Every Geek needs their Lair; that space that leaves the Real World behind and has got your identity stamped all over it. Batman’s Bruce Wayne has the Batcave, Superman has his Fortress of Solitude and Geekhood’s Archie has his Lair, known imaginatively as ‘The Lair’.

But trying to create something like this is beyond most of us:

So we need to work with what we’ve got and what we can afford, so let’s look at some simple ways you can geek up your bedroom.

1)    Decoupage. I know; it sounds like something you might do with a horse. But decoupage is a stunningly simple way to geek up even the weariest piece of furniture into something that states your geekhood, in whichever area it may lie. At its most basic, all you need are some old comics or posters or designs on paper that ring your geeky bell – and something called Modge Podge. Here’s a link to the stuff

Basically, what you do is use the Modge Podge to glue your comics to your chosen piece of furniture – but it’s more than a glue; it acts as a sealant as well, protecting your ‘new’ furniture against wear and tear. If you like the idea, but you’re a bit wary, here’s a link that will give you a look at what’s involved.

2)    Geek up your duvet! Your duvet and pillow cases are blank canvases, just waiting for your geek stamp. But, if your folks won’t let you geek up what you’ve got or what you’ve got has already got a design on, then go to a supermarket or somewhere like Primark and pick up a cheap, plain one. Then, all you need is some fabric paint.

Top tips:

a)    Put your duvet on a flat surface, stretched out as much as you can.

b)    Put a sheet of thick cardboard between the layers of your duvet, so the design doesn’t bleed through into the other side.

c)    Sketch out your design in pencil. You don’t need to do it all as one; you can do it in sections.

d)    Paint in sections, then hang it up to try, between bursts.

e)    Put it through the wash. This’ll help seal the paint and knit it into the fib res of the material.

3)    Geek up your storage! The problem with us geeky folk, is that we tend to collect stuff. Whether it’s CDs, DVDs, books, RPG miniatures, film props or whatever – we need space for our precious, obsessively-collected booty. Shelves are a good place to start and decoupage is the simplest route to a geek up.

But the real problem is all those things that won’t sit on shelves too happily; comics, dice, collectibles  – that sort of thing. So, you need to get creative. If your folks won’t spring for those plastic storage boxes, then go for good old cardboard ones; you can pick ‘em up from supermarkets or buy sturdier ones online.

Decoupage is good for these things, but if you want to get really creative, then it’s time to bust out some paints. Most dads tend to have some white emulsion kicking around the garden shed and you can start with that as your base colour. Then, all it needs is a logo: the Bat Signal, maybe? A Star trek insignia? Gandalf’s ‘G’ Rune? Go nuts.

4)    A mural. This probably the most effective way to geek up your bedroom and really stick your stamp on it – and you don’t have to be artistic! If you want to make sure that your mural really represents what it’s supposed to, then trace your chosen image onto acetate and nobble a projector and project the thin onto the wall. All you’ve got to do then, is trace the outline with a pen or pencil. Once you’ve got the outline, it’s just a case of colouring it in, using paint – and you can make it as complex or as simple as you like.

Do make sure your paints are suitable for the surface they’re going onto; some walls will only take oil-based paint and others prefer acrylic. Get a tester-pot and test it in a small corner – you can always paint over it later.

5)    Geek up your mirror.  It’s the one thing in your bedroom that is probably forgotten about, so why not geek it up and make it art?

The easiest way to do this is to get creative with things you already have to hand.  Check in your Dad’s tool box for some really strong glue then have at the mirror frame.  A great idea is to use old broken electronics that are beyond repair, unscrew and remove the mother boards and wire works and stick them around the edge of your mirror.  A Steampunk style mirror from things your mum would have probably made you chuck away, eventually!

Have you done a geek up on your room? If you’ve got any tips, I’d love to hear them!

With the summer holidays here, it’s the perfect time to pick up a book – but not those boring ones they make you read at school. You’ve got six weeks of not having to read Shakespeare or whatever’s on the syllabus; you can pick and choose your brain-fodder. For me, summer reading was – and still is – about leaving the Real World as far behind me as possible. With that in mind, I’ve compiled my Top 5 Books for Geeks. And no, I won’t be plugging mine…

1)    Lord of the Rings. As books for geeks go, this is the Big One. You’ve got six weeks, so you might as well give it a go. In a nutshell – and in case you’ve been living on another planet – it follows the adventures of two Hobbits who are trying to destroy the evil One Ring, before Sauron, the Bad Guy, gets his grubby hands on it.

It’s got everything that you could want: swords and sorcery, monsters, heroes, villains, plus friendships and enmities that are beautifully depicted. The only thing that might put you off is the language; this is High Fantasy and, at times, the writing can seen a bit Biblical. But this is the story that spawned a whole myriad of fantasy books for geeks, all trying to replicate Tolkien’s mind-bending genius.

2)    The Borribles. One of the lesser known books for geeks, but a good ‘un. The Borribles is the first in a trilogy that charts the adventures of a bunch of Borribles. Borribles are kids that have fallen between the cracks in society, grown pointy ears and stopped aging; sort of like a bunch of Peter Pans.

But there’s nothing fluffy about this lot; they’re tough and vicious and a dead-shot with a catapult. It’s set in London, where the only real threat to the Borribles’ petty-thieving existence are giant, rat-like creatures: the Rumbles.

It’s funny, sweary and a bit dark, but has gained a cult following. I loved it.

3)    The Dice Man. This was one of the first books for geeks that I read that I realised was pretty subversive. It’s for older readers and written like a journal. The premise is that, if there’s no such thing as chance and everything is predetermined, then even the roll of a die is fated to happen. Using this, the central figure, Dr Luke Rhinehart, decides to base every decision in his life on the roll of two dice.

As books for geeks go, it’s a bit sweary and sexy, but the idea behind it is so simple and brilliant that I pretty much guarantee you will be carrying a couple of dice in your pocket for a while after. I did. Which is why I ended up climbing out of the window in the middle of Mrs Hughes’ English class. Sorry, Mrs Hughes. The dice made me.

4)    Mortal Engines. I picked this up when I was just out of college and have been a slave to  the pen of Philip Reeve ever since; this guy knows how to write books for geeks and anyone with an imagination. Think entire cities that move around on tracks. Think a girl with a scarred-up face and a scarred-up soul. Think epic adventure that manages to keep a handle on human relationships, without ever dropping the ball.

In fact, think anything by this author and you’re in for a good ride.

5)    The Amulet of Samarkand. The first of the Bartimaeus books and an influence in the Geekhood series, this is all about the tenuous relationship between a young sorcerer and general git, Nathaniel, and his arrogant, self-centred djinni, Bartimaeus.

The characters are so brilliantly written that you do find yourself cursing their more stupid decisions – of which there are many. And the way the author uses footnotes is hilarious. It’s got gargoyles, demons, djinni, deceit and double-dealing, set in an alternate version of Britain.

What’ve I missed? Any books for geeks that really ought to be on this list? Let me know!

Also a quick reminder that it’s Geek Week over on YouTube so I did a special post for the Stripes blog and even better is there’s a giveaway!  Stripes are giving away both the Geekhood books SIGNED (by me obviously) and all you have to do is tweet them a photo of yourself doing something geeky with the hashtag #Geekhood .

You know me; any chance for some silliness.

So, here’s the deal: to celebrate YouTube’s Geek Week, those lovely folk at Stripes Books are having a Geekhood Competition!

How Do You Enter?

It’s so simple, it’s brilliant! All you do is take a photo of yourself and Tweet it at me or Stripes or both of us, with the hashtags #GeekWeek and #Geekhood. But, here’s the catch: these can’t be any old photos of you – they’ve got to be Geeky ones! I don’t care if it’s you dressed up as a Power Ranger on your 6th birthday or the moment you got Andy Serkis’ autograph – the Geekier, the better!

The Prize?

*drum roll* Not one….but both current Geekhood books…wait for it…SIGNED BY ME! The guy who wrote them; that chap.

Setting the Bar

It doesn’t seem fair that you guys get all the fun, so I thought I’d chuck a couple of photos of my own into the mix, just to get you thinking…

Me, dressed as a hobbit, with Darth Vader and a Stormtrooper!

Me, dressed as a Wizard, painting an Ork Stompa, while Lego Superman and batman battle it out!

Me, at a LARP, dressed as…I’m not sure, to be honest.

Good luck, you lovely people!!!

Yes, I’m excited. Even as a fan of the beautiful giraffe, Matt Smith, I’m excited. Matt Smith was brilliant. He embodied young and old at the same time and managed that breakneck speed that seems to be the hallmark of New Who. Us Classic Whovians had the luxury of four-part episodes, each with their own appointed cliff-hanger. But, more than that, we got to spend more time with the Doctor. How’s having an older chap in the role going to change things?

A Doctor Who needs Assistants

The simple answer is we’ll have to wait and see – but there are some things to think about. Peter Capaldi is the oldest actor to take the role since its originator, William Hartnell. Hartnell –  being a classic character actor – played the role a bit older than  his actual age, so we were faced with a cranky, irascible and – perhaps most importantly – physically weaker character than his subsequent incarnations. What did this do? It gave the assistants their chance to shine.

The current trend for assistants is for them to be some unfathomable part of a celestial puzzle; Clara was the Impossible Girl, Amy had that Crack in Time thing going on and even Rose had a whiff of the Bad Wolf about her. But – back in the old days, assistants were just ordinary folk; people who discovered their strengths although their weaknesses were highlighted through travelling with an intergalactic alien. These were the sorts of role you could play in the playground; if you didn’t get to be the Doctor, Harry or Sarah were a good second best – because you could relate to them.

Will They? Should They?

I’m not doubting Capaldi’s fitness, but it’d be nice to see a return to the Doctor’s brisk walk, rather than the manic run. If he’s anything like the Classic Doctors, then the 12^th Doctor should be Brain Central; he’s the guy who thinks the Big Thoughts and his assistants can get to do the running around. It’s more of a team effort.

It also ought to put the mockers on that ‘Will they/won’t they’ thing. No; they won’t. Not yet, anyway. The Doctor is as sexless as much as he is ageless; it’s not about nookie. The whole ‘Lonely Angel’ stuff never bothered any of the other Doctors; they just got on with their inter-dimensional travelling and never batted an eyelid at their assistants. I, personally, would like to see a return to this; the Doctor is the eccentric voice of wisdom and, while it’s nice to pick up a bit on his needs and wants as an alien entity – that’s just what he is: an alien entity. I’m kind if hoping that the romantic aspect disappears and we’re left with a mysterious, enigmatic creature that transcends our human template.

Thinking Gallifreyan

Also, I quite fancy a Doctor who thinks a bit more. Both Smith’s and Tennant’s Doctors were wonderfully impulsive, but I can’t help but yearn for Baker’s sonorous pondering or Troughton’s drawn-out lightbulb moments. These were the times you bit your nails for; was he going to work it out or not? New Who is a bit quick-fix for my liking and the Doctor’s short-cut solutions and the numerous abilities of the sonic screwdriver have more than a whiff of the deus ex machine about them. Let’s have some head-scratching going on.

Capaldi. His track-record is superb; there’s no doubting he’s ‘got the chops’ as those pesky rock ‘n’ rollers like to say. And he looks a bit alien. And a bit ‘dark’. I like the look of him and I predict good things.

It’s time to take the Doctor home. Whenever that might be.

I wrote about my worst to best Doctors Who not long ago but here’s a link in case you fancy another look.  I wonder where Capaldi will fit into that list, when his time’s done?

It’s the summer holidays! You’ve got six glorious weeks off from whip-cracking teachers and piles of stinking homework! But what are you going to do with them? You and your mates don’t have to let your geekhood slide; there are plenty of things for geeks to do that don’t have to break the bank and can show you a darned good time.

1)    LARPing. What? What the hell is LARPing? LARP stands for Live Action Role Play and it’s something I wanted to do in my teens, but the only place they had it back then was in Nottingham and I couldn’t afford to get there. But! Years later, when I was thinking about the story for Geekhood: Mission Improbable, I remembered it and hunted down a local group. And, I can tell you from first-hand experience: it delivers. It’s got to be one of the top things for geeks to do.

Think about living your favourite RPG for a weekend; it’s not all swords and sorcery – there are sci-fi LARPs, SteamPunk LARPs and even Harry Potter LARPs. Google LARPing in your area and see what’s on offer. Although the sites will probably show you people in elaborate costumes, most LARPs are fine with home-cobbled outfits, so get creative. On top of that, they’re incredibly friendly people and welcome newbies with open arms. They would; they’re geeks.

Don’t worry about the rules systems; they’re pretty easy to pick up. Some are day events, some are camping weekends and while there might be an entrance fee, they’re usually pretty cheap. Plus they’re all outdoors. Or in castles. Or caves. But not on a computer monitor.

Top tip: if you’re doing a swords and sorcery LARP, you can make your own weapons from the NERF range of swords and axes. LARP weapons have to be ‘game-safe’ and they fit all the criteria. Bust out your paints and get creative.

2)    Get gaming. RPGs and TTG wargames are some of the most popular things for geeks to do – but – if you’ve never done them before, it can all look a bit daunting; aside from the games themselves, there’s the wacky world of miniature-painting to get stuck into. But if you don’t know how, you might be a bit put off.

Don’t be! Games Workshop stores do free painting and gaming sessions; just turn up and let them know you want to try it out. The staff will give you a basic intro into painting and get you rolling dice in no time. It’s great fun ad ridiculously social; the huge gaming community is full of people who just want to chat, share their enthusiasm and take your army apart on a gaming table.

3)    Make a movie. OK…bear with me. Chances are you’ve got an iPad or a laptop. If you have, then all you need is some animation software. Probably the easiest to get hold of it from SAM Animation – and it’s free! Have a link on the house.

If you’ve got an iPad, you’re ready to go. If you’re on a laptop, it’s best to get an external webcam – which you can pick up for a couple of quid. Get some lighting together (lights and torches), choose your setting and then it’s time to cast your actors. Mine all happened to be either Plasticene or Lego minifigs. And that’s it: lights, camera – action! You can then stick your mini-blockbuster up on YouTube – which is also a good place to see how other people have done theirs.

4)    Go to Forbidden Planet. If you don’t know what it is, then check this link and find your nearest one. This is probably one of the more expensive things for geeks to do, because these places are Meccas for memorabilia, comics, DVDs and practically anything you could ever want. Pack some cash; you’ll need it.

But, if your local FP is too far to travel, then check out your local independent comic shops; memorabilia is big business these days and there’s always something worth a gander. And who wouldn’t want to spend an hour or two nosing through the adventures of their favourite heroes? (Hulk or Batman for me, BTW)

5)    Chances are, you know your films. You’ve probably got a few favourites up your sleeve. Wouldn’t it be cool if you could get a photo of yourself on the spot where the guy with the pointy ears said that thing to the guy without any? Searching for and visiting movie locations is one of the new wave of things for geeks to do; not all movies are shot in the States or in studios; the UK has got some of the best locations in the world, used for some of the best movies.

This link is a location-finder, so you can search out what was filmed and where, in your area. Pack a camera and maybe mock-up a costume and take your part in cinema history.

Any other Geeky adventures you can think of? Drop me a comment below!

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Caros blogueiros e leitores brasileiros – bem-vindo ao mundo da Archie e seus amigos! Eu realmente espero que gostem e é uma alegria a pensar que vocês vão estar lendo o meu livro. Se você tiver alguma dúvida, por favor me Tweet ou usar o ‘Contato Me’page neste site. Meu Português é inexistente, mas eu tenho o Google Translate para a mão e eu vou fazer o meu melhor para responder o mais breve possível.

E você linda blogueiros por aí – Eu estou mais do que feliz em participar de entrevistas, você pode ter que ser um pouco paciente comigo, o que com a língua coisa, mas eu ser humilde e honrado de participar em qualquer coisa que você pode preparar – dentro da razão!

Os meus melhores cumprimentos do geeky a todos vocês!

Andy

I’m writing this off the back of a post I did on Sister Spooky’s website, about why I really don’t like The Big Bang Theory. Funnily enough, it kind of raised a few eyebrows before it even got published and it got me thinking – which is a rarity in itself.

There’s been a lot of hoo-ha in the past about negative reviews; my post about TBBT probably falls into that category. But I feel that, as a consumer of media, I have a right not to like things and I have a right to voice that opinion. Sure, there’s a difference between just slating something and qualifying your point of view – but I do think that, as long as you’re prepared to attempt to reasonably back-up your opinion, then your opinion is as valid as anyone else’s. Because it’s an opinion.

Which brings me to books. In a roundabout fashion.

 Books, Via the Wacky World of Showbiz

I’ve done a bit of acting in me time; I’ve worked as an actor for over 20 years. It’d be a lie to say that every performance I’ve given and every play I’ve ever been in has been the toast of the town; I’ve given some less-than-brilliant performances and I’ve been in some right turkeys. As a result, there’s been a few reviews along the way that have been less-than-favourable.

But that’s cool by me. I remember my first dodgy review, describing my character as ‘stock-in-trade’. Which did nark me. But it also made me think a bit harder about what I was doing and, after a chat with the director, I tried something else. I’m not sure if it worked or not, but my point is that that review challenged me to think in a different way; to reappraise what I was doing and up my game. In hindsight, that review was helpful – despite not being fun to read.

It’s not always that way. Years later, I was doing a show in London and one of the cast, an older lady, copped a bad review. Actually the review was bad; it was written badly: the critic’s main gripe was that he thought this woman was too overweight to play the part. Which was ridiculous and not constructive at all. It didn’t help; it was a personal attack and wasn’t qualified or supported by any reasons why he thought this character should be a particular weight. It was lazy and ignorant.

 Books, at last!

So, I was thinking about the reviews for Geekhood: Close Encounters of the Girl Kind. Generally, I’m pleased to say, they were pretty good. But there were a couple who had gripes about this and that and I read them and reread them to see if I could get what they were on about. Which I did – I might not have agreed with them but, as consumers of this particular form of media, they are entitled to their opinions – just as I am about TBBT.

The thing is, they’re opinions. Not fact, but points of view. They’re what people thought about my book. As long as an opinion is reasoned and qualified, in my eyes, it stands. Because that’s what they think. The difference for me is that I know what goes into my books; for me, there are facts involved. But whatever people think about those facts is entirely up to them, because they don’t know them like I do.

 Respecting Opinion

When you act in a play, write a book, create music or whatever, you’ve got to be prepared for the idea that it won’t ring everybody’s bell. It doesn’t mean it’s worthless, it just means that other people’s life experience is different to yours and those experiences mean they process the world in a different way to you. Which is kind of cool, really.

It’s like my rant about TBBT: it’s only my opinion. I don’t know what the writers, producers and actors went through to get that show together, but I do know it doesn’t ring my bell. And as long as I don’t just say ‘I hate it’ and expect that to pass as an argument, I think I’m entitled to say so. Just as other people are entitled to say they don’t like what I do. As long as it’s qualified, I have to respect that.

 The Blogger Question

Which brings me to another thing. I’m not a blogger (if you’ve read any of my posts, you’ll agree!), but I do wonder if bloggers feel hamstrung in what they think they’re ‘allowed’ to say in a review? As I understand it, publishers give away books to bloggers, to be reviewed. Do bloggers then feel that they have to tow the party line and praise a book, even if they can’t abide it, for fear of losing that supply of review material? Do they fear being put on some sort of blacklist? If they do, then just how honest can they be about what they read, unless they are entirely independent? Bloggers – you tell me.

 A Game Changer?

I suppose what I’m saying is that honesty, whether it’s hard to hear or not, always has to be respected; you can’t knock someone for telling the truth as they see it. And I guess this goes for reviews; surely it’s better to have someone tell you they don’t like your work and tell you why, rather than just nod and lie and tell you it’s great? Either way, you then have one of two options: think about what they’ve said and up your game or know that they are wrong and keep going along your chosen path.

Nobody likes criticism but, sometimes, if it’s intelligently put together, it can help you get better at what you do. I’m all for an exchange of opinion, because that’s all it is. You can’t have an opinion on whether two plus two equals four, because it just does. But you can have an opinion on whether a piece of art generates a particular emotional response, because they’re you’re emotions and if it doesn’t work for you, then it doesn’t work for you.

 I’m as Vain as the Next Man

I’m not saying I’d prefer to read a bad review but, if it’s going to make me reassess what I do and reach a positive conclusion either way, then it’s got to be better than a good one that doesn’t really say anything at all. However, when a good review tells you that you’ve punched all the emotional buttons in the right order, there’s nothing better and it can be equally helpful – as long as it’s honest.

 A Poncey Quote

“If we are not ashamed to think it, we should not be ashamed to say it” – Cicero.

But I bet he never watched TBBT.

It would seem a bit off to let the 50^th Anniversary of Dr Who pass, without throwing my tuppence into the arena. I also realise that this is a touchy subject; everyone has their own ‘my Doctor’ and the argument as to which incarnation of the Time Lord is the best is one that tends to get Geeky eyebrows and voices raised. I daresay it’ll continue long after that much-dreaded 12^th regeneration, but I’m going to nail my sonic-screwdriver to the mast and take a stance.

The only way I can do this is on a list and, like the polarity of the neutron flow, I’m going to do it in reverse. As I write this, I can feel myself getting a bit nervous; I’ve had my theories over the years, but been careful not to broadcast them too loudly. Deep breath and here we go:

The Worst to Best Doctors Who

11. Christopher Eccleston: 9^th Doctor. New Who fans are going to hate me for this one but, for my money, the 9^th Doctor was the least convincing of the lot. Don’t get me wrong; when I heard Who was going to be resurrected, I was as excited as anyone else. And then Eccleston turned up and that excitement was instantly exterminated.

My reasons for sticking him last were perfectly summed up by Terry Wogan who, on reviewing an episode said that he thought that the Doctor was supposed to be “the eccentric voice of wisdom and not a psychotic bin-man.” Which kind of nailed it for me. All the rage and grief that the 9^th Doctor was spewing has only really been referenced in retrospect and everyone has very generously said ‘oh, it’s because he’d just finished the Time War and was shell-shocked’ or something. Personally, I think it was down to a bad character-choice on the actor’s part; he’d already said that he was never able to relate to former Doctors, finding them “too foppish”; his desire was to create a Doctor for the working classes. Fair enough, if you’re doing an Earth-bound drama – but he’s an alien. Which leads me to my next whinge:

The accent. Just, no. Any actor who has to have lines written into the script to excuse the fact that he either won’t or can’t use another accent simply isn’t doing his job. Every planet has a North? So, are we expected to believe that all Northern Gallifreyans speak like they’re from Manchester? I’ve nothing against the accent on a human-being, but an alien using it as his native dialect isn’t on. It’s lazy and, in my opinion, disrespectful to the show. And the costume? No. And the stiff-necked grin when Eccleston had to reach down into his boots to drag up the approximation of happiness? No. Fantastic? No.

10. Sylvester McCoy – the 7^th Doctor. It’s really hard to gauge what McCoy did, because the show was a disaster at the time. Even the disco-style theme-tune was enough to make me do what I never thought I would and turn it off. The writing was bad, there was a queue of z-list celebrities waiting to go on it and the monsters were rubbish. And poor old Sylvester had all that to deal with. And he tried, bless him.

He started out badly enough, playing spoons and appearing to be some sort of intergalactic jester. By the time someone realised that a dose of darkness might sort things out, for me, it was too late. There was nothing Lordly about this Doctor. However, when it came to the movie, in which he appeared to pass the torch onto Paul McGann, we got a glimpse of what could’ve been: the spluttering twit had been replaced by a reflective, pottering Gallifreyan with a fierce intelligence. But he did go and pull his trademark gurning face in the regeneration scene, which did annoy me.

9. Paul McGann – the 8^th Doctor. Tough one to judge, because we didn’t see enough of him and I haven’t listened to any of his Big Finish audio adventures. But, at face value, this Doctor was a bit too much of the romantic hero for me; less a cosmic wanderer who’d soaked up the wisdom and knowledge of new and ancient civilizations and more of a frustrated poet. But, I’d like to see him pop up at some point, so we can get a better idea of what he had to offer.

8. Peter Davison – the 5^th Doctor. Another tough one to judge because, in retrospect, I actually quite liked what he did with the character; the air of reckless innocence, the moments of sombreness and the feeling that he was an old being caught in a young body. But the show was too slick at the time; too full of glossy production values that somehow elbowed out the Gothic atmosphere that I’d come to expect from Who. Not Davison’s fault at all – but the Doctor had also become the leader of some sort of interstellar crèche, with Adric, Tegan and Nyssa all squabbling and bubbling in the background. If I’d been the Doctor, I’d have dropped them all off, just to get some peace and quiet.  And I didn’t mind his costume.

7. David Tennant – the 10^th Doctor. Sacrilege, I know! And, believe me, he was such a welcome relief after Ecclestone’s moody posturing. I really liked Tennant’s Doctor to begin with but, after a while, he became a bit of a one-trick pony: goggle-eyed on minute and bemoaning his loneliness the next. But what he did bring back to the show was a sense of humour and the wonder that the Doctor had been missing for a good few incarnations. This Doctor was charming and buoyant, but I got fed up with the idea that he was some sort of Christ-like figure.

6. William Hartnell – the 1^st Doctor. More blasphemy but, to be honest, I haven’t seen enough of this Doctor to form a concrete opinion. What I have seen has been interesting: the cranky old man, both treacherous and generous; the time-traveller who might tear a strip off you for his own selfish reasons and then ask forgiveness later on. Let’s face it; he must’ve been good or the show wouldn’t have survived to go another round. And certainly there was a lot of the Lord to this Time Lord – but he was a bit before my time and not as approachable as I like my Doctors to be.

5. Jon Pertwee – the 3^rd Doctor. I can feel the hate coming at me already. Pertwee was my first Doctor and I had a strong fondness for him. But he wasn’t an alien to me; he was a dashing, swashbuckling professor in velvet. Certainly, he had the Lordly thing in spades, full of grace, poise and that quintessential Englishness that I think is integral to the Doctor’s character. Yet there wasn’t anything alien or that mysterious about him; he was too human. Authoritarian: yes. Sometimes conceited: yes. But alien? Not much. He wasn’t helped by the fact that most of his adventures were Earth-based thanks to those pesky Time Lords meddling with the TARDIS, but Pertwee’s Doctor felt more like something out of an HG Wells novel, than someone from outer space.

4. Colin Baker – the 6^th Doctor. OK…hear me out… I think this Doctor is one of the most underrated in Who history. Baker was an out-and-out Who fan and came to the board with some really interesting ideas. He wanted his Doctor to be pompous, brash, arrogant and filled with his own sense of self-importance. Which, after charging around the universe and saving civilizations by the dozen, seems fair enough to me. I liked the way he swaggered about, looking down his nose at other races; you got a real sense that he was from an advanced society. I also liked the way his temper gave way to bouts of brattishness; this is a guy who’s been his own boss for centuries and not getting your own way must be a real grind if you’ve been used to it for that long.

And, I didn’t mind the costume. I know Baker wanted it to be black to reflect his darker interpretation, but it seemed fitting to me: a sort of preening, intergalactic peacock.

3. Patrick Troughton – the 2^nd Doctor. The cosmic hobo. I really liked him. After the Victorian rule of the 1^st Doctor, Troughton brought a sense of a character was really existing outside of Time itself. From his mop top to his crumpled frock-coat, he seemed to be everything that the 1^st Doctor had been trying to keep a lid on. But Troughton could also play dark; with that craggy face and those burning, baggy eyes, he brought a sense of the unpredictable and danger to the Doctor. On top of that, he also brought a sense of approachability and safety; you just knew that he’d get you out of a scrape, but his rescue would be so last-minute and disorganised that you’d get the full benefit of the adventure before he did.

2. Matt Smith – the 11^th Doctor. “What?” we all cried. “He’s 27?” But Smith has brought something special to the role – elements of Classic Who Doctors and New Who energy. Described by Moffat as a “beautiful giraffe”, he’s gangly, uncoordinated, but with a peculiar grace to him. Plus he’s got the alien thing down to a T: he looks odd, like there’s an old man trying to get out of a young body and it reflects in his performance. He gabbles as though there’s too much information in his head for his mouth to cope with, grins with disarming confidence, but you always get the feeling that there’s something else going on inside that 1,000 year-old bonce. This Doctor is complex and sometimes irritating, but he’s a Gallifreyan, through and through.

1. Tom Baker – the 4^th Doctor. Of course it is. My sadness at losing Pertwee to a race of giant spiders was quickly      replaced by an obsessive need to see what this marble-eyed lunatic was      going to get up to next. Tom Baker was the Doctor, from his sonorous drawl      to his toothy grin. He really looked like he’d been booted out from an      elitist society and was having to get by in his own haphazard fashion. The      TARDIS was his gypsy wagon and he was like a disgraced Oxford professor having to make up his      own rules as he went along. He really was a rootless traveller.

The early part of Tom’s incarnation presented us with the childish, wide-eyed aspect of his character, but this soon gave way to the darker, more serious parts. This was the Doctor you wanted to hang out with, but were never quite sure of what he’d do next. And he got the alien thing going from the start. In fact, I’d go as far as to say that Tom was the first to put the alien imprint on the Doctor; his predecessors had all played aspects of a character, but there was little to tie them to an extra-terrestrial race. And it might be why Who started to flounder after Tom left: he gave us everything we wanted from a Time Lord – humour, seriousness, intelligence, wonder, a slightly skewed moral compass and a sense of being different from everyone around him. Unfortunately, for everyone who came after, it meant that the moment they tried to play the alien aspect, it just looked like a Tom impression. And no-one does alien like Tom Baker.

For me, Baker’s Doctor was The Doctor – often impersonated, but never rivalled. And, if you’ve never seen him in action, my recommendations are: Genesis of the Daleks, Brain of Morbius, Deadly Assassin or the Talons of Weng Chiang.

My hat (and scarf) are firmly in the ring. Tell me how wrong I am; I dare you.

Welcome to the second of my Official Geek Debates, where I throw my hat in the ring and make myself generally unpopular. What I want to do here is try and get closer to resolving some of the bigger issues in Geekdom and where better to start than with a face-off between those two juggernauts of the comic-book world…Marvel and DC.

Meeting Batman for the First Time

I started out on DC, predictably with Batman. Although I was cheerfully soaking up The Beano at the time (I think I was eight or nine), I saw the cover of a Batman comic and had to buy it. If I remember rightly, it showed Batman faced with a pile of fish, bearing the Joker’s trademark grin; the old scoundrel had been poisoningGotham’s water-supply.

From there, I discovered the Green Lantern, Green Arrow, JLA, the Flash and a whole host of other spandex-wearing heroes. They captured my imagination and I even had a little plastic, green ring which I used to pretend was my Lantern Ring. It actually squirted water, which I chucked some food colouring in, just to make it that bit more authentic. Bear in mind, this was the late Seventies; these heroes were lantern-jawed, colourful and with a moral compass that pointed inflexibly North.

And then I discovered Marvel.

You Wouldn’t Like Me when I’m Angry…

My hero was the Hulk. I think he is for a lot of Geeks; he’s the immeasurable rage we all felt in the face of bullying and the ultimate symbol of the misunderstood monster. And then I found Spiderman, Dr Strange, Adam Warlock, the Fantastic Four and my other favourite, the Man Thing. (As a side-note, I have an autograph from Nestor Redondo, who drew Man Thing for a time).

My obsession with the Hulk pretty much took over all my comic-reading. I read Rampage magazine when I could afford it, snapped up the re-releases of the original stories (back when he was grey) and subscribed to the Incredible Hulk Weekly. My romance with DC was forgotten – apart from the Batman, with whom I’d re-establish a relationship in my teens.

So, how come I ditched DC and what makes Marvel, in my eyes, the Comic Book King? After all, they’re both escapist stories about mega-muscled men and zeppelin-boobed women, dressed in questionable costumes with amazing powers, fighting similarly fashion-challenged being with a penchant for world domination. What’s the difference? Let’s have a look…

DC vs. Marvel

For my money, a lot of the differences are perceived, rather than actual – and they all stem from the way these comics started and what they were trying to do; they’ve both cast long shadows over themselves. DC started the ball rolling in the 1940’s and its most groundbreaking character was the blue-boy-scout, himself: Superman. Superman kind of set the template for DC; DC heroes were almost-mythical, legendary heroes, whose powers and feats were way beyond us mere mortals. In many ways, I’ve always thought this type of hero is our modern equivalent of the epic sagas of old; the Viking myths, the Greek legends and the Roman tales. DC heroes were almost god-like, bestriding the Earth and saving us humans from devastation so mind-blowing that there’s no way we could ever contemplate doing it.

Epic Sagas and Modern Gods

Just like Asgard andMount Olympus, DCheroes battled it out in fictional settings, such as Gotham and Metropolis, as though no Earthly city could bear the weight of their being. Sometimes they even zipped off to other planets or alternate dimensions, to go and have a bash at creature so mind-bendingly weird and evil that the Earth itself just couldn’t have handled it. DC created something like High Fantasy in panels, using pen and ink, and gave kids like me the hope that, one day, I might discover I was from Krypton and suddenly jump over the garage in a single bound.

Which did result in me falling off my Space Hopper more than once.

Bringing it Back to Perceived Reality

And then Marvel came along in the 1960’s. But its heroes were different. Where DC took the stance that these beings were heroes first and foremost, Marvel focussed on the lives of ordinary humans who were suddenly blessed or cursed with amazing abilities. These powers had consequences to their daily lives: Gwen Stacy died at the hands of the Green Goblin (or was it Spidey’s fault – another big debate), Betty Ross got caught up in her father’s vendetta against the Hulk and the X-Men found that society wasn’t able to tolerate their mutations. Instead of charging around, firing lasers out of their eyes, Marvel characters tended to wrestle with their powers, having to hide them from their loved ones and keep their identities a watertight secret. And none of them used a pair of glasses to hide their alter-egos.

Marvel spoke to me that much louder because becoming a superhero suddenly seemed infinitely more possible. All I had to do was get caught in the blast of a gamma-bomb or get bitten by a radioactive spider and I could charge around my town, righting wrongs and dispensing justice, Andy-style. My knowledge of science was nil but, at that point in my life, the fact that these heroes had once been real people like me, made the whole thing seem much more achievable. To the point that me and my brother once spent an entire afternoon running around our garden, picking up spiders and trying to get them to bite us and then seeing if we could run up the wall of our house.

If it had worked, I wouldn’t have the time to be writing this post.

It’s an old debate and there’s a whole lot of hoo-ha about the reboots, alternate universes and the way some characters have died-but-not-really and it’s split a world of comic fans. But, for my money, I can only rely on what comics meant to me when the world was a bigger and brighter place. For nine or ten year-old me, Marvel had it going on in spades and was responsible for my short-lived career as Devon’s only superhero, The Night Creeper.

But that’s another story (although I must thank my mum for making that mask…)