left: The Doctor's mirror nemesis.

Synopsis:
The Toymaker warns that the Doctor must play his game since Stockbridge is literally in his hand. The Doctor informs Izzy that since Max and the real village are in danger, they must continue the game by returning by TARDIS to the fake Stockbridge. Once there, they come across the Toymaker's celestial toyroom, in the shape of a Lego castle in the clouds.

As they ascend the castle's stairway, the Doctor explains to Izzy they are in a conduit to the Toymaker's power source, in which he has total control of the elements. The main gate slams down, trapping them inside. The Doctor realizes that the Focus is the key and asks Izzy for Jane's, the book of artifacts. Izzy dons her reading glasses and reads aloud about how the sunburst motif on the Focus was a symbol of extraterrestrial power during the crusades and is still used by branches of the mysterious Knights Templar. She reminds the Doctor that Felix and Marwood were Templars, when the latter appears on a landing above them.

Marwood, dressed in armor, explains that he now serves a different cause and the Doctor accuses him of cowardice. Marwood tells how the Templars are no more and that their ancient treasures were passed to him by blood. He, however, lost them to the Toymaker in a hand of Canasta. Felix, he explains, betrayed him by stealing the Focus for the Templars and Marwood says that his new master has given him wonderful new toys. The Doctor warns that Marwood himself is now a plaything, but the knight disagrees and manipulates a remote control to order an army of decaying dolls to attack the Doctor and Izzy.

Izzy cries out for help as she is surrounded, but Marwood selects a button that opens the floor, dropping the Doctor into a pit of dangerous snakes. Not amused, he climbs up a ladder and finds himself before the Toymaker. Marwood stands nearby, Max hangs from a cage and Izzy is suspended from a noose. The Toymaker welcomes the Doctor to his house of fun, which is filled with various game pieces.

The Toymaker instructs the Doctor that he shall play a game of Hangman, in which the scaffold supporting Izzy will appear piece-by-piece as the Doctor makes wrong guesses in trying to ascertain a five-letter word. If he loses, the Focus will be forfeit for Izzy's life. The Doctor proceeds to make a number of wrong guesses and the scaffold assembles itself around Izzy, who pleads that the Doctor's next guess be a good one. The Doctor decides things have gone far enough and tosses the Focus to the Toymaker, who chides the Doctor for being no fun and reveals the word to be "mercy." He orders Marwood to cut her down and Izzy prods the knight to make haste.

The Toymaker then pulls a sheet from a mirror-like device he calls the Imagineum, which was built by an ancient race of alchemists and is missing the Focus, a component part. The device fell to Earth in a spacecraft, which was looted by the Templars. The Toymaker boasts that he, unlike the Templars, knows the mirror's potential. He places the Focus within a depression in the frame and energy bursts forth, knocking the Doctor to the ground. The Toymaker describes how after the Doctor cheated him to win their last game and banished him into nothing (in the televised 1st Doctor story The Celestial Toymaker) he began to search for a champion with the Doctor's same prowess. Then, he discovered the Imagineum, which converts raw light into matter. From the mirror steps the Doctor's new nemesis, a large and distorted version of himself.

Comments:
Visually, this part is extremely appealing. The Toymaker's realm provides surreal treats, such as the horrific dolls and the Lego-like castle. Wonderful and thick inks add to the creepy atmosphere, especially in the snakes and ladders pit. The facial expressions are very good this time around and the Doctor looks very much like Paul McGann, the actor who portrayed him.

The Toymaker's larger-than-life game is darkly fascinating and surprising, with the Templars adding an intriguing tie to medieval lore. The Doctor's portrayal is very strong and true to that presented in the telefilm and Izzy continues to entertain with her bold wit.
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This part of the story contains a boxed literary quote from T. H. Huxley's Lay Sermons.

Other Features This Issue:
The John Nathan-Turner Memoirs, Chapter 10; Doctor Who's future, Part 1; Paul McGann interview; PanoptiCon 1996; Archive: The Time Warrior; Pennant Roberts interview, Part 1; 20 forgotten TARDIS functions.