The Woman Who Sold the World (comic story)

The Woman Who Sold the World was a Tenth Doctor comic strip published in Doctor Who Magazine in 2007. It was the first and only comic strip in the magazine to be released during the broadcast of series three and the first one to feature Martha Jones, the then-current televised companion. The title was an allusion to the David Bowie song "".

Summary
The Tenth Doctor and Martha go to Loam and find the people are going to be killed as a woman has sold the world.

Part 1
A woman named Sugarpea and her friend Sweetleaf are worried as Sugarpea has sold the world and it is getting demolished by giant ogre-like beings called High Goliax, with new buildings to be put in its place. Martha Jones and the Tenth Doctor are in space; Martha has a rope around her so she can answer a Calamity Lamp. On Loam, Sugarpea and Sweetleaf go on a flying chair and start to fly. The Doctor and Martha have landed in Loam and are in a dark passageway. They open a door and find a little boy playing. The boy says his mum and dad are busy and the Doctor assumes that there is a war going on so his mum and dad will be elsewhere. As some locals spot Sugarpea and Sweetleaf they start to boo her. The Doctor goes to have a look around and leaves Martha in charge of the boy. It turns out his name is Kipe. Sugarpea flies past the parliament building and waves. The Prime Minister tells his aide to turn away. The Doctor finds out he is inside a High Goliax destroying the planet and the boy is controlling it. The boy gets tired of this and tosses Martha out of the High Goliax, far above the ground.

Part 2
Martha catches hold of the flying seat that Sugarpea and Sweetleaf are flying on and they let her on to safety. The Doctor, angry at Kipe, switches his game off and decides to tell his father what has happened. On the flying seat, Sugarpea and Sweetleaf tell Martha what happened on Loam and realise that she is the one who found the Calamity Lamp. The Doctor travels through a portal to the Krib, the biggest bank in the universe. He is cross with Kipe's father, Mr Kingfish, who tells the Doctor that the High Goliax have to clear the planet as collateral for the planet's death. Sugarpea tells Martha that she owed money to the bank and she was Prime Minister once. Mr Kingfish takes the Doctor to a room with a huge queue in it; he is shackled with a detectors called free-reins to ensure there is no crime committed and the queue to meet Kingfish isn't jumped. Martha, Sugarpea and Sweetleaf are chased by a High Goliax but lose it and land at the Museum of Politics. The Doctor tries to catch up with Kingfish but a man named Mandrake tells him he is wasting his time; he wants the Doctor to stop the music. Sugarpea walks up to a statue and Martha asks if it is a statue of her but she is corrected by Sweetleaf; it is in fact a Coal-Fired Diplomat known as Brassneck. According to Sweetleaf, Sugarpea called it an armoured peacemaker. The Doctor and Mandrake are at the speculator, a computer for the Krib which speculates. Mandrake tells the Doctor that the brain-like objects inside are organic processors. When the Doctor approaches the processors, he is stunned when music plays loudly in his head.

Part 3
Mandrake saves the Doctor from death. The Doctor says that the organic processors are singing to stop themselves going mad. Mandrake is puzzled; he does not know what the Doctor is on about. He says to Mandrake that the computer is full of slaves.

On Loam Sugarpea gains control of her machine Brassneck. Sugarpea says Brassneck will follow her path. Sugarpea says she will make Martha and Sweetleaf stay at the museum. As they leave the doors lock.

The Doctor tells Mandrake that his ship translated an alien language, and the voices making the music are the slaves. The Doctor says he can sort out the problem and removes the free-reins on his leg. He says he needs more free-reins as he wants to attach one to every tentacle on the computer.

Elsewhere Sugarpea is flying over the planet as the giant child-controlled High Goliax destroy the city. They begin to chase her round the city.

Sweetleaf and Martha find Sugarpea's autobiography and Martha finds a vehicle like an insect. They crash out the library and search for Sugarpea.

Mandrake and the Doctor have attached the free-reins to the slaves' tentacles. The Doctor uses his sonic screwdriver to switch control of the free-reins from the central computer the accumulator to the speculator, and the slaves' tentacles begin moving as if they were legs. Everyone waiting in the line says they have all been put through. The creatures from the speculator escape and begin to chase the Doctor and Mandrake. They both head to Kingfish's office.

At Kingfish's office, Kingfish begins to receive complaints from a riot of people who are waiting in line. Kingfish looks out his window and finds out that his computers have legs. He demands to know who did it. The Doctor and Mandrake burst in saying it was them.

On Loam Martha and Sweetleaf head to the Prime Minister's offices. Sweetleaf says Sugarpea is going to overthrow the government.

Part 4
The Prime Minister is being held up by Brassneck. Sugarpea says he will have to do as he says as she would rather not have to use force. Sweetpea tells Martha that Sugarpea does not want to rule but she wants to save Loam and that Sugarpea will make the Prime Minster resign so she can become the dictator of Loam as a way of making the debt hers. As a way of stopping the Krib from hiring despots, there is a loophole with Loam's contract which makes the debt Sugarpea's personal debt. She will then hand herself over to the Krib to face punishment to nullify Loam's debt to the Krib, but the punishment is the death penalty.

Meanwhile, Kingfish is annoyed at the Doctor, but the Doctor is also annoyed at him for putting slaves inside the computers. He argues they are not slaves but organic processors.

Meanwhile, a little girl in a High Goliax chases Sugarpea but she is on her flying chair. Brassneck holds on, but Martha holds onto the bottom of Brassneck. Sugarpea flies into the High Goliax's mouth, the little girl controlling it says she is happy that she has got one. Sugarpea tells the girl who is scared of Brassneck not to be scared they are only passing through.

The Doctor and Kingfish are still arguing, Sugarpea flies in with Brassneck and Martha. Sugarpea pays off her debts at the cost of her life. Sugarpea says she is the Dictator of Loam she says that is punishable by death, but she has arranged her death. Brassneck hits her over the head and she dies. But the organic processors break out. The Doctor Martha, Mandrake and Brassneck burst into the High Goliax which the little girl is controlling. The Doctor orders Mandrake to start getting the parents to start evacuating their kids. Brassneck flies the Doctor and Martha down to Loam. They land and watch as the Organic Processors jump out of the High Goliax's mouth. Kingfish also flies out while hanging on to an organic processor. The Doctor explains to the Prime Minister that the "processors" are the High Goliax's minds, severed from their skulls for centuries and now rejoining them to make themselves whole again. Kipe is marching about he sees his father and orders his High Goliax to crush him, not realising who he is and assuming he was getting a high score in the game. Mandrake saves the little boy as the mind enters the High Goliax he's in.

As the chaos ends the High Goliax rebuild the city as Sweetleaf and Brassneck watch. The Doctor and Martha head for the TARDIS.

Characters

 * Tenth Doctor
 * Martha Jones
 * Sugarpea
 * Sweetleaf
 * Kipe
 * Kingfish
 * Mandrake
 * Brassneck
 * Prime Minister
 * Chalmers

Original print details

 * (Publication with page count and closing captions)


 * 1) DWM 381 (9 pages) Next: "Everything Must Go!"
 * 2) DWM 382 (9 pages) Next: "Evil Is as Evil Does..."
 * 3) DWM 383 (9 pages) Next: One-Woman Revolution!
 * 4) DWM 384 (10 pages) The End

Continuity

 * This story would appear to take place very early in Martha's travels with the Doctor, based upon dialogue suggesting that items such as the sonic screwdriver are still new to her.