The latest issue of DWM's Doctor Who Chronicles covers the year 1988. This saw the broadcast of the series' 25th anniversary season. This is the first issue to cover a year in which there wasn't a lot of televised Doctor Who. The series consisted of only 14 episodes, making up just four stories - Remembrance of the Daleks, The Happiness Patrol, Silver Nemesis and The Greatest Show in the Galaxy.
The worry might be that this issue would struggle to fill its 116 pages - but such fears are unfounded.
We have all the usual features we've now come to expect - a diary / summary of the programme through the year, its media impact, visual effects, studio / location filming, merchandise, and what else people were watching that year.
There was no annual this year, so merchandise covers Target novels, VHS releases and Dapol figures. The DWM comic strip art is considered.
There are also features on fandom, which was becoming more "professionalised" in the later 1980's, with some high quality fanzines like The Frame.
The page count allows for some slightly more in-depth making-of features on the Dalek and Happiness Patrol stories.
Every classic Doctor has now had a release, apart from Colin Baker, so presumably 1985 or 1986 will be the next release, unless they give us another more recent year. I've noticed that the 2007 issue is still on sale on the Panini website. Did they produce more of this, thinking David Tennant always sells, or has it just not sold as well? I suspect the latter.
Maybe it's because I was there at the time, but it is the classic era which has the added nostalgia value for me. I simply don't have the same feelings for the post 2005 series, even though it is nearly two decades old. I think it was all too well documented at the time. I did buy the 2007 issue, but am in two minds about purchasing any more Nu-Who ones, concentrating purely on 1963 - 1989.
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