show in a way none of the others did in some
other episode of Doctor Who I have ever seen, many things we’re going to be able to tell you ways. The one thing I will say about all three
and I’ve seen them all. And that’s bloody hard about how we made it and how we did things. specials is each one will make you feel
to pull off after 60 years of the show, but it It’s the most fascinating piece of drama I’ve different. So each one will give you a different
honestly is. ever made. emotional response, not the same.
VD: It’s creepy. The making of it, the post-production of it, They’re all completely different. They all
PC: It’s just got an atmosphere and a horror all the taking all the actors through it, just every have things that you’ll talk about forever. They
of its own. So that is unlike anything I’ve ever bit of it. There’s definitely been moments all have things that make you either cry or
seen before. It genuinely is. That is the episode where I’ve woken up in the middle of the night laugh or whatever; that one should terrify you
that we would really love to not spoil, actually. and thought, “We’re not going to do it. This is a utterly, if we’ve done our job properly.
It feels honestly groundbreaking, not just in disaster. What are we even doing this for?”
terms of Doctor Who, but in terms of Episode two, in a way, feels like what we’ve Doctor Who is on BBC One in the UK and
production, in terms of the way we’ve made it. come back to do. We’ve come back to break Disney+ worldwide this month.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 41

 TALES OF THE TARDIS

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 TALES OF THE TARDIS

SFX GOES ON SET FOR THE

FILMING OF A BRAND NEW
DOCTOR WHO SERIES
TALES OF THE
TARDIS
WORDS: DARREN SCOTT

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 43

 TALES OF THE TARDIS

OTHING QUITE Maureen

prepares you for O’Brien and
walking into the actual Peter Purves
TARDIS – but that’s reminisce.
taken to a whole new
level when “your”
Doctor and companion
are there, in costume,
creating brand new
canonical adventures.
It’s a surreal, giddy moment for SFX in
Studio 1 at Bad Wolf in Cardiff on Thursday
28 September – now you know why Sylvester
McCoy and Sophie Aldred were at the Radio 2
concert, fact fans – as we step aboard the
Remembered TARDIS…
“It’s a mash-up of loads of different TARDIS
sets,” writer Pete McTighe explains. “There’s
bits of the Davison console, bits of the
Eccleston/Tennant console, bits of the Jodie
TARDIS. There’s even bits of Ncuti’s TARDIS
in there. That’s incredible, the way that they’ve
collided all these tiny pieces into one set.
“The set decoration is astonishing, there’s
loads and loads of little Easter eggs of props
from the show that are relevant to the stories Russell T Davies talks Tales
that we’re seeing, but also plenty of other
Can we confirm that TOTT is canon?
stories as well.”
ABSOLUTELY! Good god almighty!
This new six-part miniseries is, producer What the flip?!
Scott Handcock explains, “designed to help
new fans access the whole archive of Doctor You know what fandom’s like!
Who,” as 800 episodes from the Whoniverse Well, it’s going out on the iPlayer. So
arrive on BBC iPlayer this month. “It’s a format some fans will be completely justified in
saying, if it hasn’t been transmitted on
where we get to reunite beloved cast members BBC One, then it’s not canon. I mean,
and characters in a very special version of the welcome to your life. I have nothing to
TARDIS that celebrates every era of the show.” say to you. [Laughs] against a nearby wall, removed to allow for
filming. A large camera track runs almost the
FUL L CIR CLE Is this part of an intention to build out an length of the studio, directly to the famous time
existing universe?
Fans of the expansive Who box sets will machine’s entrance. The whole thing is sat
There are bigger plans behind this that
already be familiar with the concept. “Russell we can’t talk about yet. Eventually TOTT metres away from a large set from the next
told me it was inspired by the short films for will begin to make more sense as the series – spoilers!
the Blu-rays, which is amazing,” McTighe says. series next year unfolds, you will see. Inside, it’s a treasure trove of various
But while these six dramas will accompany But it’s really a lovely thing to do for the different TARDIS sets from over the years from
new omnibus editions of Classic Series stories, 60th. [Chuckles] It’s very last-minute. I floor literally to ceiling. The set dressers have
thought of it about two months ago. It’s
they’re far more than just introductions. been like, “Oh Christ. Let’s do this.” I did
gone to town with items from every era of the
“It’s not just a simple intro and outro,” think we hadn’t done enough for the 60th series, but each episode of TOTT has
McTighe explains. “It’s actually a story that and we made this. Doctor-specific nods. So here we see Ace’s
moves the characters on. Russell’s written this I’ve had one of the greatest weeks of baseball bat, a forum poster from “The
amazing piece for ‘Earthshock’, which is my entire career taking the cast members Happiness Patrol” and a kite from “The
IMAGES: ALISTAIR HEAP/MAXINE HOWELLS/BAD WOLF/BBC STUDIOS

out for dinner every night and talking to

dealing with Adric’s death, which never Greatest Show In The Galaxy”.
them and every single night, we’ve been
happened in the show. So you get 10 minutes sitting there saying how we wish that “Anytime somebody stepped into the set, and
of Peter Davison and Janet Fielding really John Nathan-Turner was still alive. [See just had a look around, I had to clear the floor,”
immersed in that event and what it meant to page 26.] director Joshua Thomas recalls later. “I had to
them and how it changed them. It’s great. It’s interesting, because what we’ve give the actors some time to absorb the history
We’ve never had this stuff before. It is 100% learned is, even to do a small spin-off that was in there, and the items that they
like TOTT has been thrilling and has
canon.” energised the entire team. What’s nice
picked up.
The focal point of the new Tales Of The about that is it’s given a lot of staff a “One of my most fond memories was when
TARDIS series is a smaller set than your chance to step up and be promoted. Wendy [Padbury] came in. She walked in and
regular Time Lord fare – built as a circular/ Scott Handcock’s our script editor and immediately was just taken aback. She stood
domed construct raised slightly above the floor. he’s become the producer of this. Joshua there and had to take a deep breath, walked
Thomas, who’s directing TOTT, is my
It has the now-traditional Police Box doors over to one of the consoles and went to place
assistant. He’s directed short films before,
as an entrance; everything else around the so he’s now pulling up. So the more her hand on one and then immediately
entrance shell is painted green to allow for product we have, the more everyone retreated and hesitated. I went, ‘You can touch
VFX later. The actual doors themselves rest up can advance and learn and get promoted. that. You can touch anything in here’. She said,

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 TALES OF THE TARDIS

Maureen
O’Brien as
Vicki takes it
all in.

I had to give the

actors some time to
absorb the history that Jamie (Frazer
was in there Hines) is
back at the
controls!

If it’s
Thursday, it
must be time
for “Fenric”.

‘I wasn’t able to touch the console back in the

day. This is unbelievable that this is here.’ I
said, ‘Well, this is your time to do that’. She put Nicola Bryant
her hand on it and her eyes started welling and (Peri) is happy
it was a breathtaking moment. She just seemed to be back,
so overwhelmed with emotion by everything too.
that we were doing. That was when it hit – it
was just really, really special to watch. Returning memories was definitely unfair and cruel to me that happens. So we’ve
“Maureen [O’Brien]’s reaction was quite something that was at the forefront for the undone that.
breathtaking,” he adds. “She stood in this really writing team, too. “‘The Mind Robber’ was “A big part of [it] is Jamie remembering the
picturesque moment, under the console that really the scene that I’ve wanted to write for 40 Doctor and his love for the Doctor. So he finds
hovers over the top of the set, and did this 360 years,” McTighe says. “It’s all about Jamie and the Second Doctor’s original recorder. There’s
spin, hand on her heart and just looked at it in Zoe getting their memories [which were wiped a real moment there with that. I wanted to use
awe. It was just beautiful. Everybody watched by the Time Lords] restored – and they’re back props from the past as kind of a talisman
her as she took it all in and everybody just took for good by the end of this tale, which means throughout these,” he explains. “For ‘Fenric’,
a deep breath. It was magic. It was really, really that they can then pop up in the parent show or obviously the chess set is really crucial in the
quite sweet.” wherever, again, because it always seemed so story and also in this new drama. I was really

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 TALES OF THE TARDIS

specific about making sure Sylvester was

wearing his darker season 26 jacket, because Sylvester McCoy on returning to Doctor Who
I just wanted it to tie closer into the original
story. I specified that we had a kite from ‘The What’s it like being back in the TARDIS? to do it as film noir in black and white. I
Greatest Show In The Galaxy’. I was just trying Great! Yeah, I missed it really… That was think that would’ve added to it a lot. I wish
really nice. they had, because it had that film noir
to think of things that were really identifiable
feeling about it. I suppose they could
from that era.” This sets up more adventures – is that fiddle about with it nowadays.
Ahead of us there are people underneath the something you’re up for?
set, on their knees with torches, working on Is the Pope Argentinian? He is – the Did you ever imagine in 1989 you’d be
fittings for people above to bring in a miniature answer’s yes! We all love Doctor Who, all talking about the 60th anniversary?
model of Jodie Whittaker’s console, which of us who have been in it really. David No, not really. I was there for nearly the
serves as a focal point for the proceedings. [Tennant]’s come back to do it as well, we 30th anniversary. But even that was
kind of can’t get away from it. We’re still astonishing. I thought that was it, really.
“That’s the crystal campfire,” McTighe doing it, Sophie and I, Colin and Peter and But thanks to the fans, the fans have
explains. “Russell created that for ‘Earthshock’, Paul and all at Big Finish. It never goes brought it back. Steven Moffat was a
which was the first script that was written. So away, thank god. fanboy, Russell’s a fanboy. And they’re the
we’ve all kept that because it’s a great little ones that brought it back. The BBC weren’t
device. It’s cute.” What did you first think when you saw the gonna bring it back. These guys did. The
There’s laughter in the studio as the first Remembered TARDIS? fans demand it. It’s a crown jewel.
scene is blocked out. A few feet away, the actual Oh, I couldn’t remember! No, it was
pretty. It was like a lumber room with loads Your stories did pave the way for the new
Seventh Doctor sits holding his question mark of stuff that you put in and then come series, though!
umbrella. By the time we get to scene 68 take back later, you pick up things and It was really partly because the script
one, McCoy gurns like he’s regenerating in The remember, “Oh, I remember that.” It’s editor, Andrew Cartmel, and myself were
TV Movie. 68/2: They nail the scene and hand chaotic, but fascinating and good fun. completely ignorant of the history of
in hand he and Aldred dance together. They go And dirty. [Shows filthy hands] Doctor Who. He was Canadian, and I had
again for sound reasons. “It wasn’t me who was been working in the theatre. I hadn’t seen
How does the scale of the Whoniverse it since maybe the first couple of episodes
creaking,” McCoy jokes about his chair.
now compare to your days? of Tom Baker’s, way back then. So I had a
There’s a familiar voice – Russell T Davies [Laughs] When we made it, we made it distant memory of it. We knew nothing. So
has turned up for filming. “Look, isn’t it lovely!” on peanuts. We used to sometimes think in a way we were blessed because we
he beams. By scene 69/1, Davies is singing a they got Blue Peter’s sticky-back plastic didn’t have that baggage to think, “Oh
made-up theme tune for TOTT. and stuck the set up – the wobbly sets. well, we can’t do this because…” We
This is quite extraordinary. I’m full of envy looked at it fresh, read it and did it. It was
SE T SECRE TS for them working on something like this. only later Steven Moffat told me that we
They’re so lucky. But I mean, we did it back had done something quite different. And
While the crew set up for another take, we
then and it seems to still be magic. we hadn’t noticed!
have a look around the studio. There are more Because people are still watching it all
“Happiness Patrol” posters (we want one these years [later], they’re going back. How do you think the show has changed in
please, Bad Wolf!), fresh celery in a glass, a blue They haven’t thrown us aside – the 60 years?
Metebelis crystal. While we’re doing that, audience, anyway. It’s changed because it got younger and
Aldred’s searching the TARDIS for a very in a way it became even more successful
specific prop. As soon as we hear that familiar Which of your other stories would you because of that. But I regret it in a way,
recommend on iPlayer? because what I loved about the early
sound, we know she’s given Sylvester McCoy
I suppose it would be “Remembrance Of Doctors was we had a superhero who was
his spoons… The Daleks”, which was very successful. It not Superman, or Mr America, he wasn’t
Ever the showman, he plays them across was about something as well. You have to muscular. He used his brain, not his brawn,
Aldred and himself, hitting his head and then watch it to find out what it was about. but he was also a wise old man.
covering his eyes with them. He has the crew “The Happiness Patrol” was fun. Although In the old Anglo-Saxon society that we
in the palm of his hand as laughter ripples I was in a way disappointed because live in, we do not respect the old, like Latin
round the studio. The pair are on fire and you originally – I heard this afterwards, I wish societies do, Indian society. You go to
I’d heard it before – the director was going Asia, they respect the old. Having an old
genuinely want to applaud after each take. Doctor meant that young people would
“Sylvester, he’s an absolute showman and get a hero, an old man hero. That’s the
brought an energy to the set that everybody fed McCoy with negative thing as far as I’m concerned. But
off,” Thomas recalls later. “When he brings out Sophie Aldred that’s only a very personal thing.
the spoons at the end, I mean, we could have in the original Has it changed? No, it hasn’t really
rolled camera on him for hours. It was just series. changed. It keeps changing and not
magic, and seeing them run around trying to fly changing, it’s like a Gordian Knot of visuals
and creatives. Writers are all affected by
the TARDIS was just really special for what they saw when they were young.
everybody, him with his umbrella and in Because I noticed that certain things
costume.” coming out in the Chris Eccleston [era]
Back on set, McCoy’s having a ball. “And were echoes of what we’d done, the baby
somewhere else the whisky’s getting cold,” he and loads of other things. And then Matt
ad-libs, covering his mouth. “In-flight lighting” Smith’s fez, I did that first – and danced
with the mop. I was on the set and I just
is activated, the pair run around pulling levers
improvised and they kept it.
– McCoy gives the console above him a big
thud with his brolly. The director shouts cut Were the spoons in your eyes earlier a
and people actually do applaud. The Seventh stage direction?
Doctor is released from shooting, with another No, no, that was just me farting around…

46 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 TALES OF THE TARDIS

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 47

 TALES OF THE TARDIS

“What
happens if
I press this ?
Ah. Oops.”

round of applause and he’s given a bouquet of going in was no, he needs to have something
flowers that’s almost as big as he is. that shows that he’s a Doctor that’s
The returning actors have all loved the distinguished as well, that time has passed
experience, the team say. “The funny thing is and he’s grown and learnt as well, in his own
you talk to the cast, and they say that when the adventures that we’ve not seen. Seeing him in
show came back in 2005 they were expecting the fittings and putting it on, he was really
almost to be ghosted, in a way,” Handcock grateful that we had made that choice. I think
recalls, “because there was a new shiny version it empowered him to deliver the beautiful
of the show and people wouldn’t be interested performance that he did. I think that was a
in the old stuff. really great moment.”
“But what they’ve discovered, actually, was Handcock adds: “It feels so absolutely right.
all these new viewers, new kids, new families, It’s just as colourful as it was, but older and Clyde (Daniel
discovered the back catalogue. So you’d have wiser, just like the character. It’s stunning.” Anthony) and
people cosplaying as Sarah Jane or Peter There have been other surprises for former Jo (Katy
Davison and everything like that. So this is just Who crew too. “The cast come in for fittings a Manning).
another way now, with the archive going on few days before we bring them to the set that
iPlayer, of introducing a new generation to they’ll be shooting on. They just fall in love
what Doctor Who was and helping them fall in with this smaller-on-the-inside version of the
love with all these established characters all TARDIS, that’s just really intimate and full of
over again.” details. Then we discreetly do the, ‘Do you
But these are characters that have grown want to go to stage six?’ where we have our
too. “Colin in his new suit was really quite massive upcoming TARDIS, which obviously
something,” Thomas says. “When we were in no one knows…
fittings, I feel like he was expecting something “It’s lovely walking them over to the stage
closer to what he was originally in. Our plan going, ‘What do you think the new TARDIS is

Who, What, When!

THE TIME MEDDLER THE THREE DOCTORS VENGEANCE ON VAROS

by Phil Ford by Phil Ford by Phil Ford
Maureen O’Brien Katy Manning Colin Baker
and Peter Purves and Daniel Anthony and Nicola Bryant
Filmed: 29 September Filmed: 30 September Filmed: 27 September

THE MIND ROBBER EARTHSHOCK THE CURSE OF FENRIC

by Pete McTighe by Russell T Davies by Pete McTighe
Frazer Hines Peter Davison Sylvester McCoy
and Wendy Padbury and Janet Fielding and Sophie Aldred
Filmed: 25 September Filmed: 26 September Filmed: 28 September

48 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 TALES OF THE TARDIS

“Of course
I can get this
off again.
Probably.”

We’ve got an entire

archive to exploit and
there are so many
brilliant characters
Ace (Sophie
Aldred) sets
off for new
adventures.

going to be like?’, and they all have different All of this presumably bodes well for more
ideas. We’ve got in the habit of shutting the trips in the Remembered TARDIS. “I’d love to
door. So they literally step in through the police see Polly come back, and Leela. It’d be
box door and their reactions, every single amazing,” McTighe says. “The great thing
time… We’ve had people burst into tears. We’ve about this is if they work, and people love
had swearing, massive smiles and just awe, them, theoretically you could go on making
actually,” Handcock grins. these for years. That would be incredible if we
“It’s Doctor Who on an absolute other level, could – if every year we could pick a little ‘best
an absolute other level. It’s been thrilling to of season’ and do these. Not to say that’s gonna
invite them back to play these roles, but also happen. But it would be good.”
show them where the show is going into the Handcock agrees. “We’ve got an entire
future as well.” archive to exploit and there are so many
“All the actors had such a great time,” brilliant characters, because it wouldn’t have to
Thomas enthuses. “I was really blessed after necessarily be Doctors and companions. You
each shoot day to get calls and messages, could have, say, Simon Williams pop out to
emails, even postcards from each of the cast help recall ‘Remembrance Of The Daleks’ or
members who had just said, ‘I had an absolute any number of people.”
blast every single moment of that day.’ Thomas is on board too. “Hopefully we get
“They fed off the crew, the crew fed off to do more and bring more companions and
them. It really was one of those rare occasions Doctors back together and other people,
on set where we all felt incredibly blessed to villains. We could do so much with this set, and
Zoe (Wendy have the opportunity to do this, and I think we could tell so many more stories.”
Padbury) everyone took every moment of those shoot
gives Jamie a days, and just put their all into it, and I think Doctor Who: Tales Of The TARDIS is on BBC
talking-to. it’s reflected on screen.” iPlayer as part of the Whoniverse Collection.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 49

 STRANGER THINGS:
THE FIRST SHADOW

Louis McCartney
(Henry Creel)
and Patrick Vaill
(Dr Brenner)

50 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 STRANGER THINGS:
THE FIRST SHADOW

THE
H AW K INS
HOR ROR
SHOW
STRANGER THINGS
IS COMING TO LONDON’S WEST
END – AND ITS STORY WILL
BE “INTEGRAL” TO THE
SHOW. SFX GOES
BEHIND THE SCENES
TO FIND OUT MORE…
WORDS:
JACK SHEPHERD Oscar Lloyd (James
Hopper Jr), Isabella
Pappas (Joyce Maldonado)
and Christopher Buckley
(Bob Newby).

HEN THE DUFFER BROTHERS,

the creators of Stranger Things,
asked scribe Kate Trefry to write
a stage play based on their Netflix
series, her reaction was a natural one:
“What the hell are you talking about?” After all,
the world of Eleven, the Upside Down and the
Mind Flayer was developed for television, and
recreating the horrors of Hawkins on stage
seemed an impossible task.
Yet here we are two years after that meeting,
and Trefry’s talking to SFX between rehearsals
for Stranger Things: The First Shadow, a prequel
heading to London’s Phoenix Theatre.
“Everything about it is extremely different,” says
Trefry, also an executive producer on the series,
comparing her experience writing the stage play
– based on a story by herself, the Duffers, and
PORTRAITS BY CHARLIE GRAY/NETFLIX

acclaimed playwright Jack Thorne – to the show.

“I wrote my original draft with little regard for
the stage because I just know how to write the
show, so I wrote the show. We’ve been working
backwards to figure out how to bring it to the
stage, but that’s why they tapped me to do it;
because it’s more important that it feels like the
show than anything else. It’s canon and it really is
part of the show.”
The idea for doing a play originated with
co-directors Justin Martin and Stephen Daldry,
the Oscar-nominated filmmaker behind Billy
Elliot. The duo had previously worked with
Netflix on royal drama The Crown, and after the

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 51

 STRANGER THINGS:
THE FIRST SHADOW

streamer showed interest in entering the

theatrical space, they searched for an idea that
could work on stage.
“The thing about Stranger Things is that the
world is inherently theatrical,” Martin tells
SFX during a lunch break amid intense
rehearsals. “There are great characters, but it’s
also got a really great heart.” The difficulty
Martin foresaw was translating the show’s
horror elements to the stage, but it was a
challenge he was eager to take on. “There’s a
feeling of safety sitting in seats in the theatre,”
he says. “I felt really excited to see what’s
possible.”
The creative team knew they had to keep
the tone of the series intact, including a few
healthy jump scares, and needed a writer who
knew the Upside Down inside out. “Kate is a
phenomenal writer who, having not done
theatre before, created this amazing script,
which really pushed us and challenged us to be
better directors,” Martin says.

C R EEL LIV ES
He calls the first drafts “brilliantly impossible”
to put on stage; for instance, the TV series often
cuts from one set of characters to another, then
back again, which is a tricky effect to achieve in
theatre. However, rather than asking Trefry to
rewrite the story, the directors instead tried to
bring her ideas to life without too many
compromises. “She really has written two
episodes that form a holistic story, an act one
and two,” Martin adds.
Speaking of story, not much is known about characters, weaving in and out of his orbit. significant part. “No one will ever guess how it
what’s going to happen once the curtain rises. Sometimes unwittingly, sometimes knowingly.” leads to this crazy place,” she says. “But Henry
The First Shadow takes place in the ’50s and Creel was introduced in the fourth season is an agent of violence and chaos who gets
features teenage versions of Joyce Maldonado and The First Shadow picks up on story threads dropped like a little grenade into this small
(played by Winona Ryder in the TV show), Jim left dangling from those episodes. In fact, town and affects everybody around him.”
Hopper (David Harbour) and Bob Newby Trefry was a writer for both the fourth and the While some of Creel’s origin story has been
(Sean Astin) in Hawkins. Their lives are upcoming fifth (and final) seasons, giving her, told, Trefry emphasises that the version of
seemingly disrupted when Henry Creel (who as she puts it, a “master view” of the series events seen on screen may not be reliable; we
will one day become the evil entity Vecna) and This enabled her to craft a new, standalone were, she notes, told what happened to the
his family move into town. prequel story that adds new context to both Creel family by Henry himself. “The play is
“This is first and foremost a story about seasons. “It’s in conversation with the seasons a different perspective,” she says. “We’re
BRAD TORCHIA

Henry, a love story about Henry and this girl prior and the season to come,” she says. “It reaching back into Henry’s past to understand
he meets,” Trefry says. “But while it’s about really informs everything that you have seen why he is the way he is.”
Henry, we spend a lot of time with our other and will see.” Creel’s not the only character we come to
Martin calls the play “integral to what understand a little better in The First Shadow.
Kate Trefry season five is going to be,” adding that The First The play presents Hopper, Joyce and Bob in a
with the Shadow was conceived around the release of new light, and writing them as teenagers was
Duffer the second season in 2017, and since then, the an interesting challenge.
brothers. seeds of the play’s story have been planted in “They are different to who you know from
the show. the series,” Martin explains, “but only
“There are referential sequences and insomuch as they become those people. They
PORTRAITS BY CHARLIE GRAY/NETFLIX

imagery and callbacks and flashbacks to the go on a journey through their lives and the play
events of the play in [season] five that will still sets them off on those journeys that they will
make sense to you if you don’t see the play,” wrestle with to become who they are. It’s been
Trefry says, “but you’ll have a deeper fun finding where certain things come from.”
understanding of them if you do.” The adolescent Hopper has
The First Shadow depicts a “traumatic event” “hypermasculine daddy issues”, while his
that reverberates through these characters for relationship with Bob is somewhat similar to
the rest of their lives. The meeting of Henry the relationship between Steve and Dustin.
and the villainous Doctor Brenner plays a Joyce, meanwhile, was tricky to write. “She’s

52 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 STRANGER THINGS:
THE FIRST SHADOW

“You fall in love with those characters in a

way that you never fell in love with them
before,” Martin says. “The thing about what
the Duffers have written with the world and
those characters and their interrelationships,
they are so rich. Being able to play with them
and find out more about them has been a joy.”
There are also a few new characters in the Co-director
play, and although both Martin and Trefry are Justin Martin
reluctant to go into too much detail for fear of (left)…
spoilers, they both point to Patty Newby –
Bob’s sister – as a highlight. “She’s just getting
more interesting every day as we continue
rehearsals,” says Trefry. “She’s a very dynamic,
very unusual female character who’s really
complex. She has an edge that you don’t
necessarily expect.”

MANUEL HARLAN
MO N ST ER MASH
Of course, this wouldn’t be Stranger Things …co-director
without a sense of time and place. Whereas the Stephen
TV show is steeped in ’80s nostalgia, the play Daldry.
takes place at the tale end of the ’50s, and you
can expect music from the period, while Potter stage play The Cursed Child, with the
Martin also implies that some of the characters, illusions department being brought over from
presumably Hopper’s father, are still dealing that show to The First Shadow. “It’s really been
with the fallout of the Second World War. an opportunity for us to push what they can do
Ella Karuna Williams However, despite the setting, the aesthetic even further, and they’ve really gone for it,”
(Patty Newby) and Louis of Stranger Things remains in place. Trefry Martin says. “There are some things I’ve never
McCartney (Henry Creel). describes their approach to keeping the story seen on stage. It’s like Harry Potter on crack
feeling like Stranger Things, incorporating cocaine.”
familiar Spielbergian elements such as focusing To be a true Stranger Things story there also
on a gang of teenage outsiders, and using needs to be monsters, and whatever mysterious
nostalgia as a tool rather than a means to an creatures the creatives are cooking up, they
defined by her children and this manic, end. “We keep the tonal landscape of the promise these beasts will be terrifyingly real.
obsessive streak of mystery-solving,” Trefry show,” she says. “It’s unbelievable.” “What we don’t do is abstract,” Martin says.
says of the adult Joyce. “We had to ask what When it comes to the staging itself, the “It’s frightening and exciting and exhilarating
she was like before having her boys, so I had designers, as of speaking to SFX, are working and surprising. It’s funny – in the rehearsal
fun rooting her out. To me, she always seems a hard on making Hawkins and its hidden room, without any lights, it suddenly works
little out there, really determined, and quick to laboratories a reality. “They originally said it’s and you’re feeling a bit frightened. We’ve got
believe. She’s always fighting for what she like 10 shows wrapped into one,” Martin says an astonishing team working on it.”
believes in and what she loves, but she’s also a gleefully. He adds that the most apt theatrical While the technical side is an important
loose cannon.” comparison, scale-wise, is the ongoing Harry aspect of the play, the focus for everyone
involved remains the story. “At the end of the
day, if the story at the centre doesn’t work, then
Michael Jibson (Victor Creel), you’ve got nothing,” Martin says. “It’s
Louis McCartney (Henry Creel) balancing the emotional nature of the story
and Lauren Ward (Virginia Creel). with a very technically complicated show,
so the technicalities never overwhelm the
human story.”
To fulfil that promise, the casting has to be
impeccable, and Martin tasked his casting
director with the challenge of “finding the next
Ben Whishaw or Andrew Garfield”. “They
went out and they did it,” he says. “There are
proper rock stars in the cast. In 10 years time,
these kids will be winning awards.”
It sounds like The First Shadow could end up
being another West End break-out. After all,
stranger things have happened…

Stranger Things: The First Shadow previews

from 17 November at the Phoenix Theatre,
London.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 53

 THANKSGIVING

DIRECTOR ELI ROTH

LIVES OUT HIS LIFELONG
DREAM OF A
T HAN K SG I V I N G
MASSACRE
WORDS: DARREN SCOTT

54 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 THANKSGIVING

HE NICE THING ABOUT MAKING A

holiday movie is you have a very clear deadline,”
director Eli Roth jokes as he takes time out from the
edit of Thanksgiving, his seasonal slasher. Not that he
hasn’t had long to make the movie – it’s actually
something he’s been thinking about since he was
13 years old.
“My best friend Jeff Rendell [writer of the film] and I
would just ingest every single horror movie we possibly
could. We started getting to see R-rated films during the
[’80s] golden age of slasher movies and the VHS boom.
Every few months you knew that a horror movie was going
to come out because a holiday was coming up. We saw
Halloween, then Silent Night, Deadly Night and April Fool’s
Day, Mother’s Day and My Bloody Valentine… To us the
most obvious one was Thanksgiving.
“We kept saying, as if there was this giant committee that
decided what movies got made,” he laughs, “‘When are they
going to make a Thanksgiving-themed horror film?’”

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 55

 THANKSGIVING

Jump forward to 2007 and a request from Addison Rae

fellow filmmakers Robert Rodriguez and putting in
Quentin Tarantino… “When Quentin and some good
Robert came to me and said, ‘Do you want to screaming.
do a fake movie trailer for Grindhouse?’ we
thought, ‘We’ve been talking about the kills in
Thanksgiving’ – we had all these deaths ready
to go! We just threw them in the trailer.”
Turning that fake trailer into a full-blown
movie wasn’t without its challenges, however.
“Well, that was the challenge,” Roth stresses,
“because you want to stay true to what you
loved about the trailer. But then you find you’re
just connecting scenes between the trailer,
between those kills. So it was very difficult. Jeff
and I, for a long time, had absolutely no idea of
how to make the movie. Every time we sat
down to write it, we were like, ‘How do we
write to get to that kill?’
“The whole point of Grindhouse was that it
was a love letter to exploitation movies. The
trailer was a joke, it didn’t have to make sense.
Nothing had to add up. So you’re just getting
the best parts of an exploitation movie. It’s just
kill after kill after kill after kill and it’s
ridiculous and absurd. You can’t stretch that
out to 90 minutes and expect it to have the
same impact, or expect people to take it

Instead of rebooting
the same stuff, try and “Have you
seen Donald
give people a new Trump’s latest
mythology hair?”

seriously. We didn’t want to make a joke don’t have to be slavishly devoted to recreating modern slasher film. I remember the first time
movie. We wanted to make a real movie.” the trailer’.” I saw Scream in the theatre and you just go,
The friends eventually landed on a unique Those worried about the more gruesome ‘Holy shit. That was amazing!’ That’s what I
solution which allowed them to move past deaths being erased shouldn’t worry – it seems want, to do that for the next generation.
their self-imposed limitations. that Roth and Rendell only went bigger. “Instead of rebooting the same stuff, try and
“We said, ‘Alright, let’s operate under this “Every time you do one of those kills that give people a new mythology and new killer,
premise. Let’s pretend that Thanksgiving was you shot before, it has to be as good or better, a new slasher. You’ve got to earn it. It’s not
a real movie that was made and came out in because otherwise, what’s the point?” Roth enough to just pick a holiday and a mask. It’s
1980.’ It was so offensive that every single print explains. “I don’t want people to watch and go, one of those classic whodunnit guessing-game
was destroyed the day of release, it was pulled ‘It’s better in the trailer.’ So if you couldn’t top slasher films. The kills have to be incredibly
from the theatres and every print was burned, what we did in the trailer, you had to do satisfying. It has to be really scary and really
every copy of the script destroyed. The crew something different. Part of the fun was it freed fun. We’ve had a couple of screenings where
all disappeared. us up to come up with all-new kills.” there’s screams, applause, cheers, people
“The only thing that survived was one copy A dream decades in the making, Covid gave thinking we’ve gone too far…
of the trailer that one person saved and that’s the director a wake-up call about making sure “It’s going to have some of those classic
been floating around corners of the he actually made it a reality. “I thought, touches and things that you love, but I want to
internet. So this movie is the ‘Whatever happens, I can’t leave this world freak people out in ways they’re not expecting.
2023 reboot of what the without having made Thanksgiving’.” I want to give them kills they don’t see coming.
filmmakers thought that But that’s only part of why it’s taken I want them to go, ‘I thought I was going in for
film might have been. This so long for this film to reach screens. this, but oh my god, that was insane.’ That’s the
is the modern version, “We wanted to get the script right. fun of the film.”
rebooting the 1980 film I mean, James Cameron spent Fun was high on the agenda during
Thanksgiving. 14 years making Avatar 2, we production too, with Roth laughing as he
“Once we said that, we spent 16 on this. So this, by that describes some of the most out-there moments.
thought, ‘Okay, we can have logic, should make $3 billion at “The parade was so insane because you just
a few of the kills, a few of the the box office,” he laughs. “We had such have extras running around screaming…
ones that we love, that we high standards and high expectations for It’s the same moment from the trailer, the
always wanted to do. But we the movie. We wanted to make a great decapitated turkey, but there’s something else

56 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 THANKSGIVING

Nell Verlaque
learns about
phone
addiction.

found it. We found something that looks

unique.”
With the key pieces in place, it’s no surprise
that Roth would like to see the kills keep
coming in future holiday seasons.
“Every shot, we’re like, ‘Oh, the
Thanksgivingverse’ – we joke about it,” he
says excitedly. “Look, if you give people a rich
mythology, and a great killer, and a great
backstory, and a good mask, the story can go
in any number of directions.
“Part of what we spent so long on was
coming up with the backstory, the mythology,
the reason and the potential suspects for who
could be doing this. I have a million different
ways I could take the story. I love it. I could
spend the rest of my life making Thanksgiving
movies.”

BLOOD BATH
As with Cabin Fever and Hostel, Roth’s been
Lizzie giving Thanksgiving the “making of” treatment.
(Amanda Not only were the cast all given Hi-8
Barker): oh handycams – to give it that retro feel – and
dear. allowed free rein on set, the director filmed
material on VR. “Something will take off at
I do, where we had to cover these two girls in that… okay, it’s not just someone in a pilgrim some point, and I will have 360 footage that I’ll
blood. The absurdity of us spraying blood on outfit, it’s John Carver, who was the first cut so that you can feel – whether it’s this year,
these kids with their parents [watching], and governor, this real historical figure.” whether it’s five years from now, 10 years, I
then laughing and them screaming at the top of Of course, with a masked slasher movie actually did this on Borderlands as well – you
their lungs… there’s another element you have to get right will be able to feel like you were there at the
“It’s one of those times I can’t believe we’re – the mask itself. “It was a lot of testing,” Roth shoot with us.”
actually doing this as a job. There are some says of the process of bringing a new face to the As for the present, the inevitable question
other moments that we had that were so nuts, pantheon of horror. “I had some ideas, drew about a director’s cut of Thanksgiving has
but I can’t say it without really revealing too some concepts. It makes sense for the world of already been raised.
much about the plot. There are a couple of the story, in the context, because this is the “We’re discussing it now,” Roth reveals.
scenes that are just completely insane. But mask that has to be given out to everyone in “The R-rated cut has everything I want. So
everybody was sticky after this one.” town, because it’s a mask of John Carver. you can always add more gore, but I don’t feel
Already set to be immortalised as an action “So it’s someone using a mask in a perverse stifled in any way, it’s the far end of the hard-R
figure, the killer from Thanksgiving is more way that makes it sick. It’s the context of spectrum, so what you’re going to see in the
rooted in fact than you might imagine. “In our putting that on and then picking up an axe that theatres is my director’s cut.”
research, we found that the first Governor of makes it scary. That was the trick – it couldn’t So it seems there really are no leftovers
New Plymouth Colony who came over on the just be the world’s most terrifying mask. That this Thanksgiving.
Mayflower was named John Carver,” Roth doesn’t make sense for the story. So it was kind
laughs. “So when history hands you a gift like of a tricky balance. But I felt like we really Thanksgiving is in cinemas from 17 November.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 57

 THE HUNGER GAMES

PRODUCER
NINA JACOBSON
AND DIRECTOR
FRANCIS LAWRENCE
EXPLAIN HOW
THEY FOUND
THEMSELVES
BACK IN

THE
HUNGER
GAMES
WORDS: TARA BENNETT

58 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 THE HUNGER GAMES

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 59

 THE HUNGER GAMES

Rachel Zegler
and Tom Blyth
are the film’s
two leads.

that’s because we did faithful adaptations Suzanne was championing it, I really didn’t
of Suzanne’s books.” have any interest.” Until the late summer of
It was Jacobson and her production 2019, when the director got a phone call from
company Color Force who secured the film Collins herself…
With its final image of Katniss Everdeen rights to those books, and then shepherded Over the ensuing years, the two kept in
(Jennifer Lawrence) holding her baby and them to the screen with director Gary Ross and touch, checking in with one another. “We
wistfully looking on as her family plays in then director Francis Lawrence for the final always texted each other if The Hunger Games
a meadow, the big-screen era of Suzanne three instalments. “She’s writing about these ended up on Jeopardy, or something like that,”
Collins’s The Hunger Games trilogy came to a big ideas, and we’re just trying not to screw he laughs. But this call floored the director.
close in 2015 on a hopeful note. The four-film them up,” Jacobson says. “I feel first and “She said, ‘I’m almost done with the Hunger
franchise was an unlikely global sensation, foremost a responsibility to Suzanne, who Games book.’ And I’m like, ‘What? Are you
considering its core themes of oppression and entrusted me with these books. I feel fiercely serious?’” he remembers. “She told me she was
the sobering costs of war. However, loyal to her and servicing the ideas that she inspired not long after Mockingjay, and started
Lawrence’s bold heroine, who becomes the explores.” working on it. She kept it really quiet.” In that
spark of defiance against an autocratic regime, And that’s why The Hunger Games film call, Collins sketched out the basics: that it was
ignited the global box office. franchise has remained dormant since the a prequel set 64 years before the first book,
“It was humbling to see how much stories release of The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part featured only one crossover character, and
that we tell can resonate and last, and what II in 2015. Despite Lionsgate exploring original there was a musical element to it.
they can mean to people in such different spin-off ideas for new instalments, both In the early days of 2020, Lawrence and
circumstances,” The Hunger Games producer Jacobson and Lawrence were vocal that they Jacobson were invited to Collins’s agent’s
Nina Jacobson tells SFX. “What they see and would not be. “I knew there was a writers’ office to get their first look at The Hunger
how it moves them was an incredible room of some kind, but I honestly had zero Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes.
experience the first time around. But honestly, interest,” Lawrence confirms to SFX. “Unless “We had to sit in a locked room and read the

60 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 THE HUNGER GAMES

Coriolanus Lucy Gray

Snow with Dr Baird and
Volumnia Gaul Snow have
(Viola Davis). a lovely lie.

Peter Dinklage
as games
master Casca
Highbottom.

Director
Francis the games, where winning results could earn of the fun of this movie is, at what point do you
Lawrence him a scholarship to university and a path back stop rooting for him? What’s really interesting
on set. to respectability. As an impressionable young is, for people that have seen it, they’re kind of
man, Snow finds himself exposed to various hungry for him going dark, and they like him
philosophies, including those of powerful going dark. So that’s been really fun and
figures like head gamemaker Dr Volumnia satisfying.”
Gaul (Viola Davis) and games architect Casca
Highbottom (Peter Dinklage), and passionate THE G AMES ARE AFOOT
manuscript,” he says. “I just fell in love with tributes like Sejanus Plinth (Jose Andres After such a chilling performance by Donald
the story and with the ideas. I was in, and Nina Rivera) and musician Lucy Gray Baird Sutherland as President Snow in the previous
was too.” (Rachel Zegler). films, Lawrence says it was essential to find an
The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes is set Asked if he was surprised that Collins actor who could suggest the future psychopath
during the lead up to the tenth anniversary of decided to pull back the curtain on the to come. They found him in Juilliard-trained
the Hunger Games. The Capitol is still digging tyrannical President Snow’s origins, Lawrence Tom Blyth (Billy The Kid).
out after the war, finding its citizens less says not exactly. “We always thought it would “There’s a charisma he has that’s very
engaged with the games in general. The war be really interesting to go more toward the important,” Lawrence says. “And specifically,
has wrecked the life of 18-year-old Coriolanus Dark Days and the origins of it all,” he says, an intelligence behind the eyes. There’s a
Snow (Tom Blyth) whose once esteemed recalling speculative ideas they bandied about control that he has that Donald has too, which
family has hit financial dire straits. He’s back in the day. “So I’m not surprised that she I think was the key. Tom and I spoke about
desperate to stay afloat by mentoring for went back toward that direction. this, and there was never an intention from
“When done well, I think it’s fun to see the either of us to ever try to copy or emulate
“Trying out origins of things,” he adds, addressing the hotly Donald’s voice or mannerisms. Tom had to do
this new look. debated topic of whether prequel stories are his own thing, but there had to be a little bit of
What do you inconsequential. “Actually, my worry was, are connectivity.”
think?” people so trained to think of Snow as the In this story, it’s through the more malleable
antagonist that we’re gonna have a hard time Snow that Collins explores the “state of
getting people behind him in this movie?” he nature” debate (as discussed by the likes of 17th
says. “But Snow is a very different person in century philosopher Thomas Hobbes), which
the beginning of this movie than he is in the asks who we believe we are as human beings.
other movies. We have to create a human being “Suzanne was interested in exploring the allure
that we can get behind and sort of root for. Part of authoritarianism,” Jacobson says. “The first

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 61

 THE HUNGER GAMES

Francis
Lawrence and
Rachel Zegler
rehearse.

movies really resonated with people who are and we’d all be great.” As the female tribute melodies for Lucy’s band, Covey. “When we
willing and able to defy the state, and put from District 12, Lucy also represents the cast Rachel, she came in and worked with Dave
themselves at risk for larger ideals. For this musical element that Collins teased Lawrence on some pre-records. But when we shot the
movie, it explores how we got there, and how about from the start. “I didn’t really understand film, Rachel did it all live. Anytime it’s acapella,
we are getting there ourselves – which is what she meant until I read the book. Then I or even when she’s with her band in The Hob,
incredibly timely.” got it,” Lawrence admits. and through a PA, she sings live.”
Lawrence continues, “Philosophically, Snow “What I discovered is that Suzanne is a big The musical elements did present a
is a young man pulled in all these directions. country music aficionado. She knows a ton challenge to Lawrence. The films have always
Somebody like Gaul is leading him toward that about it and was really inspired by the kind of used lullabies or specific songs like “The
Hobbesian point of view. She believes country music you’d find in West Virginia in Hanging Tree” to make emotional points, but
that human beings are savage by the ’20s and ’30s. I also fell in love with that those performances have been dialled back.
nature and need to be ruled with sound, and got really, really excited, “It was very important to me in the creation
an iron fist. While characters like especially for District 12, of the idea that we of the screenplay that there always has to be
his cousin Tigris [Hunter Schafer] could have that kind of sound in the movie.” some story happening,” he says of the music-
and Sejanus are pulling him into To achieve it, they brought in Nashville- orientated set-pieces. “You shouldn’t take a
[the idea] that we’re all really based producer Dave Cobb, who wrote the break for songs. You can’t have a musical break
deserving of rights and freedoms. chord progressions and the and watch her sing for a while and nothing is
“Then characters like Lucy Gray moving forward narratively.”
are even more romantic in Because Covey and Lucy are far more
[believing] that we only theatrical than Katniss ever was, Lawrence
need love, nature, art, made a point to frame their performances in a
way that didn’t turn Songbirds And Snakes into
an outright musical. From Lucy’s first
Jason performance in The Reaping, Lawrence says
Schwartzman they worked to make that clear. “That was the
plays Lucretius one where we had to modulate how we get in
Flickerman. and how people react, so it didn’t feel like we’re

62 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 THE HUNGER GAMES

Production Production designer Uli Hanisch on

Designer Uli creating the proto-arena for the games
Hanisch points
the way. By the 10th Hunger Games, Panem is growing weary of
the annual event. As such, Hanisch was tasked with
retroactively establishing the look of the early games, and
then reinventing them in one movie. For the arena interior,
he secured the UNESCO World Heritage site Centennial Hall
in Wrocław, Poland, and for the exterior entrance, Berlin’s
Olympic Stadium, where Jesse Owens once raced as Hitler
watched on.
“Obviously, [the Capitol] have problems still being
interesting to the audience,” he says of the cultural context.
“It’s unclear how the [games] were even before – like the
first night of them. It was almost clear that it was a very
short and brutal spectacle. The one question we never
found out [an answer to] was: is there anything else
happening in this arena? It seems like it’s the only event
taking place there, so it’s an abandoned place, which is in a
bad state. It comes from the past of Panem, so it’s old, but
it can’t be too old.
“The most important part was the decision to find a
“Let the closed arena instead of an open one. In the novel, it’s
games described as an open arena, so when we started to look
commence!” we were looking in any kind of direction. The more we were
looking at various options and references, the more we had
The arena. the feeling that a closed arena is a stronger location,
because it’s more like a prison.
“We should not forget that [the tributes] are imprisoned
and that they are not supposed to be able to escape. A
closed arena is much more intimidating than any open
arena where you can see the clouds and the sky and the
birds. It’s a much better idea to have this dark, sinister and
intimidating arena.”

about this, but she totally got it – was the Gene England,” the director says. “She landed and
Wilder Willy Wonka. He has this joy in the had a rehearsal for that same sequence. So her
creativity, but there is this underlying sinister first day was getting walked into the arena and
quality to him. starting what we call the bloodbath.”
“The underlying sinister quality is her belief Now Lawrence and Jacobson wait to see if
suddenly breaking into song,” he explains. system. But the truth is that she finds real joy in those who loved the original films will return
“She’s a performer and she’s doing something crafting all these things that might be able to be to see how Snow became the villain they loved
irreverent, and it’s not turning into a musical.” used in the games as horrible punishment to hate. Jacobson is confident that they will.
The antithesis of Lucy – but equally permutations. She totally got it, and that kind “We took our time to get the scripts right,”
influential on young Snow – is Gaul, who is helped spring the look for her in terms of hair, she says. “It was about keeping the fire of
essentially the first Snow of Panem. As the make-up and wardrobe.” resistance, and wanting this movie to feel as
Head Gamekeeper, she cooks up diabolical fresh, specific, original and defiant of norms in
dangers for the tributes to face in the games, all F U LL C IRCLE the marketplace as the other movies did.”
done without empathy or compassion. “She’s a Production began in 2022 with Jacobson, Jacobson says that was really important to
strange character,” Lawrence says. “She speaks Lawrence and their whole team – many the entire creative team, because they treated
in weird little riddles sometimes, and rhymes.” returnees from the earlier films – using locales The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes as likely
When initially discussing the role with in Germany and Poland that were the actual their last story in this world.
STOCK ART: GETTY

Davis, Lawrence admits he used an unusual backdrops for Hitler’s fascist regime to tell “I love these movies, I love Suzanne’s
performance reference to explain how he sees Panem’s story. The first day of the shoot was in writing and the ideas that she explores, so I
Gaul. “My weird reference to Viola – and I the arena set, which Lawrence found surreal. will always be hoping that she is writing
remember being very nervous talking to her “We had designed the opening sequence in another book,” Jacobson says. “I know that she
the arena and the games, and I remember going certainly knows the whole history of this
Hunter Schafer onto a soundstage at Studio Babelsberg with all world, and a million details and dimensions
as Coriolanus’ the newly cast tributes,” he says. “They had all that nobody else does. I don’t doubt that she
cousin, Tigris come in but I’d hardly even met most of them has more stories in them.
Snow. in person. They were standing in the circle. “But I also really appreciate that she doesn’t
That was when I was like, ‘Oh wow. Here we write them unless she has something to say. So
go!’ I was back in The Hunger Games.” until then, I’m with every other fan, just hoping
It was an experience shared by franchise that she continues to tell those stories.”
newbie Zegler, who also started her journey
with Lucy by shooting the games. “Rachel’s The Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds
first day on set, I remember she flew in from And Snakes is in cinemas from 17 November.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 63

 SCOTT PILGRIM TAKES OFF

RIM
P ILG
TT
SCO ETURNS M.
R U K N OW HI
S YO IN D
NOT A S BEH
– BUT OW RUNNER
H A N IM E
THE S LIX’S NEW X ES,
N ET F A L K EV I L E N D
ST S, A
SER IE W OR R IE A ST
O M
FA ND A LL-STA R C
T H EI R CK SH
EPHER
D
S: JA
WORD

64 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

SCOTT PILGRIM TAKES OFF

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 65

V

SCOTT PILGRIM TAKES OFF

SCOTT PILGRIM TAKES OFF STARTS

inside a dream. The eponymous dorky
23-year-old’s sleep has been intruded by a
mysterious woman with colourful hair skating
through subspace. He wakes up next to his
cooler roommate Wallace Wells, who wants
Scott to move out or find a job. Scott instead
goes to band practice, where his girlfriend,
Knives Chau, watches him play bass in awe.
Later, at a party, he meets Ramona Flowers,
the skater girl from his dreams, and the next
day orders DVDs from Netflix because
Ramona’s a delivery person for them. The two
go on a date, sparks fly, and Ramona goes to
watch Scott’s band Sex Bob-Omb play a
concert; the whole thing’s ruined when one of
Ramona’s seven evil ex-boyfriends, Matthew
Patel, crashes the gig.
So far, as expected. The first episode of
Netflix’s new anime adaptation of Bryan Lee
O’Malley’s graphic novels sticks faithfully to
the source material (apart from the added
inclusion of Netflix DVDs). But then,
something happens at the end of the series’
opener – something
that no one familiar The
with the novels or enigmatically
Edgar Wright’s cult named Sex
classic film or the Bob-Omb.
videogames will
expect.
While SFX has been
barred from going into
specifics about what
this climactic,
surprising moment
entails, we can say Mary Elizabeth
that this single event Winstead
upends the series in a voices
shocking, viscerally Ramona.
exciting way. This
isn’t Scott Pilgrim’s
Precious Little Life
any more.
For co-showrunner BenDavid Grabinski, Indeed, the opening episode is something
who previously wrote episodes of the Are You of a Trojan horse, luring in long-time fans and
Afraid Of The Dark? revival and directed then completely upending things. It’s a
Happily, remixing the core Scott Pilgrim story startling creative choice, compounded by the
was “99% of the appeal” of working on the fact that Scott Pilgrim’s creator, O’Malley,
project. “Having people not know that we were serves as the other showrunner. In essence, the
It was all
doing something mostly new, and then just author is deconstructing and rebuilding his
going so well
really embracing that while trying to stay own story – and if it hadn’t been for this
for Scott, and
within the same voice and tone of the other approach, it’s unlikely another Scott Pilgrim
then…
Scott stuff, that was the whole fun,” he says. adventure would have ever taken off.

66 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 SCOTT PILGRIM TAKES OFF

The Japanese studio Science Saru –

best known for its distinctive method
of meshing hand-drawn and digital
animation styles – animated the
series. “We tried to stay out of what
they were doing because everything
they were doing was brilliant,” says
Scott’s got Grabinski. “We didn’t have to guide
a thing for them towards anything. In terms of
Ramona the aesthetic, it was just a bullseye
Flowers. from day one.
“For instance, Gideon [leader of
the League of Ramona’s Evil Exes],
“One day, late 2018, early 2019, Netflix There are two scenes Grabinski pitched that his lair in the first episode is not
approached me saying, ‘Would you like to proved to be core linchpins for the series – one something from the books or the
movie. We wrote two sentences on a
revisit Scott Pilgrim in anime form?’ They said of which is the end of the opening episode,
page of what we thought it was.
the amazing animation studio Science Saru while the other comes in episode four (again, I remember sitting in a conference
might be interested,” O’Malley tells SFX. no spoilers here). room when some of the team were
“I was like, ‘Hell no!’” To really make the moments work, though, visiting from Japan. They presented
O’Malley had no interest in retreading the the medium in which the story was being told their designs for Gideon’s lair, and I
story, which he first wrote 19 years ago, for the had to be right, and anime seemed the best way immediately knew that our job was
not to tell them what’s cool. Ever! It’s
umpteenth time. A few months later, however, of reintroducing the Scott Pilgrim universe to so much better to get out of their
that all changed. He was out eating with the world. After originally being suggested by way. There’s such a cinematic look
Grabinski – the two being friends and fans of Netflix, Science Saru – the Japanese studio to it.”
each other’s work – when O’Malley mentioned best known in the West for animating episodes “They’re the best in the world,”
that someone had once again brought up the of Adventure Time and Star Wars: Visions O’Malley adds. “Their character
designer and the animation director,
idea of making a Scott Pilgrim anime. That got – quickly came aboard.
these Japanese guys who have been
Grabinski thinking, and he quickly started “I had done my best work on the book, and doing this for a long time, I can’t
reeling off ideas that had O’Malley rolling we did our best on the film and the videogame, overstate how respectful they were of
around the restaurant in hysterics. and they’re all unique, and they all tell the story my work without me ever asking
“Almost everything I mentioned over that in their own way, and we wanted to be able to them to be.
dinner is in the show,” Grabinski says. “There do that with the anime,” O’Malley says. “They were tearing apart the
books, different versions of the
are a lot of twists and turns, and most of them “With all the years of hindsight that we have books, they were going through my
came together extremely quickly, just in that and the culture that has accrued around Scott Instagram, finding my more recent
conversation. That was not a meeting with the Pilgrim, which didn’t exist back then, we found art and analysing how I draw.
goal of doing a show, but Bryan went back to ways to make the series silly and fun and meta “It was very humbling because
Netflix and said, ‘Hey, I know what the show without being too meta and without breaking they’re way more talented than I’ll
ever be. Given that the scripts get
wants to be, and I know who I want to do it Scott Pilgrim. We wanted to see how far we
pretty wild, they still were very
with.’ And now, years later, we have a show.” could stretch it.” faithful to the books in a way that
“That dinner will become legend among Stretch the Scott Pilgrim story the I think will make the fans super-
certain fans,” O’Malley adds with a smile. showrunners certainly do. There are self- excited.”
 SCOTT PILGRIM TAKES OFF

Scott takes
on Matthew
Patel (Satya
Bhabha).

referential moments aplenty, including wanted to use that cast to the fullest. It was
knowing nods for those people who grew up BenDavid’s brainwave to find a new way that
loving Scott and Ramona, yet the series shines we could combine characters in completely
most brightly when going in deep – deeper different ways that we’ve never seen before,
than any other version of the story – on its side and that was so fruitful and so much fun.”
characters. Wallace Wells, Knives Chau and “I love the movie and I’ve seen the movie a
Ramona’s seven evil exes all get extended billion times,” adds Grabinski. “But if you’re
screen time. Better yet, they’re all voiced by the going to tell this story in one movie, it’s going
actors who previously portrayed them in the to end up being mostly from Scott’s
With the series going off-piste from zippy 2010 film adaptation (Wright also serves perspective. The thing I was most excited
the worn Scott slopes, there’s a
question of whether this new version
as an executive producer on the series). about with this series was treating it as an
of the story will continue into a ensemble, or finding ways to spend more time
second season. “We have not F RI ENDS REU NITED with characters in ways you don’t expect. We
thought about anything past this,” Looking back, the film’s cast is a Who’s Who of had opportunities to really look at the story
Grabinski says. “This season is a story actors who would come to dominate pop and the journey that we’re putting everybody
that has an end. But I love this world,
culture – Michael Cera, Mary on from different perspectives.”
the cast and the characters. If Bryan
and I sat down one day and started Elizabeth Winstead, Kieran You would think that
brainstorming and thinking of other Culkin, Anna Kendrick, Brie convincing the A-listers to take
stories to tell, and the cast wanted to Larson, Aubrey Plaza, Chris part would be a difficult task –
do it, then great, but I put 10,000% of Evans, Jason Schwartzman – and after all, not many casting agents
my brain into this season and I think having them return for the series have Captain America (Evans),
it has a great ending.”
O’Malley, the man behind the
(alongside a handful of Captain Marvel (Larson) and Star Trek:
entire Scott Pilgrim universe, concurs. well-known guest voice actors) Picard’s Borg Queen (Alison Pill) on
“I didn’t want this to end in the gave O’Malley the confidence to speed-dial. Not only that, but
middle – I hate it when that happens play with the lore even more. Grabinski and O’Malley made it
in a show or a movie. We wrote “We knew what having the even harder on themselves by
something that comes to a full stop.
cast back would mean for the deciding that they needed everyone
I really look at it like a beautiful piece
of jewellery that we all got to work audience that grew up with back, or no one at all: “It didn’t
on together, and we’re just trying to them,” he says. “It refocused make sense to mix and match,”
make it great.” our priorities. We really Grabinski says.
 SCOTT PILGRIM TAKES OFF

“Oh no,
boys, please
don’t fight
over me…”

“There were some

characters that would
have been really hard to
recast, and that one, there’s such a
specific voice that he brought to
the role,” says Grabinski. “I had
so much fun writing him. I truly
can’t imagine anyone else doing
that part except for him. He just
has such a great take on the
character. And he was so
prepared. He knew everything,
like it was down to a science.
Knives Chau, The guy can do two takes of a
Julie Powers line that are perfect, just
immediately. It was really
and Ramona exciting to have someone come
have a goss. to a character that much later
and to have a bunch of stuff
that’s new, not from the movie.
expectations. “It felt like a passion project
We didn’t know if the across the board,” Grabinski says. O’Malley
It felt like we had a time
machine from that movie set
cast would say yes, and concurs: “I feel like they’ve lived with those
characters for so long, even if they hadn’t
to the recording booth.”

then they did. And that’s thought of them or been in that headspace. It
it. It was just insane was really fun to bring them back to life that
way.”
O’Malley knows very well how much pressure
comes from having a rabid fanbase – but doing
As well as the returning cast, the series another retelling of the same story was simply
Luckily, none of the actors batted an eyelid borrows from Scott Pilgrim’s past in other not an option for him.
when the offer came – and, unfortunately for ways, too. Anamanaguchi – the chiptune band “I knew when we started that I could not put
SFX, hoping for a fun story about O’Malley who soundtracked the videogame – created myself through years of trying to perfect my
chasing a post-Succession fame Culkin around new music for the series. In fact, the whole old work, and I knew I had to do something
Hollywood with a job offer, there were zero thing feels like an amalgamation of everything that resonated with me now, all these years
difficulties getting everyone to sign on. “I wish that came before. later, with all these different experiences.
there was a big adventure to gathering the “We’re building on top of the work “Hopefully no one will burn my house down!
cast,” Grabinski says. “The story is everybody else did, [but] my goal was But, ultimately I just had to do it my own way. I
very simple: we didn’t know if that the series had to be emotional,” hope that the fans love it, because I wrote it for
everyone would say yes, and says Grabinski. “It’s super-funny them. Like, I fucking love them, and I want
then they did. And that’s it. It and exciting, but if it didn’t have them to be happy.”
was just insane.” emotions, and if there wasn’t some Grabinski counts himself among the fandom.
When the actors stepped into joy and sadness, and if you didn’t “There’s not a single thing in our show that
the vocal booth, something akin to kind of go on a journey with these doesn’t come from a place of love for the world,
magic happened. The characters, then it would just be the characters, the tone and everything about
showrunners say that each flippant, and I don’t think either of us it. It does a lot of stuff people aren’t expecting,
individual took the task very wanted to do that.” and maybe not what they think they want from
seriously when they needed to, and Of course, with the series’ story the show, but my hope and expectation is that
less seriously when they didn’t. In being such a drastic change from people will watch it and be stoked.”
other words, they understood the the beloved source material, there
assignment and delivered is a chance some fans may be Scott Pilgrim Takes Off is on Netflix from
performances far beyond annoyed or disappointed. 17 November.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 69

 DESIGNING GOOD OMENS

OOD OMENS HAD A CHANGE

of location for its second season,
but hopefully you didn’t notice.
Because Whickber Street in Soho
upped sticks from an airfield in
Hertfordshire to a furniture warehouse in
Bathgate, Edinburgh. It’s the kind of
nonsensical geographical shenanigans that
could only make sense in the crazy world of
film and TV, and production designer Michael PRODUCTION
Ralph was the man in charge of rebuilding and DESIGNER MICHAEL
expanding the show’s vast central set.
“I wish we could have built more in season RALPH REVEALS
one than we did,” says Ralph, whose previous HOW THE SHOW’S
work has included Primeval and Dickensian. CENTREPIECE SET,
“We built the ground floor of everything and
the facades of all the shops. But we didn’t build WHICKBER STREET,
anything higher than that, because we were WAS GIVEN A
out on an airfield in a very, very difficult terrain DEVILISHLY CLEVER
and weather conditions, so we really couldn’t
go much higher. Visual effects created the UPGRADE FOR THE
upper levels.” SECOND SEASON
But with season two the set has gone to a
whole other level… literally. “What happened WORDS: DAVE GOLDER
was that the rest of the street became
integrated into the series’s storyline,” explains
Ralph. “So we needed a record shop, we
needed a coffee shop that actually had an
inside, we needed a magic shop, we needed
the pub. To introduce those meant we had to
change the street with a layout that works
from a storylines point of view. In other words,
things like someone standing at the counter in

Huge lighting
rigs just above
the camera’s
view.

The coffee
shop now has
an interior
space.

70 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 DESIGNING GOOD OMENS

Invisible Columns And Thin Walls

“The new studio is Pyramid Studios in Bathgate – it used
to be a furniture warehouse. And unfortunately – or
fortunately, because I accept these things as not challenges
but gifts – right down the middle of that studio are a series
of upright columns. But you’ll never spot them on screen. I
had to build them in and integrate them into the walls and
still get the streets between them. And it worked.
“There’s all sorts of cheeky design values to those sets.
Normally a set like this is double-skin. In other words, you
do an interior wall and an exterior wall, with an airspace in
between. But really, the only time a viewer notices that
there’s that width is at the doors and the windows. So I
cheated all that. I ended up with single walls everywhere.
So the exterior wall is the interior wall, just painted. All I did
was make the sash windows and entrances wider to give it
some depth as you walked in.”

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 71

 DESIGNING GOOD OMENS

the record shop had to be able to eyeball

somebody standing at the counter in the coffee
shop. They had to be able to eyeball Aziraphale
sitting in his office in the window of the
bookshop. But the rest of it was a pleasure to
do inside, because we could expand it and I
could go up two storeys.”
For most of the set, which is around 80
metres long and 60 metres wide, the two
storeys only applied to the shop frontages, but
in the case of Aziraphale’s bookshop, it allowed
Ralph to build the mezzanine level for real this Populating The Bookshop
time. According to Ralph it became one of the “The props in the new bookshop set were a flawless
cast and crews’ favourite places to hang out reproduction from the set decorator Bronwyn Franklin
during down time. [who is also Ralph’s wife]. It was really the worst-case
But while AZ Fell & Co has grown in height, scenario after season one. She works off the concept art
it actually has a slightly smaller footprint that I produce, but what she does is she adds so much
more to the character of the set. She doesn’t buy
because of the logistics of adapting it to the anything she doesn’t love, or doesn’t fit the character.
new studio. “But the things she put a lot of work into finding for
“Everybody swore to me that no one would season one, they were pretty much one-offs. When we
notice,” says Ralph wryly. “I walked onto it and burnt the set down in the sixth episode, we lost a lot of
instinctively knew there was a difference props, many of which had been spotted and appreciated
by the fans. So Bronwyn had to discover a new set
immediately, and they hated me for that. I have
decorating technique: forensic buying.
this innate sense about spatial awareness and “She found it all – duplicates and replicas. It took ages.
an eye like a spirit level. In that respect, the Covid delay was very helpful for
“It’s not a lot, though – I think we’ve lost Bron. There’s 7,000 books in there and there’s not one
maybe two and a half feet on the front wall fake book. That’s mainly because… it’s a weird thing to
internally. I think that there’s a couple of other say, but we wanted it to smell and feel like a bookshop
to everybody that was in it, all the time.
smaller areas, but only I’d notice. So I can be “It affects everybody subliminally; it affects
really annoying to my guys, but only on those everybody’s performance – actors and crew – it raises
levels. Not on any other. They actually quite the bar 15 to 20%. And the detail, you know… We love
like me…” a lot of detail.”

Good Omens is on Prime Video.

We’re sure
Azi knows
exactly where
everything is.

Every note is
handwritten,
with relevant
content.

The sheer
amount of
detail is
staggering.

72 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 DESIGNING GOOD OMENS

Looking up to
the popular
mezzanine
area.

A specially
handwritten
sign for the
door or AZ Fell
& Co.
Production
designer
Michael Ralph
had to consider
which shops
could be seen
from inside
other shops – as
specified in the
script – when
redesigning the
Whickber Street
set.

Aziraphale’s
Inspirational
Correspondence
“There’s not one single scrap of
paper on Aziraphale’s desk that
isn’t written specifically for
Aziraphale. Every single piece is
not just fodder that’s been shoved
there, it has a purpose; it’s a letter
of thanks, or an enquiry about a
book or something.
“Michael Sheen is so submerged
in his character he would get lost
sitting at his own desk, reading his
A Terry
own correspondence between Pratchett-
takes. I believe wholeheartedly style hat
that if you put that much care into (with a badge
every single piece of detail, on bearing the
that desk and in that room, that catchphrase
everybody feels it, including the
crew, and then they give that set of Discworld’s
the same respect it deserves. Unseen
“They also lift their game University’s
because they believe that they’re Librarian)
doing something of so much care hangs on a
and value. Really, it’s a domino
effect of passion and care for what
hatstand in AZ
you’re producing.” Fell & Co.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 73

 DESIGNING GOOD OMENS

Every single
record and
poster is
fictitious.

Alternative Music
“My daughter Mickey is lead graphic
designer [two of Ralph’s sons worked
on the series too, one as a concept
artist, the other in props]. They’re
the ones that produced all of that
handwritten work on the desk. She’s
the one that took on the record shop
and made up 80 band names so that
we didn’t have to get copyright
clearance from real bands. Then she
produced records and sleeves that
spanned 50, 60 years of their
recordings, and all of the graphics
on the walls.
“I remember Michael and Neil
[Gaiman] getting lost following one
band’s history on the wall, looking at
their posters and albums desperately
trying to find out whether they
survived that emo period.”

Ah, the 12-inch

– that’s worth
a fortune now,
you know.

The Dirty
Donkey pub
was a new
addition to
Whickber
Street for
season two.

You can
toast Terry
Pratchett’s Anyone fancy
portrait in the a pint or two
Dirty Donkey after a day of
pub. filming?

74 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 DESIGNING GOOD OMENS

The Anansi Boys

Connection
Ralph reveals that Good Omens season
two used the state-of-the-art special
effects tech Volume (famous for its use
in The Mandalorian to create virtual
backdrops) for just one sequence, but
he will be using it extensively elsewhere
on another Gaiman TV series being
made for Prime Video.
“We used Volume on the opening
sequence to create the creation of the
universe. I was designing Anansi Boys in
duality with this project, which seems an
outrageously suicidal thing to do. But it
was fantastic and Anansi Boys was all
Get yourself a on Volume. So I designed for Volume on
one show and not Volume on the other.
(real) classic The complexities and the psychology of
film poster in both is different.”
the shop.

Wonder if any The magic of

of these will Volume, used
somehow go in the opening
“missing”? sequence.

So much cool
stuff in the It’s A Kind Of Magic
new Magic One of the new shops in Whickber
Shop. Street for season two was Will
Goldstone’s Magic Shop, which is full of
as many Easter eggs as off-the-shelf
conjuring tricks, including a Matt Smith
Doctor Who-style fez and a toy
orang-utan that’s a nod to Discworld’s
The Librarian. Ralph says that while the
series is full of references to Gaiman,
Pratchett and Doctor Who, Michael
Sheen never complained about a lack of
Masters Of Sex in-jokes. “He’d be the
last person to make that sort of
comment!”
Ralph also reveals that the magic
shop counter was another one of his
wife’s purchases, bought at a Glasgow
reclamation yard.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 77

 Close
Encounters
FACE TO FACE WITH THE
BIGGEST STARS

ANJLI MOHINDRA
The star of The Lazarus Project loves escape
rooms – but can she escape a time loop?
Words by Ian Berriman /// Portrait by Simon Ridgway

he’s appeared in more grounded dramas This series you’ve got resets to the checkpoint, but also BIODATA
such as Bodyguard and Vigil, and in the near true time travel on top of that. It must be confusing. From
future we can expect to see her making her Just as you thought you understood the rules of the Born in London;
breakthrough as a television writer – The game, someone’s got the cheat level out. A lot of us cast are raised in West
Bridgford,
Goddaughter, a drama about Sikh suffragette quite cerebral – we all enjoy thinking outside of the box. It Nottinghamshire.
Sophia Duleep Singh, is in the works. But it’s isn’t a script where you can read it and be like, “Right, I
Anjli Mohindra’s sci-fi roles that SFX readers know what I’m doing.” You have to wrap your head round it. Greatest Hits
hold most dear. For some, she’ll always be Sarah Jane It feels like a good mind workout – and a bit of a mindfuck! Rani Chandra in
The Sarah Jane
Smith’s “schoolgirl investigator” neighbour Rani. Adventures,
This month she returns to our screens as Archie, the You returned to the role of Rani recently for audios of shapeshifting
kick-ass, banter-spitting ex-MI5 agent in The Lazarus The Sarah Jane Adventures – how was that? punk rock singer
Charlie in
Project. We caught up with her on set to talk time So much fun, really rewarding. It was such a lovely trip Legends Of
travel, Elisabeth Sladen, and geeking out. down memory lane hanging out with Mina Anwar [Rani’s Tomorrow, the
mum] and Danny [Anthony, as Clyde]. We haven’t seen each queen of the
Skithra in Doctor
Series two involves proper time travel. Does that mean other as much as we’d hoped, but it was like we’d never left. Who episode
we’ll see Archie meet her younger self? “Nikola Tesla’s
I will encounter myself in different time periods, but in Working with Elisabeth Sladen on the TV show must Night Of Terror”,
a very strange way. When you go from series one to series have been a good foundation for a young actor. robotic assistant
Beatrice in The
two of any show, you get to inhabit it in a different way. I cut my teeth on that show. We were so lucky to get that Peripheral,
People know that Archie is very good at her job, and very opportunity to work with her. She really took us under her Archie in The
dedicated to it. Now we get to see what happens when she’s wing and had so much joy to share, and so many little Lazarus Project.
pushed to a certain place emotionally, or facing heartbreak. anecdotes and tips – like to keep your private life private. Random Fact
The time travel allows us to explore her seeing herself in a She was really adamant that we protect ourselves. She was When it comes to
different time, from a completely different perspective, and like, “That’s your stuff. No one gets access to that.” her writing, Anjli
Mohindra has the
seeing her process her loss in a deeper way. same agent as
You’ve had lots of sci-fi roles. Is it a genre you have Russell T Davies
So we see more vulnerability? Because Archie usually a special affinity with? and Sapphire &
seems pretty bullet-proof, psychologically speaking. It just keeps happening! I wouldn’t have said I was a big Steel creator PJ
Hammond.
100%, and that’s been fun to play: seeing who’s behind sci-fi person growing up. It doesn’t dominate my watch list.
that mask. George did the thing she wished she could do: But I’m thrilled, because I love it. I’m a bit of a nerd myself.
bring back a loved one. She’s had to live with the notion that
she couldn’t have made Wes call for a Code Black and go What do you geek out about?
back and rescue [dead boyfriend] Ross. Yet George does do I love maths, I love patterns. I like having to use my brain
that and gets Sarah back. There’s an unravelling behind the to crunch things. The cast all did an escape room – I booked
scenes – it wasn’t explored in the script, but her saying, “I it – and I had to have a word with myself to let other people
could have saved him. Maybe I didn’t love him enough.” have a go, because I will just dominate the space. I managed
to bite my fist and let people crack things, then jumped in
Sarah is brought into the fold as a Lazarus agent this and saved the day a couple of times. We were on the last
year. Does that provide a different perspective? challenge, and had four minutes to get out. And because I’m
Yeah, her presence makes us all question things. And an over-thinker, I made the last thing more complicated. I
SIMON RIDGWAY/SKY

Archie’s having to really face whether she believes the said, “But what about this?” and added a dimension that
Lazarus Project is for the greater good. This organisation didn’t need to be added. Luckily we managed to realise that
where she was like, “I believe in this – I wanted a job that I wasn’t right and escaped in the nick of time…
puts humanity at the heart of everything” – now seems
corrupt. So maybe she should have used it to get Ross back. The Lazarus Project is on Sky Max and NOW in November.

76 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 CLOSE ENCOUNTERS
ANJLI MOHINDRA

Elisabeth
Sladen really
took us under
her wing and
had so much joy
to share

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 77

 THE TOMORROW PEOPLE
FREMANTLE MEDIA/SHUTTERSTOCK

BELT UP! AS MARKS ITS 50TH

78 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 THE TOMORROW PEOPLE

ANNIVERSARY, WE REVISIT OLD JAUNTS WITH CREATOR ROGER PRICE WORDS: IAN BERRIMAN

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 79

 THE TOMORROW PEOPLE

OCTOR WHO 12-year-old boys’ heads stick out at the back!

may be marking Kids come up with the stupidest ideas
a significant sometimes…”
anniversary The road to a commission, however, began
this year, but when the adult Price, a jobbing director on
so is its magazine programmes and documentaries,
competition was working on Junior Points Of View, and
from the other dedicated an edition of the BBC show to
side, The children slating the network’s output. This did
Tomorrow not go down well with the head of the
People: its 50th. Children’s department, who later collared
Produced by Price at a function.
Thames Television, “She and her acolytes – her yes ladies –
this teatime kids’ show saw confused teens pinned me into a corner and were having a
discovering new abilities, including telepathy good go at me. Finally I said, ‘Your programmes
and the ability to teleport, or “jaunt”. are patronising, and seem to be irrelevant to
Considered the next stage of human evolution, children. They’re not concerned with the
they were referred to as Homo superior. things children are concerned about, which is
Over the course of eight series and 22 teachers and parents hitting them and things
stories, these young heroes (aided by biotronic like that. She said, ‘Well, if you think you can do
computer TIM) took on the likes of shape- any better…’ I said ‘Fine, give me a time slot and
shifting robot Jedikiah, evil god a budget and I will!’. She just
Sogguth, ameboid aliens went “Huh!” and walked off.”
disguised as jumpsuits and your Left behind as his
actual Adolf Hitler from their interlocutor stormed off was a
secret base the Lab – all Roger Price didn’t man “looking like Smiley from
without striking a blow in coin the term Homo the John le Carré books – a bit
superior. It appears in
anger, thanks to their code Olaf Stapledon’s 1935 shabby and nondescript”, who’d
of non-violence. novel Odd John, and been eavesdropping. “Did you Trapped on
was also used by mean that?” this well-spoken an alien ship
Magneto to describe in “Into The
EVOLV ING THE IDEA mutants in The X-Men figure asked. “I said ‘Yes.’ ‘Well,
The man responsible for the issue one (1963), let me introduce myself: Lewis Unknown”.
madness was producer/writer Similarly, the term Rudd, head of Children’s for
“jaunting” was Nicholas
Roger Price. As he tells SFX in previously used for Thames Television. Could we
a Zoom call from his home in teleportation in Alfred do lunch?” Young and
Canada, the seeds of the idea Bester’s 1956 novel The Mike Holoway
Stars My Destination suit up.
were sown around 1952, when (aka Tiger! Tiger!). T HE DE EP EN D
Price (whose father was Future stars who At the resulting meeting, Price
working for Farouk I, the received early screen drew on the idea he’d first
credits in guest roles
recently deposed king of Egypt) included Nicholas conceived of as a boy. “He said,
was attending a German- Lyndhurst, Keith ‘What we need is an answer to
language boarding school Chegwin, Peter Doctor Who.’ I said, ‘Well,
Duncan and (most
in Switzerland. embarrassingly…) Doctor Who is an old man,
“I would have died for them, Peter Davison. so what about kids with
Series four
and they probably would have introduced Mike,
superpowers, who are the next
for me,” he says of his drummer for Flintlock, stage of human evolution? And
schoolfriends. “They were a real-life pop band he said, ‘Yes, I like that. Can
who later appeared on
Germans and I was British. The the show. The group
you do me a pitch document?’
war had been over for seven, cracked the top 40 just So I did.”
eight years. Before that, our once: “Dawn” (written Price recalls phoning up for series! When I got back from my holiday I went
by actor Mike Holoway)
fathers had been trying to kill peaked at number 30 an update while on holiday in to see my boss and he said, ‘Have you ever
each other. I thought there was in June 1976. Scotland, and finding Rudd had written a drama series before?’ I said, ‘No!’’
an insanity back then which Elizabeth was mostly moved on, leaving the concept Talk about a baptism of fire… Wisely in the
absent during season
these kids were nothing to six, with it explained to be pitched by a new head of circumstances, Price was paired with an old
do with. that she’s working on Children’s whom he’d had no hand: Brian Finch, a regular writer for
“I thought we may be the diplomatic missions for dealings with. “I was put Coronation Street. “Everybody seemed to be on
FREMANTLE MEDIA/SHUTTERSTOCK

the Galactic Federation.

next stage of human evolution In reality, actor through to Sue Turner and she my side and pushing. We wrote the 13 episodes,
– a superior kind of human Elizabeth Adare said, ‘Well, we tried to persuade I went to Thames and we started making them,
being to these bumbling, stupid was pregnant. ITV to put up the money for a and it became a big hit.”
In the 2013 American
adults. My proof for that was revival of The pilot, but they didn’t want to do Besides Price and Finch, only one other
the fact that the adults’ heads Tomorrow People, the that. So I tried to get a six-part writer got a look in; Jon Watkins (later to
didn’t stick out at the back, and father of main series, and they didn’t want to create sitcom No Place Like Home) contributed
protagonist Stephen
ours did – that’s where our Jameson is named go for that either… They want series four’s “Into The Unknown”. Was that
extra bit of brain was. But all Roger Price. to go straight for a 13-part because it was difficult to find people on the

80 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 THE TOMORROW PEOPLE

The series nearly went

international
The Tomorrow People was infamous for
production values charitably described
as, ahem, economical, but that nearly
wasn’t the case: at one point, the Head of
Children’s from American broadcaster
ABC met with Price and discussed
making the series as a co-production.
“They wanted to come in on the deal
and basically pour tons of money into it,”
Price explains. “Instead of having one
fifth of the budget of Doctor Who we’d
have had about five times the budget of
Doctor Who!
“Tail up, I went straight to Thames
management with this news, from a lunch
in London, and the response was chilly. It
was [posh voice], ‘We don’t want some
damn Yank standing around telling us to
say sidewalk instead of pavement.’’ I
couldn’t understand it – we would have
had five times the budget.
“It’s a pity, because it might have been
great. Or it might have been awful,
because I’ve learned since that some
Americans interfere a lot!”

right wavelength? “Well, Thames said that, but

I suspect it was because they got [the scripts]
for nearly free, because I was on staff,” Price
laughs. ”There was one other writer, and it
didn’t do well. Whereas I seemed to be able to
write the most outrageous rubbish and it still
got ratings!”
Price remains proud of the messages the
series imparted to young viewers. He holds up
a mug he was sent by a Tomorrow People fan,
with a dozen sentences under the heading “I
Alien learned everything about life by watching The
“cuckoos” in Tomorrow People”. He reads them out. They
“The Blue And include: “Violence is never the only solution”,
The Green”. “Power should always be used for good”,
“Authority does not imply intelligence” and
A young The “Open your mind.”
Keith Chegwin Ambassador Principal among these messages was
appeared in in “War Of The pacifism, with the Tomorrow People always
1975. Empires”. seeking other ways to resolve conflict. Price
admits adhering to this sometimes created
storytelling challenges, but is scornful of how
the writers of the 2013 US revival “could not or
did not want to manage it”. He then sets out
the philosophy behind his continuing distaste
for on-screen violence.
“There already was then a tendency to
portray violence as a way – sometimes seeming
to young minds the only way – to solve a
problem, and it is far worse now. This can have
two effects on the subconscious. One is to use

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 81

 THE TOMORROW PEOPLE

Gypsy lad Tyso

Boswell (Dean
violence. But more common in the case of the Lawrence).
vast majority of people, who know they are not Cheeky!
capable of serious violence, is to diminish their
self-confidence and self-concept.
“Almost every kid knows he cannot use
violence against an adult, so the vast majority
learn to hide their feelings,” he argues. “This
seems to be leaving the field clear for those
What links The Tomorrow people who are either the most well-muscled
People and Crash? or shrill. I don’t think there is any more
violence now than there was a century ago, but
Just as ’60s Doctor Who tapped the seeing so much of it in entertainment is, I
expertise of Dr Kit Pedler, The Tomorrow think, reducing people’s confidence to even
People picked the brains of computer Lives are at
speak up and say what is right.”
scientist Dr Christopher Evans. Listed as stake in
“Scientific Adviser” in the end credits, Not that Price wanted to preach to his
Evans worked conveniently close to audience, aware that if you lecture kids they’re “Worlds
Thames Television’s Teddington Studios. likely to switch off – figuratively and literally. Away”.
“He had a fair bit of input,” says Price. While his aim was “trying to improve the
“He picked me up on any science self-concept of the viewer”, he wanted to do so Peter Davison
mistakes I might make. He was working leaves
on trying to get computers to talk in
subliminally. “You never say ‘This is what
we’re doing’ or they go ‘I’m not being got at!’ little to the
[governmental laboratory] the National
Physical Laboratory, which is literally a Whereas most kids’ shows will come straight imagination.
few hundred metres away from Thames out [Watch With Mother voice]: ‘This is good
Television. But we met at Granada. for you! Pay attention, we’re going to teach you
“He’d published a book called Mind In
how to tell the time.’
Chains, and was being interviewed about
it,” Price says, recalling how the two met.
Evans’s 1970 anthology collected stories
by the likes of Brian Aldiss, Theodore
TV can, through
Sturgeon and John Sladek. comedy and drama,
“The interviewer hadn’t read it,
so I was feeding questions to him. Chris make kids feel better
Evans said, ‘Why aren’t you doing the
interview?’ I said, ‘Because I’m the about themselves
director – I have to be in the control
room.’ So we became friends, because “Teachers are probably the best people
I was about the only TV person he came to teach kids – they’ve got a face-to-face
across who’d actually read the damn
relationship with them. Parents are the best
thing! He never succeeded in getting
computers to understand human people to raise kids. But if they’re not doing a
speech,” Price adds, “but he was 40 good job, and screwing up the child, you need
years ahead of his time in doing that.” to point that out to the child indirectly and say,
An interesting figure, Evans (who died ‘It’s not your fault. It’s their fault.’”
in 1979) was also a close friend of JG “In my opinion,” he continues, “what
Ballard – and an influence on the SF
writer. In his autobiography, Ballard
matters if you’re in the business of making
paints a striking picture of a “hoodlum children’s programmes is to make the children
scientist” with a “Byronic air”. who have watched the show feel better about
Circa 1968, the two collaborated on an themselves at the end of it. Not necessarily Michael “Mr
idea for a play featuring a reconstruction have learned to behave or learned to eat. A lot Bronson”
of a car crash. It was never mounted, but of children’s TV is exactly that: ‘Eat your Sheard played
Ballard’s 1973 novel Crash explored Adolf Hitler.
vegetables’ stuff. That’s not the concern of TV.
LEE PEARCE/FAIRFAX MEDIA/GETTY, FREMANTLE MEDIA/SHUTTERSTOCK

similar themes, and the author modelled

the appearance of its protagonist Teachers teach, parents raise and mould, and
Vaughan on his old pal. TV can, through comedy and drama, make kids But I was certainly the only person using black
feel better about themselves.” kids in a kids’ show.”
The Price is also justifiably proud of how Asked which story he’s most proud of, Price
inspirational multi-ethnic his young cast was, with the plumps for 1977’s “The Dirtiest Business”, an
Dr Christopher Tomorrow People’s ranks including gypsy boy unusually hard-hitting two-parter centred on a
Evans in 1971. Tyso, Japanese girl Hsui Tai and two black Russian Tomorrow Person, who ends up dying
characters. “It was the first TV show in the when the KGB detonate an explosive device
world to have a black superhero [Stephen implanted in her brain.
Salmon’s Kenny]. It was the second TV show “It was about the world of espionage and the
in the world, after Star Trek, to have a black evil that can be done by people in that world. It
heroine [Elizabeth Adare’s Elizabeth]. was probably the first show for kids which
“Going back all that time, you did not see showed a kid being deliberately killed, and how
black people on British TV. A little while later, far those who serve a ruling hegemony will go.”
the black newscaster Trevor McDonald Price is surprised Thames let him film the
became an iconic person in British television. scene. “I had many doubts, but felt it was

82 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 THE TOMORROW PEOPLE

Quick! Pre-order the new novel!

The 50th anniversary year has already seen the publication of a collection of
strips from kids’ comic Look-In, and there’s plenty more for fans to look
forward to.
In the spring, publishers Chinbeard Books and Oak Tree will launch a range
of monthly novellas, variously written by Gary Russell, Nigel Fairs, Rebecca
Levene & David Derbyshire, Joseph Lidster and Iain McLaughlin. Before that,
4 December sees the release of a new novel, The Tomorrow People: Changes.
It’s centred on Gabriel, a teen pop sensation who’s won legions of fans over
the last decade, but grown weary thanks to a
weight upon his shoulders: according to the blurb,
Gabriel, who was rescued from the ruins of a city
devastated by alien invaders, was responsible for
unleashing “terrible consequences” upon
humanity due to a “moment’s hesitation”.
The book is based on a detailed treatment
written by Price for a potential reboot series,
requested by Netflix several years ago – which
would have tied in with previous iterations of the
concept. “It’s set in the ’60s,” Price explains, “and
in the present day, and two or three alternative
timelines. It’s the origin story of the Tomorrow
People at the same time as being set in the here

COVER ART BY ROBERT HAMMOND

and now. So it’s a little complicated, but it’s kind
of fun.”
Andy Davidson, author of Tomorrow People
“viewing guide” Jaunt, fleshed out Price’s
treatment into novel form, and the show’s creator
is impressed. “When he sent me the manuscript
Egyptian
my response was, ‘I’m humbled – I could never
shenanigans have written anything this good!’”
in “Revenge
Of Jedikiah”.

Vaughan-Clarke [Stephen], who was in on to me, if I casually mentioned developing

Manchester playing Peter Pan in the The Tomorrow People. Actually that makes
pantomime. He was at the theatre the more sense.”
following day and could take lunch with me. What is certain is that the two met, and had
“David Bowie needed to be comforted about a connection. “David Bowie gave me some
things that were upsetting him, so I took him valuable thoughts, because he was fascinated
along to the lunch, which was Peter’s audition. by it. His song may have been inspired by the
Then Peter had to leave, because they were idea, or my show may have been inspired by
doing matinee. David Bowie watched him go some of the things he and I talked about after
and said, ‘Oh, he’s a pretty thing.’ Obviously we Peter was gone.” Choose your own truth!
talked more about The Tomorrow People and The Tomorrow People has returned to our
Nicholas Homo superior.” screens twice: in the ’90s, Price acted as
Lyndhurst As the song was written in early 1971, Bowie executive producer on a three-season run
pre-Only Fools expert Nicholas Pegg has suggested this took starring starring former Neighbours star
And Horses. place after an 18 January 1971 recording for Kristian Schmid; in 2013, Robbie Amell
Granada’s nightly magazine show Six-O-One toplined a one-season revival for The CW.
important to be truthful and realistic about Newsday. However, lining up all the dates is Could it happen again?
life’s problems. Sometimes horrible and tricky. The series began filming in April 1973, Price is certainly keen. “It might come back.
terrible things happen. I feel it is important to so a 1972 audition would make Changes [see above] may well turn into a TV
acknowledge that for all younger viewers.” more sense. And while a Peter series, because we’re talking to other people as
At this point we simply must address the Pan panto did run in Manchester, well. I would love it to come back.
phrase “Homo superior”. David Bowie’s 1971 it began in late 1972. To have adults, years later, still
single “Oh! You Pretty Things” includes the Tomorrow People expert Andy affected by something you made
lyric “Gotta way make for the Homo superior”. Davidson instead plumps for for them when they were
Did Price hear it and think “I’m having that”? a 21 June 1972 edition of children is incredibly moving!”
Turns out they’d actually met. Lift Off With Ayesha.
“At Granada I was working as a director on Price mulls this over. We’re told to expect “more
various things, and one was a pop music show, “It’s very possible that surprises to come” for the
which David Bowie was on. I was setting up Bowie had already Tomorrow People brand... Follow
The Tomorrow People, and an agent suggested written the song and @AUK_Studios on Twitter for
that I should see her star little boy Peter that was why he latched updates, or go to aukstudios.uk.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 83

 Brought THE SFX AUTHOR
INTERVIEW
To Book

NAOMI ALDERMAN
Tomorrow’s world: the British author tells us about her new novel
Words by Jonathan Wright /// Portrait by Annabel Moeller

T WAS AN ARTICLE, SAYS NAOMI ALDERMAN, BIODATA Just how bad here can be, says Alderman, became clear to
that set her writing. Specifically an essay published in her as early as 2004, when she came across the proto-neo-
The New Yorker in 2017, in which reporter Evan Osnos From London Nazi website Stormfront. “I remember looking through this
detailed how some of America’s wealthiest people are Greatest Hits
site as a Jewish person going, ‘This is hilarious.’ And then
preppers, putting a percentage of their vast resources The Power (2017) inside something flipped and suddenly I went, ‘Oh,
into creating well-appointed bunkers and boltholes won the Women’s no, this is actually really quite deeply disturbing.’”
where they can, if the worst happens, ride out The End Prize for Fiction. So how do we get away from here? In part, The Future
Alderman’s other
Of The World As We Know It. novels are suggests, we need to start thinking about collectivism. It’s
“I think a bunker is a stupid fantasy,” she says. “It’s a Disobedience a mark of how much ground the book covers that it subtly
psychological, emotional fantasy that ‘I can make sure I’m (2006), The advances this argument in part by revisiting the biblical
Lessons (2010)
always fine whatever’. That’s not the kind of planet we live and The Liars’ story of Lot’s daughters as a way to talk about the lives of
on. Unfortunately, you can get really terrible news on a Gospel (2012). hunter-gatherers. “When you actually learn about what the
random Tuesday afternoon, but the thing that you were hunter-gatherer lifestyle was like, one of the things you have
Random Fact
always terrified of happening never happens. That, I’m The Future
to understand about humans is that we are always going to
afraid, is the type of universe we live in.” started out as be unhappy if we’re not part of a band,” Alderman says.
Not that this prevents the billionaires of Alderman’s new a novel about a
“protest novel”, The Future, from planning to escape the pandemic. When WATCH WORDS
Covid came
breakdown of civilisation. Irony underpins the novel. along, Alderman Education, the sector in which her parents worked, is a
Clearly modelled on today’s Silicon Valley chiefs, these decided “nobody recurring theme in Alderman’s life; Open University
are hyper-capitalists driven to win, even as their own wants to read courses are, she says, “One of my favourite things”. She
that now”, and
monopolistic practices destabilise the planet. rethought it. studied PPE at Oxford, where she was a contemporary of
Nevertheless, Alderman says she can understand the former PM Liz Truss. But her experience of Oxford was
instinct to hedge against what’s coming. “As a very anxious coloured by family trauma and surviving being groomed by
person, I feel that I’d like to be able to control everything,” a paedophile as a child – by scholar Sidney Greenbaum,
she says, “and a lot of that has gone into my characters.” who died in 1996. “It was brilliant that he died,” she bluntly
One of the most curious facets of the tech industry is that, says. “That was the nicest thing he ever did for me.”
over two decades after the dotcom boom, and in an era With the help of therapy, Alderman has not just survived
when we’re seeing the downsides of digital technologies on but flourished. As well as writing novels, she’s worked
a daily basis, so many within the sector talk in evangelical, extensively in the tech sector (she co-created the app
even utopian terms about what they do. This is a Star Trek Zombies, Run!). As part of a Rolex-sponsored programme,
vision of the future, where everything will inevitably turn Margaret Atwood mentored her during the writing of The
out alright in the end. “I’ve watched a lot of Star Trek, and I Power, recently adapted for Prime Video. Alderman conveys
really hope it is going to come out right,” says Alderman. a restless energy but, judging by the way she leans in when
she talks, has the knack of staying in the moment.
IN F O R M ATI O N TECHNOLOGY We finish by talking about one of Atwood’s abiding
To understand what we’re going through at the moment, themes: the environment, concern for which is also
she says, it helps to think about the printing revolution important to The Future. “We’re already living in a science
which followed Johannes Gutenberg’s invention, circa fictional world in that in the ’30s and ’40s, people were
1440, of the movable-type printing press. writing science fiction and imagining a sort of barren, sterile
“It was a huge information revolution,” she says. world, a world in which you could tell during your lifetime
“Subsequent to that, we had 350 years of bloody war over that the environment around you had changed,” she says.
the Reformation. In the end, it all settled down, but the “We’re in it now – we’re in the predicted bad future.”
truth is, when we come into contact with loads more Which may sound bleak, but then again – and here’s
information than we’ve ever seen before, and people’s perhaps the most important idea in The Future – what lies
weird opinions that we’ve never had to deal with before, it’s ahead has yet to be decided.
very disturbing. And when we feel disturbed, we then get
aggressive – and here we are.” The Future is published by 4th Estate on 7 November.

84 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 BROUGHT TO BOOK
NAOMI ALDERMAN

As a very
anxious person,
I feel that I’d
like to be able
to control
everything

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 85

 DEC
2023
edited by Ian Berriman

CINEMA 88 TV 92 HOME ENTERTAINMENT 96 BOOKS 102 COMICS 108 GAMES & STUFF 110

88

THE EXORCIST: THIS ISSUE

BELIEVER
Mean Girls two
64 REVIEWS

92
THE FALL OF
96
HELLRAISER:
102
THE FUTURE
THE HOUSE OF QUARTET OF Tech billionaires
USHER TORMENT prepare to ride out
Mike Flanagan’s Pinhead’s first four the end of the world
latest Netflix show outings get the UHD in Naomi Alderman’s
riffs on Poe. box set treatment. new novel.

RATINGS EXPLAINED SUPERB GOOD AVERAGE POOR TERRIBLE

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 87

 CINEMA

THE EXORCIST:
BELIEVER
If you go down to the woods...

Angela (Lidya Jewett) and

RELEASED OUT NOW! Katherine (Olivia O’Neill) going
15 | 111 minutes missing after wandering off into
Director David Gordon Green the woods one afternoon. Found
Cast Leslie Odom Jr, Lidya Jewett, several days later in a barn, they
Olivia O’Neill, Jennifer Nettles have no memory of the missing
time. It’s not long before they
While his two follow-ups had begin to show the familiar signs
their issues, David Gordon Green’s of demonic possession…
2018 take on Halloween got most The film has a frustratingly
things right, resulting in a low-key opening. Taking time to
satisfyingly gnarly slasher, establish a realistic milieu is all
well-grounded in character. well and good, but slow burn is
Which makes it all the more one thing, downright tedious is
surprising – and deeply another. And doubling the number
disappointing – that his revival of of victims doesn’t really bring any
another classic horror franchise is benefits. You can’t help feeling
so calamitously misjudged. that the motivation is simply to
In truth, William Friedkin’s create a “spare” who can be
1973 classic about the possession discarded if so required.
of young Regan should probably The film’s one big coup is the
never have spawned a “franchise” return of Ellen Burstyn in the role
in the first place, being a perfectly of Regan’s mother, Chris MacNeil
hermetic tale. Either you repeat – although she’s not particularly
the same old tricks (vomiting, well-served. Naturally, she’s not
shaking furniture, levitation) the only touchstone from the past,
with another girl, or you take a with Green ticking off vomit, the
divergent path – in which case, C-bomb, Mike Oldfield’s “Tubular “And I, I-I-I-
why not just make a different film? Bells” and a rotating head (one I-I, will always
Green’s big idea is – hold on to which finally answers the much– loooove
your hat – to double the number of asked question, “Wouldn’t you die you…”
girls, with 13-year-old friends if your head performed a 360?”).
What’s missing? Firstly,
a plausible explanation. The
Believer might
incident which seems to bring on even be the worst
the dual possession is simply the
kids mucking about with candles
entry in the
– hardly the sort of thing which Exorcist series
could open a gateway to another
realm. Secondly, to a significant of Dr Beehibe, a practitioner of the
degree: organised religion. African-American tradition of
It takes some nerve to make rootwork, may cause cynics to
an Exorcist film that isn’t firmly wonder whether there was a sense
centred on Catholicism, but that’s of embarrassment about centring
the route Green takes here. With the film on a religious tradition no
“I feel like the church authorities unwilling longer considered suitably
the answer is to get involved, the local priest’s “diverse”. Who wants to see
staring us in involvement is minimal. The another dusty old white guy
the face.” rather more significant presence splashing holy water about, right?

88 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 EASTER
EGGS
Four of the more
subtle references

Barking Mad
Early on, Victor
photographs a couple
of dogs fighting. This
echoes a moment from
the opening of the
original film, where
Father Merrin sees two
dogs fighting in the
desert close to the
statue of Pazuzu.

Author! Author!
Victor contacts
Chris MacNeil for help
because she wrote a
non-fiction book based
on her experiences. The
version of Chris in the
2016-2017 TV series
was also an author –
although of a cash-in
novel, The Devil In My
Daughter.

The Purple One

It could just be
coincidental, but the
scarf which formerly
The on-screen rationale comes The face-off which ensues is a It’s quite something to say, belonged to Angela’s
in the form of some vaguely messy and muddled spectacle. given the (thoroughly justified) late mother, Sorenne,
hippy-dippy platitudes about Of one thing we can be rock-bottom reputation of Exorcist is purple – the same
colour as the stole worn
“faith in each other”, but this absolutely certain: William Peter II: The Heretic, but Believer might by Father Merrin during
abjectly fails to convince – Blatty, writer of the original novel even be the worst entry in the the original film’s
particularly when it comes to and screenwriter of the 1973 film, series. At least John Boorman’s exorcism.
Katherine’s parents, who are would have been appalled. For 1977 sequel was about something,
Baptists, yet don’t so much as bat Blatty, the whole point of Regan’s even if his premise was misguided. Sofa, So Good
an eyelid at seeing their daughter possession was that it was an Believer, by contrast, is Though it’s
unrecognisable, the
tied to a chair while any old attempt to destroy the faith of the infuriatingly wishy-washy. We
couch in Chris MacNeil’s
passer-by reads out religious texts. attending priests. As Father were looking forward to another house is the same one
This includes, most laughably, Merrin speculates in The Version two instalments, but you leave the that was in her
the Fieldings’ nosey neighbour You’ve Never Seen, “The point is to cinema having lost faith in Green’s Georgetown home in
Ann (Ann Dowd), a one-time make us despair.” But Angela’s judgement. Ian Berriman the 1973 movie. After
the film wrapped, Ellen
novitiate whose introduction father, Victor (Leslie Odom Jr), Burstyn took it home
The film’s end credits identify the entity
comes when she complains about needs no such encouragement, responsible as Lamashtu, a female demon and had it reupholstered
taking in the bins. Oh, the gravitas. dismissing religion as myth. from Mesopotamian mythology. – she still owns it today!

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 89

 CINEMA

CAT PERSON
“What’s the
weather
like up –”
“DON’T.”
Littered with problems
in his pursuit of Emilia Jones’s
RELEASED OUT NOW! stupefyingly careless Margot. She
15 | 118 minutes meets him while working at the
Director Susanna Fogel concession stand in the cinema
Cast Emilia Jones, Nicholas Braun, and is intrigued by what one can
Geraldine Viswanathan, only assume is his height, since the
Isabella Rossellini towering Braun plays him in full
Norman Bates mode from the off.
Based on Kristen Roupenian’s The pair’s dates have the
viral-hit short story of 2017, which chemistry of a prostate
explored the uncomfortable and examination, which makes the
occasionally sinister romance plot machinations to bulk this
between a young woman and an short story into a nearly two-hour
older man, Cat Person takes a film entirely unconvincing. Fans of
sharp look at gender dynamics and the story, fans of the horror genre,
then literally sets it on fire. and fans of three-dimensional
As well as being a terrible film, female characters are all
this adaptation is a spectacularly underserved. Despite some stylish
squandered opportunity, with its visuals, Cat Person is about as
buzzy subject matter and a stellar clever and subtle as a Tinder
cast whose work has accrued profile written by a paralytic-
Oscars, Emmys and BAFTAs. It drunk mate. Leila Latif
puzzlingly dials up the horror
2019 horror Bodies, Bodies, Bodies
elements, making Nicholas Braun’s was based on a spec script by Kristen
Ben the embodiment of bad vibes Roupenian, who was credited for “story”.

TIME ADDICTS THE JESTER SUITABLE FLESH HOW TO SAVE

RELEASED OUT NOW! RELEASED OUT NOW! RELEASED OUT NOW! THE IMMORTAL
18 | 92 minutes 15 | 90 minutes 18 |99 minutes
RELEASED OUT NOW!
A pair of potty-mouthed This killer-clown feature As much about the evils of PG | 76 minutes
Melbourne drug addicts have a grew out of a popular series of medical malpractice as those of
high old time when they snort short films by director Colin unthinkable elder gods, this is a Drybones is an immortal
some crystal meth that sends Krawchuk. In it, a pair of sisters depressingly backward-looking seeking a wife. Barbara is a
them bouncing back and forth and their friends are stalked psychosexual cheapie. strongwoman who refuses to
into the recent past and the around a small town on After meeting a patient marry. A king wants her for
near future. Halloween by a murderous suffering from the delusion that himself, but accidentally pushes
Coming across like a orange-suited jester. his father wants his body, Dr the two together. Weirdly, a
swearier but less inventive Gorehounds may find Beth Derby decides she does talking loaf also gets involved.
episode of Misfits, this the film’s focus on creepy too… albeit in a different way. If This Russian animation rolls
micro-budget flick’s temporal atmospherics rather than kills the body horror doesn’t make out basic storytelling with
logic doesn’t bear close disappointing – it’s far tamer you cringe, the sex scenes will. occasional flashes of something
scrutiny, but it uses its limited than the likes of Terrifier 2 – The original HP Lovecraft interesting (like an Escher
locations well (most of it’s set in but the cast are solid, and source material is credited, but homage). Small kids may giggle
one house) to create a scuzzy Krawchuk’s script makes a Stuart Gordon’s adaptations are at the silly characters, but an
black comedy with a decent fist of attempting to the more obvious reference uneven dub – dull one minute,
surprisingly sweet ending. actually be about something. point. This won’t be as screeching the next – flattens
Dave Golder Will Salmon well- remembered. Sarah Dobbs the experience. Jayne Nelson

90 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

SAW X THERE’S
RELEASED OUT NOW! SOMETHING
18 | 118 minutes
Director Kevin Greutert IN THE BARN
Cast Tobin Bell, Shawnee Smith,
Synnøve Macody Lund, Renata Vaca RELEASED 1 DECEMBER
15 | 100 minutes
To borrow a bit from “Here, have
Director Magnus Martens
another iconic horror movie some of this.
Cast Martin Starr, Amrita Acharia,
villain, let’s play a game: name It’s good
Townes Bunner, Zoe Winther-Hansen
the killer in the Saw movies. stuff.”
Did you say Jigsaw, or John From Trollhunter to The

THE BYSTANDERS
Kramer? Well, you’re wrong. Ritual, the icy mythscapes of
According to him, he’s not a Scandinavian folklore have
killer: his traps always give his provided a rich seam of
victims the chance to escape. inspiration for modern horror.
There have always been some Here the legendary menace
moral gymnastics required to
accept his reasoning, and here,
Angelic Upstarts is a little more whimsical: a
barn elf, a gnome-like bugaboo
in the franchise’s tenth film, the Enter Luke (Andi Jashy), who sets himself against an
filmmakers are basically doing RELEASED 3 NOVEMBER a weed-smoking unemployed American family who’ve
triple backflips. 15 | 98 minutes gamer, prone to wiping his arse relocated to Norway – “the
Set somewhere between Saw Director Gabriel Foster Prior with a sock and guzzling ketchup happiest country on Earth” –
and Saw II, this mid-quel sees Cast Scott Haran, Seann Walsh, straight from the tube. It’s up to with plans to transform the
Kramer taking out his Andi Jashy, Georgia Mabel Clarke Peter to then turn Luke from zero murderous munchkin’s home
frustrations on the fake nurses to hero – a tall order given that into a boutique hotel.
and anaesthesiologists of a Cinema and television have he’s never worked a day in his life. The title promises some
fraudulent Mexican clinic that always loved guardian angels (see It won’t come as a surprise that enjoyably lurid, self-aware
claimed it could cure his It’s A Wonderful Life, Highway To Peter manages minor miracles, fun, but while this is clearly
(eventually fatal) cancer. Heaven and so on), but those that even somehow securing Luke a reaching for the breezy spirit of
Making him the protagonist look over us are given a hipster date with Sarah. Gremlins, it proves a muddled
is a bold choice: sure, Kramer spin in Gabriel Foster Prior’s blend of broad humour and
always claimed he helped
people, but the previous films
feature debut. It’s a dazzlingly
original SF romcom that
A dazzlingly axe-swinging scares. Presented
as crass tourists (“Ever seen a
never tried to make him the refashions your Clarences and original SF moose on a sign before?”), the
hero the way this one does.
Then again, almost two
Jonathan Smiths into Bystanders:
protectors plucked from the real
romcom family simply irritates, while
the elf himself is a cartoon-
decades after the first one, world (usually loners and losers, There’s a real inventiveness to shallow antagonist, his lore
coming up with an original who won’t be missed) who are the visuals here (the parallel barely explored.
direction for a new Saw film is a then given powers to change the dimension of the Bystanders is in Unveiled too soon, the
tough brief. At least it covers all destiny of their given subject. colour, while the real world is creature has nothing left to
the basics: plenty of traps, Newbie Bystander Peter’s rendered in black and white) show us, and not even an army
buckets of gore, a creepy inaugural project is Sarah, a which manages to camouflage the of brother elves staging a home
Charlie Clouser score, and fresh-in-London indie girl fact that the movie was made on a invasion in the final act can
Tobin Bell giving it his all. working for hip media label Smut tiny budget. Playing like an SF make the pint-sized threat feel
Simple enough to be Records. But with Peter eyeing up version of Rye Lane, The genuinely engaging.
accessible to new fans but a Bystander of the Year gong, he Bystanders has enough There’s one strikingly
familiar enough for the decides that this “middle class girl imagination to suggest that brilliant image, thrown away in
diehards, Saw X is neither the from Kent” isn’t all that much of a Gabriel Foster Prior is headed the opening scene: a baby’s
best nor the worst of the Saw challenge, and so swaps subjects for the big time. Steve O’Brien pram with a bear trap nestled
films, and right now, maybe with his Bystander buddy Frank inside. It’s the kind of blackly
The director had to sleep in stoner
that’s enough. (a surprisingly non-irritating character Luke’s bedroom for the shoot,
inventive humour this movie
Sarah Dobbs Seann Walsh). surrounded by Pot Noodles and bongs. needed more of. Nick Setchfield

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 91

 TV

DRINKING GAME
Knock back a beverage of
your choice every time…

Roderick reminds someone

that Lenore Usher is his
favourite.

Upwards of three people

engage in a sex act.

Carla Gugino gets a jazzy

new wig.

A character tells their

romantic partner that they
never loved them anyway.

Mark Hamill “fixes” one

of the Usher’s problems.

A character seems
unbothered by the gruesome
“I have some death of a family member.
very bad A raven stares ominously
news… the down the lens.
soup’s off.”

THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER

The ends of an era
name, reimagining its macabre what Roderick did to set these But even though this is
UK/US Netflix, streaming now look at family and insanity in a terrible wheels in motion. His Flanagan’s most violent series, it’s
Creator Mike Flanagan very modern context. The Ushers children – heir apparent also by far his most fun. Despite
Cast Bruce Greenwood, Mary are pharmaceutical billionaires Frederick, wellness entrepreneur the series working its way through
McDonnell, Henry Thomas, Rahul Kohli, who’ve made their fortune Tamerlane, heart surgeon the Usher clan (at the rate of
Mark Hamill, Kate Siegel peddling dangerous medications Victorine, gaming mogul Leo, around one per episode), the finale
to an unsuspecting public. PR head Camille and feckless still finds creative ways to further
EPISODES 1.01-1.08 Throughout his The family is headed by socialite Perry – are an utterly vile torture the despicable patriarch,
five horror shows for Netflix, Mike Roderick (a superb Bruce selection of humans, so there’s no proving a potent mix of all Poe’s
Flanagan has avoided producing Greenwood), who has six children shortage of reasons for people to eerie romance, compelling
straightforward adaptations, by five women – but as we’re want them dead. mystery and stunning cruelty.
instead using novels for thematic shown in the opening montage, But it becomes apparent With a move to Amazon
inspiration. The Haunting Of Hill they’ve all recently died in a series that something supernatural is imminent, it’s unclear if a change
House came first in 2018, a tribute of “freak accidents”, leaving happening, tied to a mysterious of platforms means an end to
to Shirley Jackson. That was Roderick and his twin sister woman called Verna (rearrange annual October delights from
followed up by love letters to Madeline (Mary McDonnell) as the letters for a spoiler!) and an Flanagan. Seeing him take on
Henry James, Stephen King and all that remains of the Ushers. incident that happened one New horror’s master of morbidity with
Christopher Pike. Now Flanagan In a crumbling mansion, Year’s Eve back in 1980. Even such panache makes that too scary
takes on the most iconic figure in Roderick recounts the whole tale knowing the fates of the Ushers, a thought to bear. Leila Latif
horror fiction: Edgar Allan Poe. to investigator C Auguste Dupin the programme still has the power
Bruce Greenwood replaced Frank Langella
His latest series takes its name (Carl Lumbly); we learn how each to surprise – Camille and Perry’s mid-production; he’s only 12 years older
from his 1839 story of the same Usher met their grisly end, and deaths are particularly gnarly. than Henry Thomas, who played his son.

92 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

THE BURNING GIRLS
There’s a lot at stake
young girls haunt the village,
UK Paramount Plus, streaming now apparently wanting something
Showrunner Hans Rosenfeldt from Jack and Flo. Chapel Croft
Cast Samantha Morton, Ruby Stokes, is also still reeling from the
Rupert Graves, Conrad Khan disappearance of two teenagers in
the ’90s and so, intrigued, Jack
EPISODES 1.01-1.06 Samantha starts investigating a rogues’
Morton takes the lead – beautifully gallery of suspects in what is “Does that
– in this adaptation of CJ Tudor’s ultimately a satisfying whodunnit. crowd seem
2021 novel of the same name. She The real draw here is Morton: to have
plays Jack Brooks, a vicar with a her performance is BAFTA- pitchforks?”
shady past who moves to a little worthy, never falling short of
English village to start afresh after perfection. Whether she’s lying What doesn’t work as well are carrying bastard), but there’s no
a controversy that possibly in bed talking to God or telling the scares. There are only so many denying that this is Morton’s show.
involved some kind of exorcism. someone she’ll “fuck them up” times someone can wander around It’s a shame to see her working so
Her teenage daughter Flo if they hurt her daughter, she’s an old building in the dark before damn hard, only to be let down by
(Lockwood & Co’s excellent Ruby absolutely stunning throughout. it gets boring – and while the two listless tension building and
Stokes) starts hanging around shrieking ghosts are effective, we predictable jump scares. Sadly, this
with a weird local lad (Conrad
Khan), and the villagers are a bit
This might see them far too often, lessening
their impact until they randomly
might have worked better as a
straight drama rather than a
of a weird bunch, but there are have worked disappear from the plot. supernatural tale. Jayne Nelson
bigger issues afoot: fiery ghosts!
Burned at the stake for being
better as a The supporting cast are
watchable (particularly Rupert Mary I (nicknamed “Bloody Mary”) killed

Protestants 500 years ago, two straight drama Graves, letting rip as a card-
an estimated 312 Protestants during her
five-year reign; 280 of them were burned.

BODIES
“Ah, yes, I
can explain.
Actually, I
can’t.”
Same corpse, different year
surprising ways, even if the actual
UK/US Netflix, streaming now plot, once you’ve unravelled it all,
Showrunner Paul Tomalin is fairly formulaic time-loop
Cast Amaka Okafor, Stephen Graham, shenanigans. Hell, even the
Jacob Fortune-Lloyd, Shira Haas nuclear explosion feels like a
nostalgic wave to Terminator 2:
EPISODES 1.01-1.08 When four Judgment Day.
London cops in four different time The mash-up of contrasting
periods (late Victorian, Second periods is quite striking, with a
World War, present day and grittily realistic present day, a
near-future false utopia) all Ripper Street-ish 1880s and a noir
stumble across the same naked ’40s, but let down by a rather
corpse, none of them realise bargain bin, humdrum future characters whose lives and plights Disappointingly, too, the one
they’ve also stumbled across a that’s never explored in any depth. you’re happy to follow – even if image that should be the show’s
headscratcher of a time paradox Some bold splitscreen work Shira Haas’s future cop, DC leitmotif – London under a
that could lead/has lead to London cleverly evokes the project’s Maplewood, is lumbered with a mushroom cloud – is weirdly kept
being destroyed in a nuclear graphic novel roots. distractingly ugly hairdo. There’s to a bare minimum. If you can live
explosion. Well, it’s a little above The acting is top-notch, with also an unusual storytelling with all that, however, there’s
their pay grade, to be fair. Stephen Graham magnificently structure – not just the various plenty to enjoy on this twisty-
Based on a graphic novel by tying everything together through time periods, but a real change of turny journey.
the late Si Spencer, Bodies is an all the time zones (after a gear for the last two episodes – Dave Golder
ambitious, often elegant-looking masterfully low-key introduction), that keeps things intriguing.
Israeli actress Shira Haas (DC Maplewood)
time travel mystery that merges while all the featured bobbies in But as science fiction, it’s fairly will be playing Marvel superhero Sabra in
four interlinking storylines in each era are strong, interesting derivative, cheesy and contrived. Captain America: Brave New World.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 93

 TV

STAR WARS: AHSOKA

A Thawn in their sides
your first encounter with Purrgil, Winstead) is less a character than
UK/US Disney+, streaming now
Showrunner Dave Filoni
the Nightsisters of Dathomir and
the World Between Worlds, you’ll
find yourself asking more
a plot device unleashed to expose
the naive ineptitude of the nascent
New Republic, Rosario Dawson
ROBODOC
Cast Rosario Dawson, Natasha Liu
Bordizzo, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, questions than an over- (as Anakin Skywalker’s UK Icon Film Channel,
Ray Stevenson enthusiastic Padawan. eponymous former apprentice) streaming now
Of course, if anyone’s the and Natasha Liu Bordizzo Directors Christopher Griffiths,
EPISODES 1.01-1.08 Throughout the spiritual heir to Lucas’s empire it’s (Mandalorian Rebel Sabine Wren) Eastwood Allen
media rounds for Ahsoka, cast and Filoni, and his knowledge of and add depth to characters who
crew assured the world that prior affection for the veteran franchise debuted in animation. EPISODES 1.01-1.04 Running

knowledge of The Clone Wars and shine through in the trademark Baylan Skoll (played with at close to five hours, this
Rebels wasn’t needed to enjoy the sweeps and dissolves, the impressive subtlety by the late Ray crowd-funded documentary
show. That’s true – but only from beautifully choreographed Stevenson) is up there with the (subtitled The Creation Of
a certain point of view. lightsaber duels, and the most intriguing and enigmatic RoboCop) is almost three times
While Disney+’s latest jaunt to spectacular space battles. Force-wielders we’ve ever seen, longer than the movie that
the universe George Lucas built is He also makes a concerted and the strategy-obsessed Grand inspired it. That could easily
a fully functional continuation of (and literal) effort to transport the Admiral Thrawn justifies the feel like overkill, but as
the post-Return Of The Jedi story storytelling beyond the confines of long-building hype surrounding RoboDoc explores Paul
started by The Mandalorian, the saga’s traditional galaxy – even his imminent return. Rebels voice Verhoeven’s violent
there’s no question that if the ultimate destination, actor Lars Mikkelsen deserves masterpiece in minute, bloody
showrunner Dave Filoni has made Peridea, doesn’t feel particularly extra kudos for delivering a detail, the extraordinary depth
a live-action follow-up to the far, far away. suitably chilling performance, of the dive becomes one of the
aforementioned animated shows While returning Rebel general despite a costume that looks like series’ biggest strengths.
that made his name. Alas, if this is Hera Syndulla (Mary Elizabeth middling cosplay. As does the independent
Although it gets plenty right, nature of the project. If this
“I am… however, Ahsoka doesn’t quite were a studio-backed Making
AHSOKA!” hang together as a whole. The first Of, it’s hard to believe that the
“Bless you. half of the season is unnecessarily impressive assortment of
Tissue?” ponderous, fooling no one as it talking heads – every inch of
pretends that the return of RoboCop’s end credits is
Thrawn (long ago spoiled in represented, from lowly
trailers) is anything but certain. behind-the-scenes technicians
It also falls into a trap that has to director Verhoeven and star
done for Marvel on numerous Peter Weller – would have been
occasions, by functioning more quite so candid. The
as a bridge between The filmmakers’ love for the subject
Mandalorian and future projects matter also shines through in
– including the Filoni-directed their compulsion to share
theatrical movie that’s set to bring everything they’ve learned
this era of Star Wars to a close – about the movie – no piece of
than a story in its own right. information is too obscure.
Most frustratingly of all, the Indeed, in terms of
season wraps up without telling anecdotes, trivia and behind-
you anything you couldn’t have the-scenes material, the
guessed when it started. Sure, constantly entertaining
you’ve probably already dived into RoboDoc feels like the ultimate
Wookieepedia to find out the treasure trove for fans.
relevance of those freaky statues Admittedly, the title could have
on Peridea, but obscure lore from done with more work, but
a pair of animated TV series seeing as most of the cast and
shouldn’t be seen as Star Wars’ crew rolled their eyes at
latest new hope. “RoboCop” in the mid-’80s,
Richard Edwards we’ll let it slide. Note: a Blu-ray
release (featuring interview
Former Farscape and Stargate SG-1 star
Claudia Black plays Klothow, one of the
out-take bonuses) is due on 18
Dathomirian witches on Peridea. December. Richard Edwards

94 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

UPLOAD Season Three
Double trouble in paradise
solution? Create another digital
UK/US Prime Video, streaming now Nathan for Lakeview.
Showrunners Greg Daniels It also pulls off the seemingly
Cast Robbie Amell, Andy Allo, impossible cast of redeeming
Allegra Edwards, Zainab Johnson Ingrid, Nathan’s formerly odious
fiance. It’s fun watching the
EPISODES 3.01-3.08 Season three of manipulative and self-seeking
Upload has an ingenious solution Ingrid start to be humanised. Then
to the fact that, by the end of there’s the fact that Nathan’s head
season two, it began to feel like may explode if he stays in his
a show pulling in two different clone body too long.
directions. There was the zany, It holds together well, with the
hilarious stuff set inside the virtual usual bizarre imagery and weird
afterlife of Lakeview, then the less characters in Lakeview providing
funny plot stuff in the real world the big laughs, while the
concerning the corrupt company conspiracy plot keeps you hooked.
behind Lakeview: Horizen. And while it looks like all the
Lead character Nathan Brown’s plotlines are heading for a neat
digital consciousness had been and tidy series finale, instead we
extracted from Lakeview and get an audacious finale twist that
downloaded into a cloned body so resets just about everything, The
he could help expose Horizen. Good Place-style. Dave Golder Shirt: £10,
Which was all well and good, but from Matalan.
it felt like mission creep was Author William Gibson cameos in episode Smiles:
five, as an automated virtual warning
turning into mission sprint. The about the dangers of reading books. models’ own.

GEN V Season One

School Of Shocks
in The Seven is going to be a
titanic struggle. Especially as the
school has a deep dark secret that
the spectacular suicide of its star
pupil threatens to blow wide open.
Some of the
wackiness feels
a tad contrived
At times it’s all a bit The
murdering past, lack of a mobile Boys-lite. It doesn’t have the same understand. Some of the effects
UK/US Prime Video, streaming now phone and (possibly worst of all) crazed energy, and some of the look a little cheap, the action
Showrunners Michele Fazekas, really dark skin all make her wackiness feels a tad contrived, scenes aren’t quite as polished,
Tara Butters unlikely to score high on the with gross-out moments that often and there’s some clunky plotting.
Cast Jaz Sinclair, Chance Perdomo, public popularity-meter, her aim come across like a little kid using But there’s a lot to enjoy here,
Lizze Broadway, Maddie Phillips of becoming the first black woman swear words they don’t including some delicious satire, a
range of loveably quirky, morally
EPISODES 1.01-1.08 When a TV show dubious characters and a hellish
uses the phrase “tag team amount of jaw-dropping twists. It
cocksplosion” you can kinda guess all dovetails marvellously with the
we’re in The Boys universe. This parent show, with loads of clever
second spin-off from Amazon’s cameos and one superbly
super-gross superhero splatterfest gratuitous one (Soldier Boy), and
centres on a university for the final few minutes of the finale
teenagers who’ve gained powers will leave you reeling multiple
as a result of their parents plying times. Plus there’s also a sweet,
them with the drug Gen V when warped and ultimately tragic
they were still in their nappies. love story.
Some are studying to be caped Most crucially, though, like The
crimefighters, while the less gifted Boys, Gen V makes woke look
(and less social media-friendly) totally f**king awesome.
are encouraged to become media “Wow, Mac Dave Golder
stars. So for Marie Moreau OS 14 looks
(Sinclair), whose blood- really gnarly, Haley Joel Osment cameos as the lead
of a TV series called The Mesmerizer, as
manipulating powers, parent- dude.” previously seen in the The Boys.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 95

 HOME ENTERTAINMENT

about the film’s shortcomings. The

new features are solid too. “Power
Of Imagination” (58 minutes) sees
lecturers Sorcha Ní Fhlainn and
Karmel Kniprath delve deep into
the first movie and Barker’s
literary work. Hell Was What They
Wanted! is a feature-length (85
minutes) chat between authors
George Daniel Lea and Kit Power,
particularly focused on Hellbound.
Another horror author, Guy
Adams, provides two featurettes:
“That Rat-Slice Sound” (12
minutes) celebrates Christopher
Young’s scores for the first two
films, while “Flesh Is A Trap”
(18 minutes) is a visual essay about
body horror, which also features
Adams getting a tattoo. Now
there’s commitment.
Sex and Hellraiser go hand-in-
leather-gloved-hand. “The Pursuit
“I tell you, Of Possibilities” (41 minutes)
mate, never explores the series’ LGBTQ+
annoy a B&Q themes, while “The Beauty Of
employee.” Suffering” (28 minutes) delves
into the intersection between the

HELLRAISER:
slaughtering people using the
height of ’90s technology: CDs.
Clive Barker’s
And so to Bloodline, the adaptation of his
weirdest of the four by quite some novella remains

QUARTET OF TORMENT
distance. The film starts in the
future and in deep space, before compelling
travelling back in time to the 1700s
and the origins of the Lament movies, sex work and the goth and
Configuration puzzle box. There’s BDSM subcultures. Elsewhere
Has such sights to show you some evocative imagery here, but
by this point the series has drifted
writer AK Benedict celebrates
the Lament Configuration
a long way from Barker’s seedy (22 minutes). Finally, a previously-
melodrama making for a uniquely and sensual explorations of desire. unseen EPK (electronic press kit)
RELEASED OUT NOW! alluring film. Pinhead (Doug Extras A packed set, with all for the first film offers period
1987-1996 | 18 | Blu-ray (4K/standard) Bradley) might be the nail-studded four films benefiting from heaps interviews with Barker, Andrew
Directors Clive Barker, Tony Randel, face of the franchise, but he’s an of new or previously unseen Robinson, Clare Higgins, Ashley
Anthony Hickox, Kevin Yagher enigmatic presence here, with material. Both versions of Hell On Laurence and special effects
(as Alan Smithee) murderous lovers Frank (Sean Earth (theatrical/an unrated cut artists (totalling 24 minutes).
Cast Doug Bradley, Andrew Robinson, Chapman) and Julia (Clare with standard-def inserts) are There’s also stacks of archival
Clare Higgins, Ashley Laurence Higgins) the true villains. included, as is a newly discovered material from previous releases:
Tony Randel’s sequel Hellbound workprint of Bloodline. The interviews with the likes of Sean
The suffering of the Hellraiser is messier, but also more enjoyably differences from the theatrical Chapman, Doug Bradley and Paula
franchise is legendary, even in schlocky. The film also manages to version are notable, with swapped Marshall; a feature on industrial
a genre prone to sequels of add tantalising layers of backstory around scenes and a different pioneers Coil’s rejected
diminishing returns. This to Pinhead without undermining score, but the transfer comes from soundtrack for the first film
beautifully scrubbed-up set wisely his fundamental mystery. a swampy, timecoded VHS that’s a (18 minutes); 2015 doc Hellraiser
concentrates on the first four The same cannot be said about chore to watch. Despite this, it’s a Evolutions (48 minutes), which
films, before things really went Hellraiser III: Hell On Earth. fascinating curio for completists. goes into the troubles the later
off the rails and the series was Pinhead undergoes a radical There are 10 commentaries. sequels faced; plus deleted scenes,
consigned to its own Hell: the personality shift, from morally Most are archival, but genre expert trailers and image galleries. This is
direct-to-video market. blank enforcer of metaphysical Kim Newman and unit publicist Hellraiser Heaven.
Clive Barker’s 1987 adaptation torment to indiscriminate killer – Stephen Jones provide a lively Will Salmon
of his novella The Hellbound Heart a decision that robs him of all his track for all four films, joined on
As scripted, Frank says “Fuck you” before
remains as compelling as ever, its intrigue. The new Cenobites are Bloodline by screenwriter Peter he’s ripped apart. Actor Andrew Robinson
combination of kink and laughable, too, with one Atkins, who’s pleasingly frank changed the line to “Jesus wept.”

96 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

FROM BEIJING MEATCLEAVER NANDOR FODOR NO ONE WILL
WITH LOVE MASSACRE AND THE TALKING SAVE YOU
RELEASED OUT NOW! RELEASED OUT NOW! MONGOOSE RELEASED OUT NOW!
1994 | 15 | Blu-ray 1976 | 15 | Blu-ray 2023 | 16+ | SVOD
Director Stephen Chow, Lee Lik-chi Director It’s complicated… RELEASED OUT NOW! Director Brian Duffield
Cast Stephen Chow, Anita Yuen, Cast Larry Justin, J Arthur Craig, 2023 | 12 | SVOD Cast Kaitlyn Dever,
Kar-ying Law, Wong Kam Kong James Habif, Robert Clark Director Adam Sigal Geraldine Singer, Evangeline Rose,
Cast Simon Pegg, Minnie Driver, Dane Rhodes
BLU-RAY DEBUT In 1974 the Bond BLU-RAY DEBUT When it comes
Christopher Lloyd, Neil Gaiman
franchise riffed on the Asian to misleading titles, this one DISNEY+ Put the scalpels

cinema boom with The Man (appended to cash in on a PRIME VIDEO Those who’ve down: you don’t have to
With The Golden Gun. Consider certain Texas massacre) takes spent years poring through the perform a Roswell autopsy to
this an act of reverse cultural the biscuit – meatcleavers are pages of Fortean Times will no trace the DNA of this alien
appropriation: 007 by way of conspicuous by their absence. doubt know the story of Gef, chiller. It’s as if Signs,
Hong Kong; part spoof, part It starts very Last House On the strange creature identified Poltergeist and the darkest parts
homage, part rip-off. The Left, as four stoner pals kill as a mysterious mongoose of Close Encounters have been
Stephen Chow is the pork their professor’s family, leaving (and self-described as an distilled to their nerve-
merchant turned insouciant him paralysed. He then sets a “earthbound spirit”) who, it shredding essence, then
secret agent, a cigarette vengeance demon on them. was claimed, inhabited a injected directly into your
seemingly surgically attached to Despite that title, it’s pretty family’s farmhouse on the Isle dreams – with a paranoid
his lips. On the trail of a stolen light on gore. The demon is of Man in the ’30s. The tale has chaser of Invasion Of The Body
dinosaur skull he finds himself initially invisible, but finally widely been dismissed as a Snatchers to follow.
pitted against a supervillain manifests as a fat, hairy bloke fraud. But that didn’t stop Living alone among a hostile
with – checks notes – a golden painted green. Oh dear. writer/director Adam Sigal rural community, anxious
gun, and a hench with sinister Co-writer Keith Burns was from making a film about it. young orphan Brynn (Kaitlyn
dental work. replaced as director after some With Simon Pegg slapping Dever) finds her isolated home
The Bond steals are footage turned out unusably on a ’tache, beard and accent to infiltrated by otherworldly
audacious, made all the more dark. Plan 9 From Outer Space’s play real-life parapsychological visitors. At first director Brian
amusing by a straight-faced Ed Wood is in the frame, but investigator Nandor Fodor, this Duffield keeps his ETs in the
legal disclaimer that’s cast say that the baton was (like its source material) is an shadows: half-glimpsed shapes;
immediately followed by a passed around. Whoever’s odd one. Played primarily for scampering, imp-like figures,
cheekily familiar musical cue. responsible for what, it’s an laughs, it also wants to their tantalising, terrifying
But the mix of slapstick and inept production, though its ruminate on perception and power enhanced by immersive
intrigue skews closer to one of offbeat eccentricities do amuse: grief, and never quite nails sound design. It’s a house
the later Pink Panther movies, a sepia dream sequence is quite down a coherent tone. encounter of the third kind,
while a brutal, blood-splashed well done; flash cuts and Pegg does a workmanlike job skilfully playing on primal fears.
fight sits a little uneasily among ear-clearing blasts of psych as Nandor, while Minnie Driver As Brynn flees her home, the
the laughs. Still, this is zippy, further enliven proceedings. has the most likeable character scale of the invasion broadens
entertaining fun. Extras Choose between two as his put-upon secretary/ even as the film takes us deeper
Extras Co-star Wong Kam cuts – one bookended by seven assistant Anne. Elsewhere, the into her psyche and the tragic
Kong reflects on the movie (22 minutes of portentous likes of Christopher Lloyd and past that defines her life.
minutes), while also retracing Christopher Lee narration. Paul Kaye do what they can Audaciously, there’s only a
his career (54 minutes). A 2005 Burns and two of the cast are with more minor roles (and single line of dialogue. It’s a
interview with co-director Lee interviewed (totalling 60 Sigal even ropes in Neil Gaiman decision that not only focuses
Lik-chi (25 minutes) offers more minutes); there are some good to voice Gef, which is quite the the storytelling but delivers a
of a general retrospective on the “guerilla filmmaking” anecdotes thing to hear). But ultimately tension of its own.
“king of Mo lei tau” (a Hong here. All are understandably the film disappears down a In the absence of dialogue
Kong brand of slapstick). bemused by the film’s longevity. quirky bolthole and ends up it’s Dever’s expressive face that
There’s also an audio There are two booklets; one only fitfully entertaining. You carries you through the
commentary by Asian cinema presents the original screenplay, may want to believe, but you nightmare, all the way to a
expert Frank Djeng. Plus: entitled Professor Cantrell’s could have difficulty caring provocatively unsettling ending.
trailer; booklet. Nick Setchfield Messiah. Plus: trailer. Ian Berriman enough. James White Nick Setchfield

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 97

 HOME ENTERTAINMENT

FINGERNAILS
Meet-cuticles
cannot deny the connection she is
RELEASED 3 NOVEMBER forming with her colleague Amir
2023 | TBC | SVOD (Riz Ahmed).
Director Christos Nikou The chemistry between Buckley
Cast Jessie Buckley, Riz Ahmed, and Ahmed is electrifying, and
Jeremy Allen White, Annie Murphy Nikou’s world is a strange but
fascinating alternative reality.
APPLE TV+ Funny, moving and Restaurants offer discounts to
delightfully weird, Christos those officially in love, schools
Nikou’s first English language indoctrinate students with a
feature will draw favourable rewriting of the Adam and Eve
comparisons to fellow Greek myth which comes with a happy
director Yorgos Lanthimos’s ending, and cinemas feature Hugh
The Lobster. Grant marathons to further drum
It’s set in a world where science in that “love” is the ultimate goal.
has created a test to determine Fingernails asks what the point
whether or not two people are of love is when its limits are so
truly in love using their fingernails clearly defined; no matter how
and some nifty-looking gadgets. advanced the science may be, it
Anna (Jessie Buckley) and her cannot account for Riz Ahmed’s
boyfriend Ryan (Jeremy Allen charisma in this film.
“Oh I see, White) have been happily paired Leila Latif
a 12-inch up for three years, with the test’s
pianist ! I get approval. But it turns out love and Technology has a deliberately minimal
presence in the film; Nikou explains that he
it now.” life are not so simple, and Anna wanted it to “look a bit more timeless”.

WHEN EVIL LURKS APPENDAGE IRON WARRIOR TOTALLY KILLER

RELEASED OUT NOW! RELEASED OUT NOW! RELEASED OUT NOW! RELEASED OUT NOW!
2023 | 15 | SVOD 2023 | TBC | SVOD 1987 | 15 | Blu-ray 2023 | 15 | SVOD

SHUDDER A botched exorcism DISNEY+ Anna Zlokovic’s BLU-RAY DEBUT This standalone PRIME VIDEO Teenager Jamie

unleashes a particularly debut employs body horror as a story (notionally the third in (Kiernan Shipka) time-travels
grotesque form of evil in this metaphor for both anxiety and the Italian Ator series) sees our to 1987 to undo her mum’s
desperately bleak Argentinean the hardening required to Conan-lite protagonist saving murder by a serial killer in this
possession flick. survive in a competitive the kingdom from a sorceress potty-mouthed horror-comedy,
Suitable only for viewers environment, as a young NYC and her metal-masked enforcer. which has much sport showing
with stainless-steel stomachs, fashion designer grows a It’s atmospheric, with a a Gen Z kid being triggered by
it packs both gut-wrenching talking appendage that acts like dreamlike quality; filmed in the mores of the past.
tragedy and vomit-inducing a critical inner voice. Malta, the exterior shots are Heavily in debt to Back To
gore. Nothing and no one is This critter (which soon beautiful. But Iron Warrior is The Future and Scream, it does
sacred here, from little kids to splits off ) is a bit too Muppety also a low-budget mess of the smart thing by explicitly
grandparents to cute farm to creep you out, and two major second-hand ideas, with scenes referencing both, though this
animals, and the practical twists are visible from some shamelessly pilfered from does tend to remind you they’re
effects are so evocative you can distance. They’re good twists Indiana Jones and Star Wars. superior movies. Christopher
almost smell the waves of though, and the film ticks along Extras Commentary; Landon’s filmography also feels
stench coming off the demon- entertainingly, deftly opening producers and cameraman like a touchstone – fans of
infested “rottens”. Feel-bad out Zlokovic’s original interviews (51 minutes); trailer; Happy Death Day and Freaky
horror at its gooiest. Sarah Dobbs six-minute short. Ian Berriman booklet; poster. Dave Bradley should approve. Ian Berriman

98 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

TOD BROWNING’S 4K X FOUR

SIDESHOW SHOCKERS
OLD MOVIES NOW
AVAILABLE ON UHD

All the fun of the fair

they’re a scam is the whole point, Crawford). Wedding night would A haunted house tale with
with Browning meticulously clearly present a problem… What the ghost swapped for a
RELEASED OUT NOW! zombie, Lucio Fulci’s 1981
1925-1932 | 12 | Blu-ray showing how the trick is done. to do? A morbid Freudian stew of horror THE HOUSE BY
Cast Aileen Pringle, Conway Tearle, The plotting is Swiss-cheese, but castration imagery, the film has a THE CEMETERY (OUT
Lon Chaney, Norman Kerry, the smirking Zara (Aileen Pringle) weirdly febrile atmosphere, and NOW) sees a family move
is a great character, and the seance Chaney’s performance – all into a New England
Wallace Ford, Leila Hyams
scenes are glorious. David Lynch monstrous leers and lip-curling mansion once owned by
a 19th century scientist –
BLU-RAY DEBUT Tod Browning collaborator Dean Harley provides sneers – is simply mesmerising. who still lurks in the cellar.
is best known for making Bela a sumptuously moody new score. Infamous for using genuine Bolstering Arrow’s 2012
Lugosi a star with Dracula. But the “Man of a Thousand Faces” Lon sideshow folk, including conjoined Blu-ray bonuses are a
former carnival barker’s sideshow Chaney stars in 1927 silent The twins, a “human torso” and people third commentary and
nine interviews (154
movies are more fascinating. This Unknown – a perverse, darkly with microcephaly, 1932’s Freaks minutes) from Blue
Criterion Collection box set ironic gem. Chaney (aided by a sees grotesque vengeance enacted Underground’s 2020 US
collects three restored examples. “leg double”) plays knife-thrower after a trapeze artist marries a release. It comes with a
The least way-out is 1925 silent Alonzo the Armless… who actually dwarf to steal his money. The sight booklet, poster and six
movie The Mystic. A Hungarian does have arms, strapped behind of these knife-wielding avengers postcards. We said: “As
Fulci films go, about as
gypsy introduced to New York his back to help conceal his true crawling through mud on a stormy traditional as it gets –
society conducts seances where identity. He’s wooing a performer night still induces a shiver. While though there are many
spirits manifest, but the fact with a phobia about touch (Joan it remains “problematic”, the focus baffling details.” Set in
is squarely on the performers’ Jersey in 1945, 2001’s THE
OTHERS (OUT NOW) sees
everyday lives, and we are strongly
Nicole Kidman’s character
encouraged to empathise. convinced her country
Extras The lion’s share concern house is haunted after her
Freaks – many carried over from a daughter claims visitations
2004 DVD. Browning biographer from a boy, his parents,
and a blind woman. The
David Skal and sideshow experts big twist is a doozy! New
contribute to a 62-minute Making bonuses: 50-minute doc
Of, at its most entertaining when “Looking Back At The
supplying cast biographies. Skal Others”, and a bit on the
also provides commentary and a score. We said: “A
supernatural tale cut from
reading of “Spurs”, the story it was crystal, finely hewn and
adapted from (48 minutes), and sharp as a razor.” Mia
details variant endings (six Farrow’s mother-to-be is
minutes). There’s also a Freaks- the target of a Satanic
conspiracy in 1968 classic
focused edition of podcast The ROSEMARY’S BABY (OUT
Ticklish Business (58 minutes), a NOW). No new bonuses
gallery of portrait photos, and the – just a 23-minute doc
opening scroll from a 1947 reissue. shot during filming and a
Skal provides commentary for 2000 retrospective. We
said: “Farrow’s quietly
The Unknown and a well-informed desperate performance
intro for The Mystic (nine gives Rosemary’s Baby its
minutes). Finally, critic Megan true horror.” Finally,
Abbott’s erudite but accessible Dudley Moore’s elf gets
caught up in a toy
talking head (32 minutes) tackles
company’s machinations
all three films, discussing topics in 1985’s SANTA CLAUS:
like “bodily anxiety”, and claiming THE MOVIE (13
auteur status for Browning. Plus: November). A cheesy,
The brave booklet. Ian Berriman overblown affairr, it rather
ladies and drags; viewers of a certain
age may enjoy spotting
gentlemen In the ’40s, The Mystic’s leading lady
Christopher Ryan and Don
Aileen Pringle was briefly married to
of Freaks. James M Cain, author of Double Indemnity. Estelle as elves, though.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 99

 HOME ENTERTAINMENT

MESSIAH OF EVIL
California Dreaming
father, meeting a visiting aristocrat
RELEASED OUT NOW! and his companions, and slowly
1974 | 15 | Blu-ray realising that something is very
Directors Willard Huyck, Gloria Katz wrong in Point Dume.
Cast Marianna Hill, Michael Greer, You could call it a zombie film,
Joy Bang, Anitra Ford but the pale-skinned locals who
feast on human flesh don’t stumble Entranced
BLU-RAY DEBUT The work of about – ominous staring is more by the sight
husband-and-wife team Willard their MO. Plus they’re not actually of Richard
Huyck and Gloria Katz, best dead, rather somehow infected. Osman.
known for their collaborations The Z-word also creates the
with George Lucas (writing wrong impression, because this walking mysteriously abandoned a phone call recorded for a 2019
American Graffiti and Temple Of is a beautifully shot film which streets, rendered insignificant by podcast (37 minutes; the first 23
Doom; directing Howard The melds horror tropes with a all the looming empty space. For focus on Messiah). Unfortunately
Duck), this eerie horror was European sensibility. those who love horror and the audio quality is poor, bringing
abandoned, incomplete, when There are striking images here, arthouse cinema, it’s a must-see. to mind Norman Collier’s
finances ran out, then pieced some of them surreal: bleeding Extras A 57-minute malfunctioning-microphone
together years later using poetic eyes; sinister silhouettes; scenes documentary is decent enough, routines (ask your dad). A dry
narration and montage. awash with blue light; figures but only features critical voices, visual essay (21 minutes) discusses
It’s such a strange, dreamlike lacking any cast or crew. You’ll the film as an example of gothic
film anyway that this patch-up job learn more hard facts from Kim – which seems a bit of a stretch.
doesn’t seem unsympathetic. Set This eerie Newman and Stephen Thrower’s Plus: an 80-page book. Ian Berriman
in a town on the Malibu coastline,
it sees a young woman (Marianna
horror was commentary, with Thrower in
particular a fount of knowledge. Hucyk and Katz first met at a screening of

Hill) searching for her artist abandoned Willard Huyck is represented, via
The Wild Angels. He was impressed by her
miniskirt – the first he’d ever seen!

SHORT SHARP
SHOCKS Volume Three
Camera obscura
he’s doomed, doooomed – the
RELEASED OUT NOW! other a pseudo-Hitchcockian
thriller on a boat. Two trite Press Gang’s
1951-1985 | 15 | Blu-ray
’50s yarns under the “Strange Dexter Fletcher
Directors Various
Experiences” banner are balanced in “Wings Of
Cast Orson Welles, Valentine Dyall,
by a couple of reliably nasty ’70s Death”.
Henry Woolf, Dexter Fletcher
public information films, while the
BLU-RAY DEBUT The BFI’s mission wilfully oblique “The Maze” feels Extras Bob Bentley reveals how reflects on his score for “The
to prise edgy, offbeat or plain like the post-’60s hangover put Truffaut, dream states and Greek Terminal Game”, and there’s a
forgotten curios from obscurity on celluloid. myth helped shape “The Maze” retrospective on indie producer
continues with this third Disc two brings a little more (20 minutes), “Skinflicker”’s Tony Roger Proudlock (seven minutes).
collection of shorts. energy: “Skinflicker” is an Bicât confesses “I tried to be Some original 8mm footage takes
No less a god than Orson Welles authentically disturbing found- messy” (26 minutes); Nichola us behind the scenes on “Wings Of
fronts “Return To Glennascaul”, footage kidnap tale with a grim ’n’ Bruce and Michael Coulson reveal Death”. Plus: galleries for “The
a predictable but gorgeously grotty aesthetic, while “Wings Of the Jarman-adjacent, punk culture Maze”, “Skinflicker” and “Wings
atmospheric Irish ghost tale. More Death” proves a richly textured connections of “Wings Of Death” Of Death”; an illustrated booklet
long shadows fall in “Strange junkie nightmare. Finally, trading (31 minutes); while with with further insights from the
Stories”, which sticks together two in ZX Spectrum-era paranoia impeccable irony, “The Terminal directors. Nick Setchfield
stories: one a Victorian chiller about primordial AI, 1982’s “The Game”’s Geoff Lowe discloses he
“Wings Of Death” was released as a
with a charismatic turn from Dad’s Terminal Game” proves that while now uses AI to write (28 minutes). supporting feature to A Nightmare On Elm
Army’s John Laurie – naturally the tech dates, our fears remain. Elsewhere composer Colin Towns Street in British cinemas in 1984.

100 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 NOW ON DIGITAL PLATFORMS Cobweb • The Nun II • Saw X • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem

ROUND UP

THE HORRIBLE
DR HICHCOCK Good news, physical
media lovers: the following
RELEASED OUT NOW! are all now available on
1962 | 15 | Blu-ray shiny disc. BARBIE (4K/
Director Riccardo Freda Blu-ray/DVD) sees the doll
Cast Barbara Steele, Robert suffer an existential crisis
Paris Fashion and travel from Barbie’s
Flemyng, Silvano Tranquilli
Week once world to ours. We said:
again proved “Hilariously meta, very
BLU-RAY DEBUT No, not Alfred
clever, ridiculously funny.”
(with a T) – though it is a nod, controversial. It comes with around 40
and he might have approved of minutes of featurettes on

THE NIGHT OF
this slice of ripe Italian gothic. important topics such as
casting, costumes and
Set in a foggy 19th century
Ken’s “dream ballet”. The
London, it has strong echoes of fifth in the franchise about
Poe, Rebecca and Gaslight. a family haunted by

THE DEVILS
Sometimes a facial demons from a realm
expression can horrify more known as the Further,
INSIDIOUS: THE RED
than gore. That’s the case here, DOOR (Blu-ray/DVD) is
in a film that toys with directed by star Patrick
necrophilia. Nothing’s shown, Wilson, and sees his
but as the camera lingers on the
titular surgeon’s face, emotions
Not found Vourdalak-ing character Josh uncovering
the truth about the father
who abandoned him. We
playing over it as he comes to some gruesome face-melting said: “A solid legacy
the decision to pop back to the RELEASED OUT NOW! effects; you can see the hairdryer sequel that digs deeper
morgue, your skin crawls… 1972 | 18 | Blu-ray heat haze, but they’re good for the into the mythology.”
And sometimes a face can be time. There are some pretty Extras? Just two
Director Giorgio Ferroni featurettes, totalling eight
the best visual effect – as with Cast Gianni Garko, Agostina Belli, musical cues too – especially the minutes. Seriously, Sony?
Barbara Steele (as Hichcock’s Maria Monti, Cinzia De Caroli swoonsome love theme. The film Shark sequel MEG 2: THE
new wife), whose eyes clearly ends just as strongly as it began, in TRENCH (4K/Blu-ray/
take up too much of her face. BLU-RAY DEBUT Framing devices harrowingly bleak fashion. DVD) goes full kaiju by
Still, as Hichcock’s dead first can be a bore, but not this one. An Extras Of four new interviews letting three Megalodons
and a giant squid loose on
wife seems to be haunting her, amnesiac man (Gianni Garko) is (totalling 78 minutes), three with a resort. We said: “The
some bulging is justified. An wired up to an encephalograph. cast are no great shakes: the only action is relentless but
abrupt ending frustrates, Images of eroticism and violence revelation lead Gianno Garko has also incoherent, while the
leaving questions hanging, but follow: a maggot-ridden skull, a is that he wore a fake ’tache, while script’s stabs at self-
mocking humour get
goths will still snaffle up this woman’s naked body groped; a then-child actor Cinzia de Carolis stuck in the shallows.”
perverse, gloomy confection. heart ripped out; a face exploding. barely remembers anything. Bonuses: a 13-minute
Extras Three versions We then see what trauma sent A chat with cameraman Nino Making Of and 10-minute
(Italian, English, US cut) and him doolally. The mystery man is a Celeste is better, with amusing creature design featurette
two commentaries (one actually lumber importer. Pranging his car anecdotes about pranking the – which you can just watch
on YouTube... Finally, in
a long essay, read out). Writer in the Balkans (painful), he takes director – who, practically deaf by TALK TO ME (4K/Blu-ray/
Ernesto Gastaldi (34 minutes) is refuge with a nearby family. But this point, relied on a hearing aid. DVD), a group of friends
charmingly sardonic. A useful they are cursed, barricading the There’s also archive footage of a come into possession of
visual essay (34 minutes) relates house each night against a witch rambling talk with late composer an embalmed hand; grip it
and say “talk to me” and
the film to gothic melodramas. – who seems more like a vampire. Giorgio Gaslini (32 minutes).
your body is taken over
A slightly troubling talking head Based on Tolstoy’s The Family Horror mavens Alan Jones by a dead spirit. We said:
(18 minutes) with an artist who Of The Vourdalak, the film doesn’t and Kim Newman provide a “Impressively gnarly and
argues that “we’re all on the match director Giorgio Ferroni’s commentary track. Plus: an old exceptionally scary.”
necrophiliac spectrum” (er, Mill Of the Stone Women, but its intro; booklet. Ian Berriman Bonuses: directors’
commentary, a Q&A, a
really?) may have you reaching moody atmosphere still impresses. 13-minute featurette, and
Cameraman Nino Celeste put on star
for your cruxifix... Plus: gallery; Carlo Rambaldi – later to win Gianni Garko’s trousers to film a shot deleted scenes. Now that’s
trailer; booklet. Ian Berriman Oscars for ET and Alien – provides where the hero is stumbling along. a bit more like it!

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 101

 BOOKS

influencer-survivalist whose
view of post-end-of-civilisation
scenarios is far more realistic than
the rich she occasionally
encounters, the opportunity to
do this opens up.
What unfolds reads, in all the
best ways, like an airport thriller.
The plot skitters along in heist-
flick fashion. Alderman’s conjuring
up of near-future technologies –
systems to control the weather,
SATURNALIA
nasty weaponry and more – is RELEASED OUT NOW!
convincing. The characters – 238 pages | Paperback/ebook/
excluding those you’d want to audiobook
punch in a preemptive strike were Author Stephanie Feldman
you to meet them – are likeable Publisher VERVE Books
but flawed.
Yet this is also an exercise in Stephanie Feldman’s
popular fiction filled with ideas. In follow-up to her Crawford

THE FUTURE
particular, in passages written as if Award-winning debut must be
they were forum posts, Alderman the most Halloweeny novel ever
contrasts a hunter-gatherer view to not be set during Halloween.
of the world with that of farmers There’s an all-night festival,
– via an extended riff on the spooky fancy dress, a graveyard
deeper meanings of the story of and blood sacrifice, but here the
Bunker mentality Lot and his daughters – and the
worldview of those who live in
occasion for world-turned-
upside-down debauchery is the
winter solstice. Oh, and the end
Then again, the billionaires
Alderman shows us here do like to
This is also of the world.
In a near-future Philadelphia,
RELEASED 7 NOVEMBER
416 pages | Hardback/ebook/audiobook chase after money. Men – and it’s an exercise in climate collapse, virulent
Author Naomi Alderman
Publisher Fourth Estate
mostly, although not exclusively,
men who behave most badly in
popular fiction disease and desperate refugees
are seriously harshing rich
The Future – like Lenk Sketlish, filled with ideas people’s buzz. In response, said
If recent years are anything to founder of Fantail, someone prone rich people have established
go by, our collective path through to volcanic eruptions of temper yet nature with an urban perspective. various private clubs to while
the next few decades could find us in control of a social network It says much for Alderman’s away the dying-Earth days in
collectively encountering much central to millions of lives. Suffice writing that she can be pedagogic networking, entertaining and
weirdness. How do you write to say these are characters you can without making you wish she’d get plotting their escape to the few
about such interesting times? One map onto our current world. on with the story. remaining habitable enclaves.
approach adopted by William While we’re fascinated by these A criticism is that the main Working-class Nina was an
Gibson was to set his stories in the kinds of larger-than-life figures, plot resolves itself too neatly. outsider in the Saturn Club long
unfolding immediate future, we less often think about those Structurally, this means Alderman, before she left its ranks under a
emphasising how we already live who surround them. In Succession having built an argument for cloud, but at the invitation of an
in a disconcerting world. terms, think of Kendall Roy’s collective action, also effectively old friend she returns, for the
While the timelines are fuzzier general counsel Gerri Kellman, offers a narrative of the near lavish annual Saturnalia bash.
in Naomi Alderman’s fifth novel, albeit without the ick factor of her future that emphasises how What unfolds is a propulsive
there’s certainly something of this connection to Roman Roy. Instead, individuals shape events. mystery-thriller, with Nina
approach at play as she builds Alderman offers us Martha Whatever your view of how pursued by both a creepy
around a plot around the idea – Einkorn, who’s the daughter of a things happen and why, there’s a man-shaped critter and her
odd and compelling because it’s cult leader and, because of this, tension here – although perhaps own past, but also a portrait of a
true – that Silicon Valley better equipped than most to that’s the point, another terrified city slowly losing its
billionaires might be preppers, thrive in a world of capricious dichotomy for readers to mull collective mind. Future Philly
people making grand plans to live business leaders who blithely over. Which you will, because this falls somewhere between
in comfort while the rest of the wield power without thinking too is a terrific novel that, for all its steampunk and cyberpunk –
world goes to hell. much about the consequences. dystopian elements, may even baroque, pungent, stratified,
Leaving aside for a moment the Except what if you could use make you optimistic about what crumbling – and Feldman gives
inherent problems with this idea, this proximity to turn the tables on lies ahead as it offers approaches its plight considerable
there’s something disquieting a mega-rich class who are imbued for building a greener and better emotional charge by making it
about those with so much power with a kind of dangerous fatalism world. Jonathan Wright feel real and lived-in. Like her
and wealth being so disconnected that things can only get worse? home, Nina is broken and bitter
Naomia Alderman will be doing a virtual
from the rest of us that they would Without giving too much away, author talk on 30 November. Visit bit.ly/
– but not without humanity or
even do this. when Einkorn meets Lai Zhen, an naomitalk for details. hope. Nic Clarke

102 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

MOTHTOWN MY BROTHER’S
RELEASED 14 NOVEMBER KEEPER
300 pages | Paperback/ebook
Author Caroline Hardaker RELEASED OUT NOW!
Publisher Angry Robot 320 pages | Hardback/ebook
Author Tim Powers
Isolation and loss do Publisher Head Of Zeus
strange things to you, as young

STARLING HOUSE
David Porter, the protagonist of There’s something about
Catherine Hardaker’s eerie Emily Brontë, reclusive author
second novel, gradually of one of the most compelling
discovers for himself. gothic novels ever written, that
Mothtown is set across two makes people really want to
time periods. In the past we
follow the young David, who is
Flying from the past mythologise her.
Emily’s own sister Charlotte
devastated when his university Is it cursed, as locals suspect? started the trend after her death
professor grandfather dies RELEASED OUT NOW! More importantly, can any curse in 1848, writing prefaces to
unexpectedly. Gramps always 320 pages | Hardback/ebook/audiobook – or destructive patterns with Wuthering Heights that
had esoteric interests, and Author Alix E Harrow roots deep in the past – ever be depicted her as a shy but
David becomes convinced that Publisher Tor broken? As Harrow answers these mysterious genius. With My
he hasn’t really died, simply questions, it becomes clear that Brother’s Keeper, World
vanished elsewhere. How do you build a life when her intention is both to celebrate Fantasy Award winner Tim
He wouldn’t be the first – the odds are so stacked against you and subvert Southern Gothic. Powers adds to the author’s
it seems to be a regular as to be seemingly impossible to Celebrate because what’s not to mystique by casting her as
occurrence, to the point where overcome? You just keep going. like about eldritch happenings, an indomitable force of
these disappearances are You never give up. You treat life bad people getting their supernatural goodness: when
simply referred to as “the as a hustle. Or at least that’s the comeuppance and the sense that Brontë brother Branwell almost
Modern Problem”. Years later, approach adopted by Opal, the history lies heavy on the present? succumbs to a werewolf cult,
the twentysomething David twentysomething heroine of Alix Subvert because, in key respects, she’s his only hope of salvation.
continues his search, obsessed E Harrow’s latest novel. Powers has form for this sort
with the idea that perhaps his
grandfather is somehow still
In the ironically named Kansas
town of Eden, a community
It’s a house of historical revisionism, and as
usual he makes sure to keep all
out there. blighted by environmental with its own the facts in place even as he
Mothtown is an odd book
that defies easy categorisation.
degradation caused by the mining
industry, Opal lives in a motel. She
distinct weaves his own story of the
occult around them. It’s clever,
It’s about a young boy growing works at Tractor Supply. Her personality as is Powers’s original pagan
into maturity, but it’s far from mother is dead. However, Opal is twin-god lore, and the ghostly
a conventional coming of age imbued with a sense of purpose Southern Gothic is acting as a imagery he superimposes over
story. It has more than a shiver by the need to ensure her mood-setting backdrop to a novel the Yorkshire moors is properly
of the uncanny, but it’s not academically gifted younger about post-industrial society and shiver-inducing.
exactly horror. Likewise, its brother fulfils his potential. the need for human connection. The thing is, though, because
otherworlds are more elusive Which is why, despite its Starling House occasionally flags Emily Brontë is the heroine of
than those of, say, Philip inherent spookiness, Opal goes to in the middle, as its inherent the story, it’s impossible not to
Pullman’s His Dark Materials. work as a cleaner at Starling authorial slights of hand leave you think about Cathy and
That’s not a criticism – the House. This is a sprawling wondering where the story may be Heathcliff. There aren’t many
book is, in some ways, fixated mansion occupied by a grouchy headed. But there’s no need to horror stories that can live up
on the obsessive places we custodian, Arthur Starling, with worry. As Harrow pulls the plot to that one, so this all feels a
create for ourselves, and whom Opal bickers incessantly. strands together, the denouement little inconsequential. And the
Hardaker writes beautifully It’s also a house with its own is, by turns, devastating, eerie and Brontë family are fascinating,
about loss, grief and the distinct personality, which you upbeat. Jonathan Wright but not because of werewolves.
loneliness of mental illness, could best describe as sullen and So as respectful as this is, you’re
Eden is based on Paradise, Kentucky,
while still filling her novel with resentful. But why is the house evacuated in the ’60s over health concerns
probably better off just reading
wonder and horror. Will Salmon this way? related to coal-fired power generation. their books. Sarah Dobbs

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 103

 BOOKS

THE WICKER MAN Christopher Lee’s outings as

Dracula beyond Hammer were
“minor roles” (er… Count Dracula,

THE OFFICIAL STORY OF THE FILM

1970?). Just occasionally you get a
sense of internet scuttlebutt being
repeated without confirmation.
But mostly the book feels very
Burning issues scrupulously researched,
with Walsh taking pains

RELEASED OUT NOW!

Peter Snell – then MD of
production company
to interrogate a few
old myths. THESE BURNING
192 pages | Hardback
Author John Walsh
British Lion. Flannery is
absolutely excoriating
about director Robin
And visually it’s a
delight, with scores of
stills reproduced at a
STARS
Publisher Titan Books
Hardy, variously labelling him generous size, including shots of RELEASED OUT NOW!
We make this John Walsh’s “just unpleasant”, “a nasty little lost sequences and snaps taken by 448 pages | Paperback/ebook/
fifth deep-dive into the man” and “in love with himself”. locals on location. The biggest audiobook
StudioCanal archives over the last Deeley, meanwhile – often cast treat, however, are Flannery’s Author Bethany Jacobs
three years. The results are the as the villain of the piece – mounts original sketches for the Wicker Publisher Orbit Books
best yet, providing entertaining a solid defence, arguing that Man – including variant concepts
new perspectives on a film that is without the cuts which made him featuring a sinister grinning One of the biggest obstacles
already extremely well- a hate figure for some fans, The mouth and eyeholes packed with facing any space opera is
documented. Wicker Man would not have Michaelmas daisies. It’s a book balancing the prerequisite
The author conducted 15 received a theatrical release at all. worth keeping an appointment world-building with the need to
original interviews, key among We have a few nitpicks. with. Ian Berriman grab the reader’s attention. It’s
them discussions with production Lumping Witchfinder General in a challenge the opening chapter
Logan’s Run star Michael York was offered
designer Seamus Flannery, with “pagan sacrifice films” is the lead role of Howie, but had to turn it
of These Burning Stars
producer Michael Deeley and off-beam, as is the assertion that down as it clashed with filming Cabaret. navigates in spectacular style,
delivering a barnstorming
Seamus Christopher introduction to the future
Flannery’s Lee and Britt universe of “the Treble”, while
design for the Ekland shelter setting the scene for a
Wicker Man. from the rain. thoroughly entertaining game
of interstellar cat-and-mouse.
Warrior cleric Esek
Nightfoot – an amoral but
utterly compelling creation
– creates an enemy for life
when she cruelly shuns a
promising rookie known simply
as Six. Over the subsequent
decades, their destructive
obsession with one another is
the catalyst for a dense, cleverly
plotted mix of action and
political intrigue.
With its ocular implants,
jump gates and a totalitarian
regime known as the Kindom
pulling the strings, These
PRODUCTION DESIGN IMAGES COURTESY OF SEAMUS FLANNERY

Burning Stars borrows plenty of

Ian Campbell elements from standard SF. But
as Oak, inside it’s what debut author Bethany
the dragon Jacobs does with them that
hobby outfit. matters, as she constructs her
story around characters who
talk like real people, carry
plenty of emotional baggage
and keep you guessing.
You also get the sense that
the book has just scraped the
surface of this vivid universe –
Alternative which bodes well for future
concepts for instalments. Richard Edwards
the Wicker
Man’s face.
104 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023
 REISSUES
Spot the
reference to a
“goddamned
cash till”!
Our paperback picks this
issue include Adrian
Tchaikovsky’s CITY OF
LAST CHANCES
( , 9 November,
Head Of Zeus), winner of

THE HURRICANE
the BSFA
award for

WARS
Best Novel.
The setting is
Ilmar,
occupied
three years
RELEASED OUT NOW! ago by the
470 pages | Hardback/ebook/ Palleseen, rationalists
audiobook whose mission is to bring
Author Thea Guanzon perfection to the world.
Residents weary of their
Publisher HarperVoyager
oppression can try to
Need to know escape through a mystical
Making a “new” series out grove where the full moon
of a popular fan fiction can the size of a opens a portal to distant
work out very well – just ask EL Hooligan class lands. We said: “As
James. It’s a success story many unit? Voila! complex and multifaceted
as the plot’s structure may
have hoped to emulate,
be, Tchaikovsky’s prose is
including, we’re sure, the as vigorous as ever… An

THE CULTURE:
publishers of this romantasy ambitiously imagined
debut, which reworks a Star creation.” Also ace: Ian
Wars-inspired fanfic. Try and McDonald’s HOPELAND
( , 9 November,
guess the original characters…

THE DRAWINGS
Gollancz). Moving from
In the last days of the rioting
Sardovian/Kesath war, London to
young soldier and powerful geothermal
Lightweaver Talasyn finds Iceland to the
climate-struck
herself up against the heir to islands of
Kesath’s Night Empire,
Shadowforge master Alaric.
The original Banksy Polynesia, it
starts as an
Both detest each other for the urban fantasy love story
before twisting to become
damage wrought by the other’s exuberance here, a genuine joy in a magical realism-tinged
side in the war, and yet their RELEASED 7 NOVEMBER creation. One wonderful page has tale and a philosophical
mirrored powers keep bringing 152 pages | Hardback weapons with neat writing novel that’s also a
them together. explaining how each works: the rollicking sea adventure.
Author Iain M Banks
For both good and ill, this is a Ion Holer Gun is “mostly used to Crikey. We said: “Touches
Publisher Orbit Books beautifully and deftly on
story that embodies many of the impress natives”, while there’s no gender, human
tropes of its origin mythology as The scribblings in this book illustration of the Micro Black connection, the nature of
well as fan fiction itself. The are reproduced from notes Iain M Hole, just the cheeky note family, and how we
cliché of an orphan with a royal Banks kept in the ’80s as he “invisible”. Wit like this is typical. perceive time.” Finally,
Divergent author Veronica
destiny and magical powers is planned the utopian universe of One vessel has below it the – Roth’s latest is POSTER
balanced out by an intriguing his SF novels. Banks sketched as accurate – complaint, “Looks like GIRL ( , 15
magical system and world, but part of his creative process. It’s a goddamned cash-till.” November, Hodderscape).
the war and politics are far less haphazard work – back-of- The collection is a fascinating Set in a world in which
important here than the envelope plans, never intended glimpse into how Banks thought, citizens receive points for
good
drawn-out romance between for sharing. The drawings of some but it’s not especially pretty. Many behaviour,
Talasyn and Alaric. ships are barely a couple of pages, dominated by miniature it centres on
Enemies-to-lovers is a classic triangles and a rectangle, but rows of numbers and teenager
trope, but one taken to nevertheless annotations show the abbreviations, are unlikely to be Sonya, locked
up by new
frustrating lengths here in the author calculating the length and meaningful to a Consider Phlebas
regime the
pair’s complete blindness to crew capacity. virgin. Intended for Culture Triumvirate
each other’s desire. Uneven It’s fantastic to see the detail completists, it’s the ideal gift for a for once appearing on a
pacing and an overabundance that went into specific stories. For fan hungry for insight into Banks’s poster promoting the old
of expositionary dialogue instance, a tiny figure shows the world-building. Dave Bradley regime. We said: “Roth is a
master not only at solid
contribute to a novel that whips character Gurgeh’s size compared world-building, but also
In the 1994 essay “A Few Notes On The
up “all the feels” but ultimately to the ship from The Player Of Culture”, Banks names himself Sun-Earther drip-feeding just enough
fails to impress. Rhian Drinkwater Games. There’s a youthful Iain El-Bonko Banks Of North Queensferry. information.”

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 105

 BOOKS

ALSO OUT
There’s plenty more books
that we couldn’t quite fit
in. In Adrienne Young’s
THE UNMAKING OF
JUNE FARROW (out
now, Quercus), the titular

MAKING IT SO GARTH DOCTOR WHO: THE

character sets out to
break the curse that’s

MARENGHI’S EVIL OF THE DALEKS

beset her family for
generations and solve the
RELEASED OUT NOW! puzzle of her mother’s
469 pages pages | Hardback/ebook/
audiobook INCARCERAT RELEASED OUT NOW!
disappearance. The clues
lead to a mysterious door…
and ultimately a star-
Author Sir Patrick Stewart 229 pages pages | Hardback/ebook/ crossed love. A mansion
Publisher Gallery Books RELEASED OUT NOW! audiobook with strange symbols
400 pages | Hardback/ebook/ Author Frazer Hines marked on the doors,
With an acting career that a naive heroine and a
audiobook Publisher BBC Books
stretches back 64 years, Sir handsome young priest
Author Matthew Holness with a secret aptitude for
Patrick Stewart has no shortage Publisher Coronet This 1966 seven-parter has magic all feature in Isabel
of material for this memoir, but been novelised before, by John Cañas’s gothic romance
it’s his time in the Captain’s Garth Marenghi’s Peel (not that one) in 1993. THE HACIENDA (out now,
chair that will reel in SFX TerrorTome marked the reprise However, copies of that rarity Solaris), set in the 1820s
shortly after the Mexican
readers. You can expect about of comedian Matthew Holness’s now change hands for £50 –
War of Independence.
60 pages on Star Trek: The Next signature character almost 20 and who can resist an actor Translated from the
Generation and another nine on years after his wonderful TV adapting a story they starred in? original French, Christelle
Picard. The movies get shorter show Darkplace. It followed the It takes the Second Doctor Dabos’s YA book HERE
shrift, with only First Contact misadventures of Nick Steen, and companion Jamie (as AND ONLY HERE (out
now, Europa) follows four
dealt with in any depth. a pompous paperback horror played by author Frazer Hines) students at a macabre,
This makes sense, as his life hack (and thinly veiled avatar of from modern-day London to rigidly stratified high
among the stars has been Marenghi) as he variously had Victorian times and the planet school. Could its
well-documented. Most fans sex with a demonic typewriter, Skaro, caught up in a Dalek plan peculiarities be down to a
will already know, for example, beat off an army of Boners to achieve invincibility by supernatural substance in
the pipes? The 40th
how during season one he (living skeletons – get your isolating the “human factor”, anniversary of Discworld
scolded fellow cast, priggishly mind out of the gutter) and using the Scot as a subject. is looming (more on that
declaring, “We’re not here to faced his own subconscious David Whitaker’s scripts give next issue). Co-written by
have fun!” Though it is news coming to life. the Daleks some amusingly Terry Pratchett’s daughter
Rhianna, in-world title
that his LA home of that era Incarcerat is very much more oddball things to do, such as TIFFANY ACHING’S
was plagued by a poltergeist… of the same. Steen’s demented playing like children, but the GUIDE TO BEING A
Other SF projects are imaginings are causing chaos in means used to lure in our WITCH (9 November,
covered: there’s an amusing the town of Stalkford, while heroes seem overly complicated Random House Children’s)
Dune anecdote about getting Nick – now an airline pilot as – and why on earth would you offers advice on subjects
like tending flocks and
the cold shoulder from David well as a writer – is imprisoned include deadly booby traps in dealing with elves.
Lynch. But it’s his account of a by the shadowy Nulltec. Can he the test set for Jamie? Naturally, Paul Kidby
working-class childhood in escape? What’s with the young Hines frames the story via provides the illustrations.
Mirfield, near Huddersfield – girl that seems to be haunting the same device used for a 1968 Finally, GHOSTS: THE
BUTTON HOUSE
no hot water, no bathroom, two him? And where is his editor repeat, with new companion
ARCHIVES (out now,
in a bed – and the violence he Roz in all of this? Zoe shown past events via a Bloomsbury) – written
witnessed his father meting out Like TerrorTome, this is telepathic display machine. by the creators of the
to his mother that’s most nominally three stories, but These regular intermissions supernatural sitcom –
captivating. Stewart credits this actually one rambling narrative. become rather unwelcome – compiles artefacts
related to the
short-tempered man (formerly Garth’s prose is as purple as did we really need a sandwich series’ spirits,
a sergeant major in the ever, Holness always finding break, for instance? from Thomas’s
Parachute Regiment) as an the right mix of astonishing He does a decent job of love letters
influence on Picard’s bearing. self-regard, casual sexism and fleshing the scripts out into and the
Captain’s
It’s an unpretentious bitterness in the character. prose, though. We’d say the
war
account, which never threatens The fact that it’s coming out results are indistinguishable journal
to become self-important; hot on the heels of the first from the work of a regular Who to
Stewart, a proud Yorkshireman book does slightly take away writer, except you can’t help Julian
whose upbringing left him (in from the impact of having but notice that practically every Fawcett
MP’s
Jonathan Frakes’s words) with Garth back, but he remains young woman Jamie dodgy
a “poverty mentality”, is far too singularly dreadful and encounters considers him expense
grounded for that. Ian Berriman hilarious company. Will Salmon a dish… Ian Berriman claims.

106 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 THE SFX AUTHOR
QUESTIONNAIRE

Cory
Doctorow

JOHNATHANWORTH.COM
The prolific SF author has a
very impressive famous fan…

What is your daily writing Which of your books was the great, but touring them all and
routine like? most difficult to write? getting them through production
I write 500 words every day Someone Leaves Town took the is leaving me unhealthily
when I’m working on a novel; I longest; I started it in a hotel room overextended.
write until I reach my limit and while inspired, wrote 8,000
stop mid-sentence so I have a few words, then revisited it two years Were you a keen reader when
“free” words to start with on the later and wrote the rest over a you were a child?
next day. year. When I got to the ending, I was, and I read many thousands
I discovered I hated what I had of books. I worked in bookstores
Describe the room in which planned. I moped for two weeks, and libraries. I didn’t really have
you typically write. then conceived an alternative faves per se, though I devoured the
When I’m home, I write in my ending. Having written that, I entire canons of Daniel Pinkwater,
backyard hammock, under the turned the manuscript over to William Gibson, Bruce Sterling
eaves. I’m on the road a lot (a third revise the whole thing to suit the and Octavia Butler.
to half of the year) and then I new ending, only to discover that
write wherever I am – subways, I’d foreshadowed it all along, What would be your desert
crouching next to airport lounge literally from the first page. island book?
AC outlets, escalators, etc. Never trust anyone who has
Got any writing “bad habits” a single favourite book. It’s
How do you deal with writers’ that you have to keep in check? inevitably either the Bible, Mein
block/the urge to procrastinate? Only writing too much. I write to Kampf or Atlas Shrugged. In Edward Snowden’s hand, as
My crucial realisation was that distract myself from stress, anxiety he’s packing up to flee Hong Kong,
even though some work feels like and upset. The pandemic years Recommend a book you love in the documentary Citizenfour.
it’s great at the time and other were hard for all of us; I ended up that’s not very well known.
work feels terrible, and even writing eight books. That was Daniel Pinkwater’s Alan What’s the most frustrating
though some of the work in Mendelsohn, The Boy From Mars. thing about being a professional
A childhood
retrospect is great and some It made me the mutant I am today. author?
favourite by
needs a rewrite, the two aren’t An extraordinarily small number
author Daniel
correlated. The major correlate of What’s the best gift you’ve of people control your career, and
M Pinkwater.
feeling like the day’s writing is received from a reader? a careless slip or arbitrary decision
poor is stress – work/personal My all-time favourite musician is on any of their parts can destroy a
conflict, low blood sugar, sleep David Byrne; he follows my work lifetime’s work.
deprivation. and we know each other slightly.
Following that realisation I can I recently had tickets to the first Any writing advice to share?
feel the absolute certainty that my and last Talking Heads reunion Write every day. Make it a habit.
work is terrible that day and write fall through, and he sorted me out Habits are free.
it anyway. It’s an anhedonic with replacements.
discipline with major The Lost Cause is out on
commonalities with cognitive Where’s the oddest place you’ve 16 November, published by Head
behavioral therapy. seen one of your books? Of Zeus.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 107

 COMICS

ULTIMATE INVASION
Shake-up Maker
apocalypse. While new Spider- unexpected source… If this is
RELEASED OUT NOW!
Publisher Marvel Comics
Man Miles Morales is the best
known, it’s the Maker – a
megalomaniacal version of the
sounding complicated and bizarre,
then Jonathan Hickman’s
presence as writer should make
VOID RIVALS
Writer Jonathan Hickman
Artist Bryan Hitch Fantastic Four’s Reed Richards sense, although his work here in RELEASED OUT NOW!
– who’s at the heart of the reviving an old concept isn’t as Publisher Skybound
ISSUES 1-4 Superhero comics love four-issue miniseries that kicks focused as his epic 2019 X-Men Entertainment/Image Comics
unexpected comebacks – and off this return. reboot. Instead, Ultimate Invasion Writer Robert Kirkman
there are few weirder or more When the Maker escapes from reads as yet another “villain Artist Lorenzo De Felici
convoluted than the return of imprisonment in the core Marvel creates a dark alternate Marvel
Marvel’s Ultimate universe. universe, he voyages into the universe” tale, one that’s ISSUES 1-4 Although it was

Created in 2000 as an accessible multiverse and executes a devious ambitiously stylish and well- inevitably spoiled online,
and modern reboot of Marvel plan. Finding a new alternate of paced, but which isn’t quite as stealth-releasing this
characters, the Ultimate universe the Marvel universe, he gripping as it needs to be – and apparently standalone new title
lasted 15 years, spawning manipulates events so that the also isn’t as much fun as the as the first salvo in Skybound’s
memorable classics like Ultimate majority of traditional Marvel similar recent X-Men saga Sins new Energon Universe was an
Spider-Man and The Ultimates, characters don’t exist, and starts to Of Sinister. ingenious masterstroke.
before eventually collapsing under engineer the resulting strange Ultimate Invasion has Beyond brief cameos from
the weight of its own continuity dystopia into a perfect society. Hickman’s wild imagination on its Jetfire in issue one and
and being phased out as part of He’s helped by that universe’s side, and also has Ultimates artist Shockwave in issue four,
2015’s universe-destroying Secret Iron Man (Howard Stark, Tony’s Bryan Hitch bringing a familiar Robert Kirkman wisely keeps
Wars event. father), but soon the Maker’s kind of intense detail and wild appearances by the Autobots
Only two major Ultimate strategy spins out of control cinematic style. What it hasn’t yet and Decepticons to a minimum,
characters survived this thanks to attacks from an delivered is a decent reason for instead weaving in characters
from the wider Transformers
Ambitiously lore, such as a Skuxxoid
freebooter and slippery alien
stylish, but not Slizardo. In contrast to the
as gripping as it shrill bombast of the
Transformers’ big-screen
needs to be outings, Void Rivals begins at
a refreshingly subdued pace.
rebooting the Ultimate universe Indeed, the first issue is
in the first place, beyond nostalgia essentially a two-hander,
and the dreaded “brand centred on two pilots from
recognition”. bitterly opposed races who
The original point of Marvel’s crash-land on a desolate remote
Ultimate comics was to be new- planet and are forced to work
reader-friendly, and this together in order to escape
introductory series – while their predicament. Agorrian
undeniably well-crafted and Darak and Zetonian Solila
entertaining – will be borderline uncover a conspiracy that has
gibberish to anyone who doesn’t implications not only for this
have a deep knowledge of Marvel book but the Energon line as
continuity. Maybe things will get a whole.
clearer with the upcoming With issue one’s double-page
Ultimate Universe one-shot spread of Darak and Solila first
special, which will properly removing their helmets
introduce the new Ultimate particularly impressing,
comics coming in 2024, but right Lorenzo De Felici proves to be
now this fascinatingly flawed equally adept at depicting the
reboot hasn’t yet fully justified its quieter moments as he is at
Where’s own existence. Saxon Bullock exhilarating action sequences.
Wally? Just There’s definitely more to this
joking, he’s Hickman will also be writing one of the
enthralling series than meets
new Ultimate comics, with his Ultimate
not there. Spider-Man series starting in January. the eye. Stephen Jewell

108 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

WORLD’S FINEST: DOCTOR WHO:
TEEN TITANS ONCE UPON A
RELEASED OUT NOW! TIME LORD
Publisher DC Comics
Writer Mark Waid RELEASED 7 NOVEMBER
Artist Emanuela Lupacchino Publisher Titan Comics
Breaking all
Writer Dan Slott
ISSUES 1-4 DC’s ever-popular kinds of health
Artists Christopher Jones,
band of teen superheroes are and safety
Matthew Dow Smith, Mike Collins
back again, in a new series that rules.
spins directly out of the current GRAPHIC NOVEL Dan Slott

RONIN: BOOK II
Batman/Superman: World’s helmed an impressive 10-year
Finest title. Here, we flashback run on Amazing Spider-Man,
to the early days of the Titans, and has written for characters
when the adolescent heroes like She-Hulk and the
were learning to work together, Avengers. He’s also a Doctor
delivering adventures that are
colourful, entertaining and
Frankly, disappointing Who fan, something that came
across in his run on Silver
(mostly) self-contained. Japanese warrior who’s Surfer. So Titan getting him to
The characters here are the RELEASED OUT NOW! reincarnated in a dystopian New write actual Who is a big deal.
original Titans – Robin, Kid Publisher Frank Miller Presents York. Evoking The Matrix – which Once Upon A Time Lord is
Flash, Aqualad, Wonder Girl, Writer Frank Miller Ronin predated by two decades – mainly focused on the Tenth
Bumblebee and Speedy – not Artists Philip Tan, Daniel Henriques, we’re reintroduced to Aquarius Doctor and Martha Jones as
the more familiar line-up from Frank Miller Corporation security chief Casey, they encounter the Pyromeths.
various animated shows, and who’s initially kept captive in a These baddies feed off stories
while there are overarching ISSUES 1-4 With its pioneering simulated virtual reality and now and, after capturing Martha,
plot threads (and an unnamed prestige format and creator- has a son. Like Casey’s father Billy force her to tell some tales to
villain lurking in the shadows), owned status, Frank Miller’s Challas, limbless host of the save her life. Yes, we’re in meta
these first four issues are Ronin arguably proved just as original Ronin, he’s confusingly territory, as Martha regales
refreshingly light on continuity. influential when it first appeared also called Billy. them with accounts of the
Veteran comics writer Mark in 1983 as The Dark Knight Returns With Casey and Billy setting off Doctor going fishing, on a quest
Waid makes this an easy a few years later. With its black on a quest to free Billy Sr from the to find an Osiran starship, and
jumping-on point for new and white art – mostly by Philip clutches of the evil AI Virgo, taking a trip to the underworld.
readers, while delivering plenty Tan and Daniel Henriques, with Miller stretches the plot too thin A backup story with the Ninth
of retro comics action and inter- Miller providing layouts over these first four issues, and the Doctor is fun but throwaway.
team conflict. He also adds throughout and full pencils for dialogue is often portentous and There’s a nifty twist that ties
modern elements (like archer issue four – this belated sequel overwritten. The highlight is a bow on the main Pyrometh
Speedy’s obsession with his can’t help but underwhelm. undoubtedly the artwork. With story, and Slott’s dialogue is
social media status) and keeps Although he includes some frequent double-page spreads, Tan strong throughout. Still, the
the storytelling frothy and additional background in is given plenty of opportunities to comic falls foul of Titan’s
fast-paced. subsequent issues, Miller throws cut loose, while Henriques’s tendency to overdo the
Adding to the energy is readers in at the deep end in issue moody tones are an adequate continuity references: on
Emanuela Lupacchino’s one; before diving in you’d be well replacement for Lynn Varley’s the first page alone there are
brilliantly expressive art, advised to brush up on the original lush painted colours of the cameos from multiple Doctors
which balances lively character series, which centred on a feudal original. With two issues left in and a companion from the
interactions with kinetic action this six-parter, hopefully Miller, audios. The art, meanwhile,
sequences. Together with You’d be well Tan and Henriques can bring this is fine, but rarely pops.
Waid’s light narrative touch, to a conclusion worthy of its Entertaining enough, but
this makes for a satisfying mix. advised to brush predecessor. Stephen Jewell with a writer like Slott you’d
More superhero comics should
be aiming for this level of
up on the original Ronin was originally going to be a Marvel
hope for something a little
more exciting and accessible
accessible fun. Saxon Bullock series graphic novel, until Miller was persuaded
that he’d have more freedom at DC. to newbies. Will Salmon

DECEMBER 2022 | SFX MAGAZINE | 109

 GAMES & STUFF

SPIDER-MAN 2
a faction of enemies that feel truly
formidable to brawl with – some
snipe from perches, others leap at
you with massive swords, and he
even has robo-hunting dogs.
Nothing short of spectacular These fights unfold as you
web-swing and web-glide (the
wingsuit is new to this entry) with
childhood friend Harry Osborne ease across a huge, lush rendition
RELEASED OUT NOW!
Reviewed on PS5
is seemingly cured of his chronic
illness thanks to an inky black
of New York City, bigger than ever.
You can now fight crime across the ASSASSIN’S
Publisher Sony

VIDEOGAME Superhero movie

ooze. But, naturally, that symbiotic
gunk turns out to be somewhat
venomous; all the while, Kraven
river in Brooklyn and beyond, with
the PS5’s fast-loading SSD
meaning you can really web across
CREED MIRAGE
grumblers, shift your focus. The the Hunter tears through New the districts without noticing. RELEASED OUT NOW!
PlayStation’s third Spidey game York to free supervillains, beef Pop-in Story missions, meanwhile, Reviewed on PS5
(2020’s smaller-scoped Miles them up, and then set them loose offer fantastic unique spaces Also available on PS4, Xbox One,
Morales was still phenomenal) for him to hunt and kill in the (there’s a lot less boring Xbox Series S|X, PC
is one of the best adventures the search for the ultimate game. warehouses than there were in Publisher Ubisoft
wallcrawlers have ever had. What’s great about this Spidey previous entries), including one
Peter Parker and Miles Morales universe isn’t just how it retells fantastic monumental scrap across VIDEOGAME While the last few

are now working side by side, and classic stories, but how it remixes Coney Island’s funfair. entries in this sci-fi tinged
neither is without their personal and reimagines them to tell them Given such great foundations, historical fantasy franchise
problems. Miles is using anew, all while being unafraid to it’s just a shame that by the time have seen you explore whole
crimefighting to procrastinate make events have huge Venom makes a proper appearance continents, Mirage’s Golden
about filling in college consequences for these versions of the game has run out of ideas for Age of Baghdad setting feels
applications, while Peter struggles the characters. Indeed, having the finale, ultimately settling into refreshing thanks to a more
to pay off the mortgage on his Miles as a foil to Peter’s symbiote much more generic and familiar focused approach.
family home – alongside juggling suit crankiness is a genuine boss-battle fare. Going from street urchin
his non-existent career and his revelation. Oscar Taylor-Kent thief to an initiate in the
presently on-again relationship The game introduces and tells a mysterious Hidden Ones (read:
Look out for a brief appearance by Delilah,
with Mary-Jane Watson. Things complete Kraven story. The villain the bartender from a deleted scene in
assassins), Basim finds himself
briefly look up when Peter’s is a constant scene-stealer, leading Across The Spider-Verse. returning to his home city to
unravel and ultimately cut the
puppet strings of the evil,
shadowy Order Of The
Ancients, who’ve taken
control in his absence.
Pleasingly, this has you
unfurling a large Investigation
Board of missions at pretty
much your own pace,
parkouring across rooftops and
streets as you go, with plenty of
hidden treasures in puzzle
box-like buildings to snaffle up.
With enough clues, you take
on a more detailed mission to
off a larger target. While
somewhat freeform, ultimately
it only gives you a few fairly
strict options to choose
between, unlike truer
sandboxes such as Hitman:
World Of Assassination.
Picking your way stealthily
through enemy camps has a
certain charm, but wonky AI
and clunky controls make it feel
old-fashioned in more ways
“No tongues” than one. Mirage is a mid-step
is never an on the way to Creed’s next
option with reinvention, and unfortunately
Venom. feels like it. Oscar Taylor-Kent

110 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

DOCTOR WHO
Carey and Keff cacophony
RELEASED 24 NOVEMBER by bored primary school children
52 minutes/76 minutes | CD/download in music lessons. It’s not hard to
Label Silva Screen Records imagine Hinchcliffe playing the
tape, hearing 30 seconds of
SOUNDTRACKS Silva Screen’s alternating drum bash/woodblock
sixtieth anniversary celebrations hit, and arching an eyebrow.
see them dusting off two TV Blyton also employs archaic into an
scores best described as “divisive”. wind instruments, the serpent and overpoweringly
Carey Blyton’s score for 1975 the ophicleide, to represent the brash synth
Tom Baker adventure “Revenge story’s two factions of alien bombardment, with
Of The Cybermen” Vogans, with results faintly dramatic stabs that are like
is so idiosyncratic that producer suggestive of an intestinal having a fork repeatedly poked in
Philip Hinchcliffe baulked at it, disturbance. Slightly reminiscent positioning in fan polls. No doubt your ear. He’s also horribly fond
with the Radiophonic Workshop’s of Jerry Goldsmith’s work on the music has its advocates too, of gimmicks, riffing on Ron
Peter Howell asked to rework Planet Of The Apes, it’s a but they need their ears testing. Grainer’s theme and deploying
material, overlaying electronic memorably strange score, To be fair, McCulloch put a naff settings on his Roland – you
sounds. Of Blyton’s original 37 bordering on avant garde. shift in: while Blyton repeatedly may find yourself howling, “No,
cues, only 16 were aired; and of “Memorable” can also be reworks core melodies, his themes not the Pan-pipes!” You could
Clarke’s alternative takes and ironically applied to Keff are multitudinous. Unfortunately simply shrug and say, “It was the
additions, seven of 27 were also McCulloch’s score for Sylvester many are better suited to a Big Fun ’80s”, but even then this was
left unused. McCoy’s debut “Time And The B-side; others are drippily fingers-in-ears stuff. Ian Berriman
Heavy on percussion, it makes Rani” – a story that’s lachrymose. Ambient sections are
Both CDs also have bonus tracks, including
extensive use of the scraper, an been reclaimed as a camp artefact, fine, but whenever there’s action improvisation from Blyton’s session musos
instrument usually only wielded but deserves its next-to-bottom on-screen, the score shifts gear and McCulloch’s theme tune demos.

SLAYERS
Once More, Without Buffy
too: it’s co-written and co-directed Drusilla are
RELEASED OUT NOW! by Amber Benson (Tara) and planning world
483 minutes | Download Christopher Golden, who wrote vampire
Publisher Audible about a zillion Buffy spin-off domination. Pretty
novels. soon our Spike,
AUDIO DRAMA Listening to Slayers: It’s set 10 years after the Buffy Clem and Giles are
A Buffyverse Story is a little like finale. Our world is full of Slayers, crossing realities,
watching Doctor Who’s “The with demons forming a resistance taking a new
Power Of The Doctor” – a lovely to fight them. Spike is a double young slayer,
nostalgia fest for hardcore fans, agent pretending to be evil, but Indira, with them.
but other listeners might be actually working for the Slayers. It’s kinda fun,
thinking, “Couldn’t they afford A great set-up, but one in which but far from the
proper stars?” Okay, we do get most of the returning characters slickest audiobook production. accents, and all the performances
James Marsters (Spike) and are unfortunately dead. The At nine hour-longish episodes it’s feel like they needed a bit longer
Anthony Stewart Head (Giles), but answer? An alternate dimension of way too long for its plot. The in rehearsal.
Buffy, Angel, Willow and Xander course, where Cordelia is the lone dialogue feels as if it’s about 50% However, there’s a bonkers
are all notable by their absence. Slayer, and an evil Tara and exposition. Some of the meta-gags energy to it, and moments where it
Still, if you value quantity over and cultural references are truly captures that old magic. Mainly
quality, this is great stuff: Cordelia,
Tara, Anya, wrinkly demon Clem,
Some of clunky, while a glut of comedy
supporting character voices leave
when the characters aren’t
explaining the plot to each other…
evil geek Jonathan and Giles’s love the cultural some scenes sounding like Fraggle Dave Golder
interest Olivia are all back, played
by the original actors. There’s
references are Rock. Both Marsters and Juliet
Landau (Drusilla) struggle to Although Oz doesn’t feature, Seth Green

authenticity behind the scenes, truly clunky maintain their faux-British

popped by during recording, as he was in
a booth elsewhere in the building.

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 111

 Blastermind
The SFX quiz

CRYPTIDS
How well do you know these creatures that lurk at the
edge of science? Put some Fort into your answers…
Quizmaster Nick Setchfield, Editor-at-large

QUESTION 1
In The Six Million Dollar Man,
which cryptid turned out to be a
cyborg created by aliens?

QUESTION 2
The Yeti in ’60s Doctor Who “The
Abominable Snowmen” were the
robot servants of which adversary?

QUESTION 3 QUESTION 4 QUESTION 8

2021 horror Antlers features
which demonic creature from
Native American folklore?

QUESTION 4 Picture Question

Identify this cryptozoological film
from the poster detail.

QUESTION 5
In the 1998 found-footage film The
Last Broadcast, which mythical
creature are the documentary QUESTION 12 QUESTION 16
crew searching for?
QUESTION 11 QUESTION 16 Picture Question
20 Man-Thing (by two months!)
The Black Lagoon 19 Robert Forster
QUESTION 6 Which legendary sea beast takes Identify the movie from this detail 17 A brontosaurus 18 Creature From
Doctor Who gave two competing on the Nautilus crew in 1954’s of the poster.
16 The Mothman Prophecies
14 Sarah Perry 15 Thunderbird
explanations for which classic 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea? Hendersons 13 Nigel Kneale
cryptozoological phenomenon? QUESTION 17 11 Giant squid 12 Harry And The
QUESTION 12 Picture Question
Chupacabra 10 Her dog is eaten
What kind of creature is the Kiel 8 What A Whopper 9 El
QUESTION 7 Name the movie. mokele-mbembe, featured in 6 The Loch Ness Monster 7 Richard
In Kolchak: The Night Stalker, Baby: Secret Of The Lost Legend? Boggy Creek 5 The Jersey Devil
3 The Wendigo 4 The Legend Of
which actor portrayed moss- QUESTION 13 1 Bigfoot 2 The Great Intelligence
covered bayou boogeyman Père Who wrote the screenplay for the QUESTION 18 Answers
Malfait? (Hint: think Bond.) Hammer film The Abominable Which classic 1954 cryptid movie
Snowman, based on his own directly inspired Guillermo del
QUESTION 8 Picture Question television play? Toro’s The Shape Of Water? How did you do?
Name this British comedy film.
QUESTION 14 QUESTION 19 Measure your sasquatch track
QUESTION 9 The myth of the Blackwater Beast Inspired by an urban legend, 0-5
Titchyfoot
What mythical beast is suspected haunts the pages of The Essex 1980’s Alligator featured which
6-10
of being involved in the X-Files Serpent – who wrote the novel? future star of Quentin Tarantino’s Smallfoot
episode “El Mundo Gira”? Jackie Brown? 11-15
QUESTION 15 Mediumfoot
QUESTION 10 Which member of the X-Men was QUESTION 20 16-19
Bigfoot
And what distressing event befalls named after a giant flying creature Which bog-dwelling creature
© ALAMY

Scully during their investigation of in indigenous North American appeared in print first – Marvel’s 20
Biggestfoot
the aquatic cryptid Big Blue? folklore? Man-Thing or DC’s Swamp Thing?

112 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

 NEXT ISSUE

SFX 373
ON S
1 D E C E A LE
MBER

NCUTI GATWA IS
THE DOCTOR!
MORE ART CARDS! MORE POSTERS! MORE EXCLUSIVES!
Celebrate Christmas with DOCTOR WHO

REBEL MOON
Zack Snyder’s sci-fi epic begins

A GHOST STORY
FOR CHRISTMAS
Getting spooky on set

AQUAMAN AND
THE LOST KINGDOM
Something fishy’s going on

WONKA
Timothée Chalamet’s Willy
unleashed
All contents are subject to change via inexplicable regeneration

DISCWORLD… and much,

much more!
JAMES PARDON, BBC

PLUS!
Festive killers! Comics!
A Yule cat!

Sign up to our monthly newsletter to receive a sneak preview! bit.ly/SFXnewsletter

DECEMBER 2023 | SFX MAGAZINE | 113

Total Recall Personal recollections of cherished sci-fi and fantasy

Radio Times’ Doctor Who 20th Anniversary Special

Darren Scott, Editor With, ahem, a little more expertise under my for my Mum for another 39 years, but given
Do you remember the before- belt I can see how truly dreadful the cover is, that I also got the Doctor Who Technical
times when you were blissfully but as a child it was beyond exciting. “A 20 Year Manual and some Doctor Who sweets that year,
unaware of dates, deadlines and Voyage Through Eternity”, by Ian Levine, listed I reckon she was already wise to it. Weirdly,
release schedules? My life must every story in order. That back page giving a apple chew bars always make me think of the
have been so completely hint at the season ahead! Witchcraft! Radio Times Anniversary Special.
carefree not having to anticipate anything I remember poring over the opening I quite literally read the magazine until it fell
other than weekly comics and annual events. double-page spread with a photo of producer apart in my hands years later. What was left of
So it was Christmas 1983 when a very special John Nathan-Turner in his office, looking at the pages lived in a binder before being lost to
magazine materialised in my Christmas every detail behind him, and devouring the A-Z time and eventually replaced with a pristine
stocking and blew my tiny little mind. of companions. I never really got Roger new copy. Now I’m nostalgic for a whole other
The Radio Times Doctor Who 20th Woddis’s poem, “Five Against The Fiends” – thing: the possibility that something magical,
Anniversary Special was only 64 pages, but sorry Rog. And Eric Saward’s short story “Birth new and previously unknown might just
even now the memory cheats at how big it was Of A Renegade” was so exciting to me as a materialise in my life one day. But then, isn’t
because of the wealth of information within. It youngster with no concept of canon. that the magic of Doctor Who?
was probably my gateway to the very magazine I genuinely think it unlocked something in
you’re reading today. My first issue of Doctor me: the Doctor Who Fan Gene, if you will. I’d Darren thinks it must be timey-wimey that this
Who Magazine followed a few months later. say it made Christmas and birthday gifts easy came out 40 years ago, as he’s only 39.

Fact Attack!
The success of the Radio Originally the magazine Colin Baker and Nicola The mag came with an Bizarrely, the Dalek on the
© RADIO TIMES

Times 10th Anniversary cost £1.50 (that’s about £6 Bryant appeared in the iconic poster of Peter back cover is a blue and silver
Special led to this publication; now). These days you should magazine, but not in costume, Davison, Janet Fielding and model from Madame
sadly a 30th anniversary be able to pick up a copy on as their characters hadn’t Mark Strickson, shot in mist Tussauds’ Doctor Who
special never followed. eBay for around £15. been seen yet. against a black background. Exhibition.

114 | SFX MAGAZINE | DECEMBER 2023

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