The First Doctor Novelisations: Galaxy Four (1985)

Doctor Who: Galaxy Four: Number 104 in the Doctor Who Library
by William Emms

My last first Doctor novelisation brings us to Galaxy Four and the 1980s. This is a third and final stage in the progression through novelisations I've been chronicling here. First we had the three that were books first and novelisations second, ones designed to just be Doctor Who in a world where the show could not be rewatched: The Daleks (1964), The Zarbi (1965), The Crusaders (1966). Then we had two from an era where the first Doctor was no longer the Doctor, but still ones designed to fill in significant parts of the show's history for viewers a decade later: The Tenth Planet (1976), The Dalek Invasion of Earth (1977). Now we're into the third and final stage: gap filling. Galaxy Four is not a major piece of Doctor Who lore or even a minor one; by 1985, it is simply a story that has not been novelised yet and thus needs to be. In publication order, the first Doctor novelisations that preceded and followed this were The Gunfighters and The Savages. Hardly Doctor Who's greatest hits.

Originally published: 1985
Acquired: July 2008
Read: August 2024

But the value of this service cannot be understated. This is a story I have not seen, not the animation, not even the single existing episode, so the entirety of it was new to me (though I was familiar with the broad strokes of the plot from reading many reference guides over the years). Now I very rarely come to an novelisation having not seen the story, but in this case, my approach was much like that of the audience of 1985.

What we have here is a fairly solid read, if a bit creaky. It's a decent showing for the Doctor, Vicki, and Steven. Emms adds in a bunch of small introspective moments on the part of the Doctor (more on those later), most of which worked well for me. Neither Vicki nor Steven get big moments, but they do their bits well, Emms showcasing Vicki's curiosity and compassion, and Steven's determination and cleverness throughout the story. 

The fundamental idea that the gross alien monsters turn out to be the good guys is a decent ones... but undermined by the fact that the Drahvins are so clearly baddies from the moment they first appear. And even by the standards of Doctor Who science, it doesn't seem like Emms has a very good grasp of, well, anything. Do planets blow up and take their stars with them? Why is the first chapter called "Four Hundred Dawns"? This number of dawns is at no point alluded to in the text. And, to be honest, I'm not convinced very much actually happens here. The characters move back and forth between two crashed spaceships a lot; the Doctor pumps some power into one of them; the end.

But like I said up top, this is the first first Doctor novelisation I've read (for this project) from the 1980s. By this time, fans and Doctor Who creators alike had a much deeper sense of Doctor Who as something with a continuity. While Terrance Dicks did some minor smoothing out in Dalek Invasion and Gerry Davis was willing to tweak the details of The Tenth Planet a bit, this is the first time I've seen a writer really take what was established later on and fold it back into the original Doctor's run. I'm sure some purists found these annoying, but I rather enjoyed them. Emms anticipates The Tenth Planet by depicting a Doctor who's aware that his body is running out of steam; he even draws on the Pertwee era in mentioning his multiple hearts. There are lots of little references to this being just one of many bodies the Doctor can have, and indeed, Emms anticipates "The Timeless Children" by making it clear this isn't his first body; there's a bit where the Doctor notes that he's never bothered to register how tall he is in this incarnation! Emms does a good bit of capturing the cosmic perspective of a Time Lord.

That's it; this catches me up on all the first Doctor novelisations I owned, plus ones that got modern reprints. In three months, I'll move on to the Doctor Who book I've owned the next longest without having read it, which is Doctor Who and the Ark in Space. Like I did here, I'll use that as an opportunity to read all the fourth Doctor novelisations I own or that have received modern publications. See you all in November!

Every three months, I read the unread Doctor Who book I've owned the longest. Next up in sequence: Doctor Who and the Loch Ness Monster