The Official Doctor Who Annual 2020.

Books Can we talk briefly about this year's Doctor Who Annual? It certainly looks the part, although we could quibble about the font which is a bit too 1980s futro, although it makes a change from Helvetica.



When the second revival annual was published for Christmas 2007, it contained a reprint of a comic strip from the second issue of Doctor Who Adventures.

Russell T Davies was furious and said later that he made sure that all future annuals under his watch would contain original content.  I'll find a citation for this when it isn't Christmas.

Although the annuals have been of variable quality in the meantime, it's still true that they've stuck to this approach, with 2019 offering a stupendous comic strip with cameos from all the old Doctors.

Scroll through to this year's book and we get a basic synopsis of each of the episodes from the last series, which kids will have already watched endlessly, a couple of pages of puzzles and some text stories, except both the text stories, however nicely illustrated are reprints.

A chapter from David Solomons' The Secret in Vault 13 and one of the stories from Twelve Angels Weeping by Dave Rudden both of which are over a year old which means a young fan may already have received them under the tree last Christmas.

If this was me I'd be somewhat disappointed, however nice the accompanying pictures.

But to make matters worse, both include small adverts for the books themselves which means that parents have shelled out £7.99 (RRP) for the printed equivalent of some free Kindle samples.

Imagine if the 1976 annual had included excerpts from the Genesis of the Daleks and Revenge of the Cybermen novelisations instead of The Sinister Sponge or The Hospitality on Hankus.

Are future fans likely to look back at this 2020 volume with such fond nostalgia?

How did this happen?

Was the commissioning budget for the book so low they couldn't afford to pay someone for new material.  I notice the book doesn't have any editorial credits which makes me wonder if it was created by someone outside of the usual Doctor Who editorial line.

With some much amazing Doctor Who fiction floating around now, it's sad to see what should be and is one of the flagship publications reduced to this poor relation of previous triumphs.

Happy Christmas!