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  1. Entertainment

Doctor Who: The Spear Of Destiny REVIEW

BOOK REVIEW Pertwee goes pilfering

Reviews
By sfx
Published 22 March 2013

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Why you can trust GamesRadar+ Our experts review games, movies and tech over countless hours, so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about our reviews policy.

Doctor Who: The Spear Of Destiny book review .

Puffin’s 50th Anniversary ebook range by “big-name writers” is turning out to be a series of underwhelming vignettes by YA authors you’ve probably never have heard of.

This story starts promisingly, as the Third Doctor and Jo come up against machine gun-toting museum guards, but goes a tad trad once they head to the second century to take a second crack at pinching the titular magical MacGuffin, this time from the Vikings.

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Marcus Sedgwick nails Pertwee’s patrician speech patterns (it’s all “My dear” and “Old boy”), but other continuity points are obvious or unwelcome. You won’t need to know your Norse to guess the identity of a mystery antagonist, and the fact that a TARDIS function not mentioned until the Davison era ultimately saves the day feels oddly anachronistic.

Calvin Baxter

Read our Doctor Who press launch report .
Watch the Doctor Who new series trailer
Read our JN-T biography review .

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SFX Magazine is the world's number one sci-fi, fantasy, and horror magazine published by Future PLC. Established in 1995, SFX Magazine prides itself on writing for its fans, welcoming geeks, collectors, and aficionados into its readership for over 25 years. Covering films, TV shows, books, comics, games, merch, and more, SFX Magazine is published every month. If you love it, chances are we do too and you'll find it in SFX.

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