The Stockbridge Showdown (comic story)

 was a comic story published in the 500th issue of Doctor Who Magazine. It featured the return of all major companions original to the DWM comic strip, along with Josiah W. Dogbolter, Stockbridge and a cameo appearance of Cornucopia. Also returning to the DWM comic strip were various comic strip artists, alongside mainstays Mike Collins, Martin Geraghty and David A Roach, and The Time Team illustrator Adrian Salmon.

It was also the first DWM comic strip to be set after Clara's departure. Coincidentally, Titan Publishing Group released its first monthly comic set after Clara's departure just one day before The Stockbridge Showdown released.

Publisher's summary
A very special celebratory comic strip adventure from Scott Gray, Dave Gibbons, Martin Geraghty, Roger Langridge and many more!

Plot
After a day of searching for crop circles, Maxwell Edison is driving his motorbike back to Stockbridge on a still Autumn night. Today is Maxwell's 60th birthday. As he drives past a gate, a familiar blue box materializes on the road behind Maxwell.

The Twelfth Doctor jumps out of the TARDIS with a look of joy on his face. After a moment of being surprised that the Doctor has changed his face again, Maxwell is hugged by the Doctor. The Doctor explains that he has visited Stockbridge because he detected temporal distortions coming from the area. Maxwell is briefly disappointed as he had assumed the Doctor had came to celebrate Maxwell's birthday. The two then head towards Stockbridge to investigate the distortions.

They enter Stockbridge to find that the villagers have been frozen in time. The Doctor examines a woman and finds that she has been "slightly phased outside this continuum". He declares that everyone has been trapped between nanoseconds, and that whoever did it must have been a genius. Meanwhile, a floating camera drone watches the Doctor and Maxwell from the sky.

Many years later, someone else is celebrating their birthday. Josiah W. Dogbolter is holding a service for his 500th birthday at the headquarters of Intra-Venus, Inc.. Watching over the party, Dogbolter asks Hob why his daughter, Berakka Dogbolter, isn't there. Hob replies that she mentioned something about an emergency board meeting.

Sharon Allen, a former companion of the Fourth Doctor who is now a journalist for the Galactic Broadcasting Corporation, confronts Dogbolter. She tells him that there have been many men throughout history as powerful as Dogbolter is now, and that eventually all their empires fell. Before Dogbolter can reply, he recieves a notification on his mobile phone that pleases him immensely. He tells Sharon, "See you later Miss Allen... or earlier!".

Dogbolter enters a dark basement where he greets the person who sent him the notification: Chiyoko! Chiyoko tells Dogbolter that she has achieved harmonic alignment with Stockbridge in 2016 and created a crude time tunnel leading to the village. She explains that she froze Stockbridge's citizens to lure the Doctor to the village and that the Doctor fell for the trap.

Back in Stockbridge, the Doctor and Maxwell encounter Gol Clutha and her group of mercenaries. Dogbolter has hired her to escort the Doctor and Maxwell to St Justinian's Church, where Dogbolter and Chiyoko are waiting. The Doctor uses the city's temporally frozen nature to escape: he throws a cricket ball at a nearby fountain, disrupting the static atoms of the water, causing it to explode. Maxwell and the Doctor use the distraction to run away.

Meanwhile in the future, the Intra-Venus Inc. major shareholders hold an emergency meeting. Mr Groblux brings to attention the fact that nobody knows who called this meeting together. Majenta Pryce enters the room and declares that she did. This causes uproar as Majenta, a junior shareholder, had no right to do so. Majenta tells the shareholders that soon she will no longer be a minor player, as she will soon buy all of their shares for 12 Mazumas each, which is only 0.0000001% of their real value. She begins threatening the shareholders by listing the several illegal activities committed by various shareholders, and then lowers her offer to 10 Mazumas per share.

Berakka Dogbolter bursts into the room and and hysterically announces that she will give "her daddy" an extra present for his birthday: Majenta's head in a box. As she lunges towards Majenta with a sword, Majenta presses a button on her glove and a figure with a sword jumps through a circular window to rescue Majenta. That figure is Destrii!

Destrii lands on the ground and blocks Berakka's sword with her own. She then punches Berakka's face before jumping away to avoid being sliced in half. The two continue to fight in this pattern, with Destrii evading Berakka's sword but not using her own. Eventually, Destrii manages to kick Berakka, knocking her out. Majenta then addresses the shareholders, saying that she'll now buy their shares for 5 Mazumas each.

Back in 2016, Gol Clutha catches up with the Doctor and Maxwell and traps Max in a tangle web. She threatens to shoot Maxwell if the Doctor doesn't come with her to St Justinian's Church, forcing the doctor to comply.

The Doctor and Maxwell enter the church to see Dogbolter and Chiyoko waiting for them, behind them covered in orange wrapping paper and a blue bow is the ultimate birthday gift: the Doctor's TARDIS. Dogbolter forces the Doctor and Maxwell to kneel before him as he explains that with a time machine he can "destroy [his] competitors before they're born" and "play the stock market and always win", letting him become the wealthiest man in all of time.

At this point the Doctor asks Dogbolter if he remembers hiring an assassin to kill Angus Goodman. Dogbolter tells the Doctor that he's killed thousands of "nobodies" to get his way and Angus was not more significant than any of the others. Dogbolter then proclaims that the Doctor is a dead loss and orders Clutha kill him.

to be finished on Wednesday

Characters

 * Twelfth Doctor
 * Maxwell Edison
 * Sharon Allen
 * Majenta Pryce
 * Destrii
 * Izzy Sinclair
 * Frobisher
 * Josiah W. Dogbolter
 * Primal Miniature of Lesser Braxtonia
 * Hob
 * Mr Groblux
 * Mr Andro
 * Berakka Dogbolter
 * Gol Clutha

Continuity

 * Frobisher masquerades as Chiyoko wanting revenge for her previous defeat at the hands of the Eleventh Doctor. (COMIC: The Child of Time)
 * The Eleventh Doctor faced Gol Clutha in COMIC: Hunters of the Burning Stone.

The birthday party guests

 * The Werelox first appeared in COMIC: Doctor Who and the Dogs of Doom
 * The Mobox first appeared in COMIC: Ophidius.
 * Cazkelf appeared in COMIC: Art Attack.
 * The Skith first appeared in COMIC: The First.