The Omega Man

Mark Griffiths and John Ridgway are bringing back “Time Lord Satan” Omega in a new comic series

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ESTABLISHED BY THE publishers of Doctor Who comics fanzine Vworp Vworp!, Cutaway Comics is filling in the gaps of the classic series’ three-decade-long continuity. With the Doctor himself conspicuous by his absence, the focus is instead on various supporting characters whose copyright lies with their original creators, beginning last year with Eric Saward and Barry Renshaw’s Lytton. It’s now the turn of Omega, created by Bob Baker and the late Dave Martin for Third Doctor tale “The Three Doctors”, who returns in a four-issue mini-series by writer Mark Griffiths and artist John Ridgway.

“A friend described us as the Mandalorian and Rogue One of the Doctor Who universe,” laughs editor Gareth Kavanagh. “We’re far more influenced by the back-up strips from the early days of Doctor Who Weekly. Those little strips were a consciously Doctor-free zone inhabited by Cybermen with souls, Dalek Killers and all manner of nasties.”

Kavanagh says that “we’re really interested in the mythology of Omega, as he’s such a big character in the history of Doctor Who”. The sinister, all-powerful Time Lord – whose stellar engineering provided his race with the power for time travel, but left him trapped in a black hole in the process – has been compared to Fantastic Four planet eater Galactus. “You also get something more to him than that,” Kavanagh adds, “as there’s that awful loneliness, the longing to belong to a universe – which would rather he stays where he is.