Tal and I have been rewatching Doctor Who for a few weeks now, so when I saw EMPIRE OF THE WOLF pop up on Netgalley I knew I had to request it. As soon as I was approved, I curled up to read it and it’s totally rekindled my love for reading Doctor Who content. As I write this, I’m listening to an anthology of short stories (12 Doctors, 12 Stories) and I’ve added a dozen more to my tbr. Oops.
Thanks to Titan Comics for the eARC of this book. It has not affected my honest review.
About the book:
When searching for his next adventure, the Eighth Doctor meets a strange young woman from another universe… Rose Tyler. He has no idea of the destiny they share, but makes it his mission to discover what brought her here, and how to get her home.
Meanwhile, the Eleventh Doctor is summoned by a mysterious empress plagued with visions of another life. It’s Rose Tyler, but not the one he knows! Hailing from an alternate timeline and trapped here alone, she has become a liberator, conqueror, and now empress. And when she finds out she’s not the only Rose in this universe, something must be done…All hail the Bad Wolf!
What did I think?
I’m very familiar with Nine onwards, but didn’t know much about Eight before reading this comic. I actually really liked the balance of Eight versus Eleven, especially in combination with the two Roses in this graphic novel. It worked very well, and I always enjoy Doctor and Doctor interactions. In this graphic novel, we also get to see an insight into TenToo and Rose’s life in the alternate universe, which I absolutely loved. We’d only recently rewatched Ten’s seasons, so it was nice to see this little scrap of her future.
I don’t know enough to say if Eight was in character, but Eleven definitely felt accurately portrayed – I could imagine Matt Smith saying his dialogue and all of his individual quirks were present. Rose was also well-written, and I liked that the two Roses were still very distinct characters. The art style was very pretty, though the character designs could have been a bit more distinct, and I liked the page design very much. It was dynamic and guided the eye very well, leading us through the story in a very readable way. I ended up reading the whole thing in one sitting.
Bad Wolf Rose is super interesting to see and I’d love to see more about her. Her character arc is fascinating and I do wish that there was more depth to her character. We get to see an excellent storyline where she deals with the moral consequences of her own actions, but I’d have liked to see more about how she became the Empress in the first place. A story about her rise to power would be fascinating and I’d like that a lot as a graphic novel.
Goodreads | Hive | Waterstones | Amazon | Book Depository
(may include affiliate links)
Release Date: May 3rd 2022
inkandplasma reviews 