Doctor Who: The Iron Legion

By (author): "Steve Moore, Pat Mills, John Wagner, Dave Gibbons"
Publish Date: July 1st 1980
Doctor Who: The Iron Legion
ISBN1904159370
ISBN139781904159377
AsinDoctor Who: The Iron Legion
CharactersThe Fourth Doctor, The Doctor
Original titleThe Iron Legion (Doctor Who Graphic Novels)
SeriesDoctor Who Graphic Novels: The Fourth Doctor #1, Doctor Who Magazine Graphic Novels #1, Adventures of the 4th Doctor #15
The Doctor visits a small English town to stock up on jelly babies, but finds it under attack by robot Roman legionnaires from an alternate timeline. The TARDIS falls through the “dimensional duct” to the alternate Rome, where the Doctor is interrogated by the robot General Ironicus. When he refuses to give up the secrets of time travel, he is thrown to the Ecto-Slime in the arena, and when he survives that ordeal he is made a slave on the Imperial War Galley. A cyborg slave named Morris helps the Doctor to escape, and they make their way to the Imperial palace, which is actually an alien spacecraft. There, the oldest robot in Rome, Vesuvius, leads them to the temple of the gods, whom the Doctor recognizes as the evil alien Malevilus. Morris is killed by robot guards as the Doctor escapes, but with Vesuvius’ help the Doctor finds and releases the Bestiarus, genetically engineered and unstable super-soldiers. As they spread havoc throughout Rome, the Doctor confronts Magog, the leader of the Malevilus, who has taken the form of Juno, the Emperor’s mother. Magog kills Ironicus for his failure, and tortures the Doctor, who uses the television cameras in the Imperial box to broadcast Magog’s true form to the people of Rome. The Romans rise up against their evil gods, but Magog, certain that this setback is only temporary, forces the Doctor to take it to the TARDIS and explain how to operate it. The Doctor tricks Magog into operating a control which traps it in a pocket dimension within the TARDIS. The other Malevilus, trying to escape from the rebels, discover too late that Magog has drained all the power from their ship, which crashes and explodes upon take-off.