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Lacks Planning

By:David Layton, Los Angeles, United States
Date:Sunday 4 August 2024
Rating:   6

Justin Richards' Theatre of War is one of those "idea" stories that fans often have when they get together and spend too much time talking. "What if," someone suddenly blurts out, "You had a society that was all about love of theatre!" Then all agree what a swell idea that would be. And so, Richards has given us this "idea," a society dedicated to all things theatrical. To make it "Doctor Who," Richards has made the theatrical society into bloodthirsty conquerors of many planets, with a kind of Italian Renaissance governmental structure, with all the political machinations to go with it. That may be because, at heart, once Richards settled on theatre as the motif, he just had to make it all Shakespearean. To get the reader into this tragedy, Richards has started with an investigation. Archaeologists from the Heletian Empire (Theatre World) are investigating the last remaining structure on Menaxus, a specialized and famous theatre in which the only known full performance of a famous 24th-century (or some such future date) play, in the manner of Shakespeare, took place. The Heletian Empire is now under siege, losing world after world in a war gone horribly wrong for them, and even Menaxus is under threat from the war. The TARDIS crew get involved when they drop off Bernice at a vast private library known as the Braxiatel Collection, where she runs into one of the investigators into Menaxus, who intrigues her curiosity. She wiggles her way into the new archaeological survey team. However, things are getting weird on Menaxus, and people start dying. Bernice hits the panic button (quite literally) and thus The Doctor and Ace join her for the rest of the story.

The novel would be fine as a general run-of-the-mill Doctor Who story. At more than 300 pages, though, the novel demonstrates the theatre-mad society cannot work and really makes no sense. The plotting is also filled with contrivances and coincidences just to keep things running. It's too preposterous for its own good. The novel does have some good points. The Doctor, Bernice, and Ace are well characterized, though I still find Ace too soldiery in a clichéd way. Their dialogue fits the characters well. One can also give credit to Richards for running the conceit through to the end.



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