UNDERWORLD

[Tony]

Here we are discussing Terrance Dicks' novelization of UNDERWORLD! If you want to hear your review of or comments on this book read on the air, or you have a specific question about the book, please post it here by no later than 5pm CST on Friday, August 13!

[Damon]

Not one of the TV stories I remember very well but this book is okay again lots of tunnels instead of corridors to run down.

Another computer gone rogue so not the most inventive story plot.

A good ending as well 3 stars.

[Michael]

One of the few Tom/Louise era Target books I had in my collection, simply because I kept missing it on my local PBS station. Given the unlimited budget of my imagination and the lack of dodgy CSO effects, I found myself liking it a good bit back in the day.

Years later, I've finally seen the story and was whelmed by it -- didn't love it, didn't hate it. It's just kind of there.

The adaptation is better than I remembered -- it kind of feels like Dicks has taken a bit more interest or had a bit more time than usual. Maybe that's just the sum-up-the-backstory prologue talking or this one is actually better than I recall.

The final episode feels fairly condensed on the printed page, possibly because it's just so many battles between various parties that can be easily summed up in a paragraph or two.

I can't help but feel like this one takes one of the themes of classic Star Trek with a computer that is bent upon keeping and maintaining its power and status within a society that seems to be stuck in neutral. Indeed, the Doctor pulls his own version of Captain Kirk using illogical logic to defeat said computer in the final pages -- though in this case, it's the Doctor pulling the old switch the McGuffin trick instead.

I gave this one three stars on my review -- rounding up a bit for the Louise Jameson narration, which was quite solid.