By Owen Quinn author of the Time Warriors and Zombie Blues
The planet Utopia is everything its name suggests – a world of incomparable beauty and leisure. An adult playground on a planetary scale.
What the travel brochures do not tell of is that there is a very dark side to paradise. Utopia is a world of shattered dreams with a tragic past, and its owner will do anything necessary to keep that past hidden. Arigh Boke is not a man to be crossed, and will not tolerate upstarts.
But Arigh Boke has never met the crew of the Starhawk.
Jesse Forster and his team have arrived on Utopia for some much needed rest, but a ghost from Jesse’s past is about to help sow the seeds of revolution among Utopia’s downtrodden, pitching the crew of the Starhawk into full-scale rebellion. They are about to teach Arigh Boke the meaning of the word “wreck-reation.”
Posted by Owen Quinn author of the Time Warriors and Zombie Blues
Though more than a quarter-century has passed since the end of the last war, the Galactic Confederation is still busy picking up the pieces. Whole sectors of the galaxy remain lawless, rife with corruption and greed. The criminal element has a well-established foothold on these sectors.
It is a good time to be a bounty hunter.
Jesse Forster and the crew of the STARHAWK are some of the best bounty hunters in the business. Kayla Karson is a young independent hunter out to make a name for herself. Their paths collide as both take up pursuit of the leaders of the Nexus Gang, the galaxy’s most brutal crime syndicate. An uneasy alliance is formed as the two undertake the most difficult hunt of their careers. Great rewards are to be claimed, if they don’t kill each other in the process.
Posted by Owen Quinn author of the Time Warriors and Zombie Blues
The Phantasmagoria Special Edition Series #3: M.R. James. Featuring M.R. James, Ramsey Campbell, Stephen Gallagher, Stephen Jones, Mark Morris, Adam L. G. Nevill, Kim Newman and more! With artwork from Randy Broecker, Dave Carson, Peter Coleborn, Les Edwards, Stephen Jones, Allen Koszowski, James McBryde, Jim Pitts and G.C.H. Reilly, and fiction by M.R. James, Ramsey Campbell, Adam L. G. Nevill, David A. Sutton, Johnny Mains, Raven Dane, Dean M. Drinkel, Joe X. Young, Barnaby Page, Con Connolly and Frank Coffman.
Posted By Owen Quinn author of the Time Warriors and Zombie Blues
On the outskirts of Belfast in the late 1980s, a thirteen-year-old boy finds his life irrecoverably changed when he becomes embroiled in a mystery connected to the violent death of a young woman, centuries old witchcraft trials, a sinister ice-cream van, and an otherworldly entity known only as Mr. Needlesticks…(Cover by Adrian Baldwin)
Posted By Owen Quinn author of the Time Warriors and Zombie Blues
A comical homage to a city ablaze with recreational rioting where everyone’s fired up with their own twisted agenda. Tommy Bridge, a cop who’s known hard times, now armed with a yoga mat, a Glock and his own – slightly suspect – moral code, is out to seek revenge. Clark Wallace, criminal Kingpin and riot choreographer is on the rampage. Jimmy McAuley, a stoned student who wanders into the wrong place at the wrong time ends up going viral. Grace Doran, investigative journalist with conflicted morals, is good at her job but is she out to get more than the truth behind the events?
By Owen Quinn author of the Time Warriors and Zombie Blues
Photo copyright BBC
Every week Owen looks back at a character from Doctor Who, some you’ll recall, others you won’t, but all were important to the story of our favourite time-traveller…
To date the only known living relative of the Doctor, Susan, played by Carole Ann Ford, was his granddaughter.
We first met her as a mysterious super pupil attending Coal Hill School where her knowledge drew the attention of two of her teachers.
They followed her home to a junkyard where they found a police box and an old man who they believed was holding Susan prisoner. But the truth was far more amazing as they were hurtled into time and space.
Susan’s heritage should have made her a strong independent character in her own right but the newly formed Tardis family saw her fill the role of surrogate daughter to Ian and Barbara (next week’s Heroes). As the stories progressed, Susan became little more than a screamer and was the victim of many a sprained ankle.
Fiercely protected by her grandfather, she was the bridge between their human passengers and the Doctor. She saw a kindred spirit in humanity which the Doctor had not yet embraced. Susan was always intended as the reason young people watched the show, someone they could identify with. She was a frightened young girl in most stories, eager to see the uninverse and show it off to her friends but the character focus was mostly on Ian, Barbara and the Doctor.
Occasionally, her telepathic abilities were touched upon such as the recently released DVD story The Sensorites. It gave Susan a depth and a purpose that was rarely utilised and here we saw a glimpse of the powerful character she could have been if written properly.
In human terms, she was approximately fifteen-years-old and she claimed she and the Doctor were exiles cut off from their own world for reasons unknown. She was the only link the Doctor had to his home so it seemed very strange that at the end of the Dalek Invasion of Earth, the Doctor locked her out of the Tardis claiming she had to settle down and find roots with the freedom fighter David Campbell whom she had fallen in love with.
His decision haunted him and years later when he learned how to pilot the Tardis, it seemed strange the Doctor never went back to see her.
copyright Bbc
She did return in the twentieth anniversary story the Five Doctors where she was teamed with Turlough and contributed little else except sprain her ankle but she did finally face the Cybermen.
Though we have met Jenny, a girl created from the Doctor’s D.N.A. and the jury is still out whether the woman in the End of Time was actually his mother but none will ever have the connection Susan had.
Of course, Susan reappeared in novels which used the alien part of her to great effect like the Witch Hunters and when, in Legacy of the Daleks, the 8th Doctor returns to Earth after the Dalek Invasion. Susan is separated from David now and hides her aging with make-up. However, the Master has returned to revive hidden nests of Daleks left over from the invasion. In the end, Susan manages to steal his Tardis, leaving the Master hideously deformed leading into the fourth Doctor adventure the Deadly Assassin.
But in the Big Finish world we see a different life. The eighth Doctor makes another visit to Earth and discovers Susan alive and well and hiding a secret. The Doctor has a grandson, played by Paul McGann’s real life son. In it we get to see something we have never seen before with the Doctor; family dynamics where he wants to take his grandson and show him the universe but Susan objects vehemently.
The story is further explored in the McGann final story in the 8th Doctor range when the Daleks again invade 22nd century Earth. But this time the Doctor is joined by his granddaughter, his grandson, the Meddling Monk and Lucie Miller as the race to save Earth is on.
Carole Ann has also completed several Companion Chronicles for the series highlighting adventures during and before her time on the show.
Maybe we will get to see Susan again in the new series but according to the Doctor all the Time Lords are dead. But he has been wrong before; Master anyone? This adds a new dimension to the Time War. Was Susan recalled to help fight or did the Doctor change her to be human to keep her safe as in the Family of Blood? Though these may be questions for fan fiction to answer in the future, for now all we can do is speculate…
You can’t choose your family-a major career obstacle for DS Shannon McNulty when she takes up a post with the Police Service of Northern Ireland. The move back to her hometown of Warrenpoint following a decade on the force in London coincides with the untimely death of her gangster uncle, Brendan. Now Shannon must balance an unofficial investigation into her uncle’s shooting with her first case for the PSNI. Swift resolution to the disappearance of a politician’s daughter could lead to a stellar career as a Belfast detective. But if she fumbles juggling family and job, she’ll lose everything.
By Owen Quinn author of the Time Warriors and Zombie Blues
Once again we look back at the history of Doctor Who and pick out one of the people that helped define one of sci-fi’s most enduring characters…
copyright BBC
Doctor Grace Holloway, played by Daphne Ashbrook, was one of those limited number of companions that oversaw one of the Doctor’s regenerations. In fact, she was the first companion ever to be directly responsible for killing the Doctor and triggering his regeneration.
Shot down in a hail of bullets in San Francisco on Millennium Eve, the seventh Doctor is rushed to hospital where he undergoes emergency surgery. Despite his pleas not to administer drugs , Grace goes ahead and his alien biology reacts badly with her work, killing him instantly.
When we meet Grace she is attending the opera, being a fan of Puccini, and has a boyfriend who expects her to stay at home more rather than be a doctor on call. She is devastated at the loss of her patient but knows something is wrong. The x-rays showed he had two hearts but when her bosses burn the evidence and tell her to forget the whole thing she quits.
Unbeknownst to her, a newly regenerated Doctor has followed her and hides in the back of her car, being led there by her CD of Puccini. She thinks he is crazy until he pulls the surgical wire out of his side that caused his death.
Taking him home, she finds her boyfriend has moved out taking all her furniture but there is no time to think about that as the Doctor tells her the Master is somewhere nearby.
It’s not long before the Doctor remembers who he is and Grace becomes the first companion to be kissed on the lips by him, a great source of controversy at the time by fans who declared the Doctor wouldn’t do that sort of thing. If only they knew what would happen in the new era.
Grace falls for the Doctor completely and has no hesitation in following him when he discovers the Master has entered the Tardis and has opened the Eye of Harmony, the power source of the ship.
He realizes the master intends to open the Eye, completely restoring himself but the Earth will be sucked in completely and destroyed.
Before the end of the adventure, Grace is taken over by the Master, having been infected by the same black substance that he has become in order to possess bodies and killed outright. But in another twist that had fans crying, the Doctor reversed time and brought her back to life. If only Adric had been so lucky.
Since Grace was obviously in love with the Doctor, it’s strange she didn’t follow him into the Tardis for a new life. Maybe if the show had gone to a series as intended, that would have changed.
Daphne Ashbrook has returned to Big Finish, albeit as a different character, but you never know with them whether Grace will board the Tardis again.
However, her story didn’t end there; in the comic strip adventure The Fallen she returned. In the movie the Doctor had a habit of telling people about their future and teasing them and he told Grace she would do great things. In the Fallen she finds some of the Master’s essence and believes she can create a cure for all diseases from it but it takes on a life of its own and nearly destroys every living thing in London. The Doctor’s anger about this is silenced when she says it’s his fault for telling her she would do great things. She thought this would be a good thing to help the world and maybe if he had kept his mouth shut it would never have happened.
Grace again refused to go with him, though they did kiss again.
So, for a one-time companion, Grace had a lot happen to her and her time was truly filled with firsts…
By Owen Quinn author of the Time Warriors and Zombie Blues
When I created the Time Warriors cast, Jacke was the first and most defined character of the four. Jacqueline ‘Jacke’ Baker was a black girl born and bred in Belfast. Her natural beauty belays a humble soul ready to help out anyone thanks to her upbringing. She was to empower and break stereotypes. I don’t think there are any Irish black people in science fiction never mind from Belfast. My intention was to reflect our changing times where the world is becoming more international than ever before. As a child Jacke had been abused by a family friend and I wanted to get the message across to any kid in that situation that there is hope. So I surrounded Jacke with a solid family and friends. Her parents, Rupert and Marlene are fiercely protective of their brood with Marlene being a force to be reckoned with just like her daughter. Jacke took her experience and refused to let it beat her. Instead she went to Queen’s University to study psychology to work with traumatised kids. She uses that same fight to battle alongside Varran against all the strange creatures and villains the Time Warriors encounter. She is a martial artist and designed to be the calm centre of the four characters. She is the reasonable one and steps in when Michael and Varran have a huge argument. My intention was to reflect our changing times where the world is becoming more international than ever before.
Jacke is also a tribute to the first lady I ever fell in love with; Star Trek’s Nichelle Nicholsaka Uhura. This beautiful lady captivated me as a kid watching the show and Jacke was created in not only her honour but for all other ladies of colour that followed in strong leads. If Jacke can have half the impact on the audience that Nichelle had then I’ll be a happy man.
Jacke for me represents the heart of the Time Warriors. When she is crippled by terrible nightmares when helping the Mordan colony we learn for the first time her past. Her past is the colony childrens’ present and she is subconsciously linked to their silent cried for help. When the Lothari come to rescue the children, Jacke goes with them to help ease the children into a pain free life. She returns weeks later once her task is accomplished but she is very stalwart in what is the right and moral thing to do.
We also learn that th Baker women share an empathic link that can warn them when one of them is in trouble as seen in Experiment Four. Attacked by giant jellyfish, Jacke’s mother has a vision her daughter is in trouble and calls her. The mobile phone ringing is enough to allow them to escape being killed. This link is further explored in Homecoming hen Jacke’s grandmother, veronica, dies. Grief stricken, Jacke quits the Time Warriors as she feels guilty her grandmother died alone. She feels she has spent too long looking out for the universe while neglecting her own loved ones. Veronica comes to her in a dream and gives her a talking to about quitting. Jacke rejoins the others at the story’s conclusion. She is almost killed by mutant jellyfish in Experiment Four, argues on behalf of humanity in Return To Eden and manages to realise they have all been infected by a nerve gas which is making them turn on each other in Meltdown.
In Tempest Jacke is apparently killed but has been in fact kidnapped by the Family, renegade Xerebans trying to make the Earth a new power base. Using all their own people with latent mental powers, the Family implanted each of them with a chip that reduced them to mindless drones ready to carry out their orders. Again Marlene realises Jacke is not dead after all and storms off to find her daughter.
In Venom Jacke reveals she has now bought her grandmother’s house and has a new boyfriend, Stephen. On his first adventure they are both turned into vampire drones. She is afraid that the experience will drive him off bit not so. Not only does he stick with her but Stephen moves in. She is Varran’s confidant as he tells her about a lost love in Trinity and is hurled with Michael into a future where the Xereban people have been exposed because of something she and Michael did. Battling friends and foes alike she must find a way to restore the timeline.
In The Skull Jacke is kidnapped to be fed to a regenerating Veldrox and faces down the Mentara in The Belbridge Mystery.
Jacke is a vital part of the stories and the team. What the future holds for her, who knows? I know this; I truly hope Jacke joins the likes of Uhura, Dayne from blake’s 7, Jackie Brown, Michael Burnham, Oda Mae Brown and Martha Jones amongst others. I certainly hope some kid scared of the dark will read her story and find the darkness is not as scary as it once was. I hope they look up and see that helping hand and smile that will ignite the light within them to defeat the darkness. It’s all any writer wishes for his characters.
The Time Warriors and Beyond 