Editorial

Burnt Toast#2, 1990

"Don't you have anything you hate?"
"I can't stand burnt toast. I loathe bus stations, terrible places, full of lost luggage, and lost souls."
"I told you, I never wanted to come back here again."
"And then there's unrequited love, and tyranny, and cruelty..."

Ace and The Doctor
Ghost Light

With the above lines was the name of a fanzine born, Season 26 fever strikes again. Hopefully there isn't too much here-in that relies on knowledge of that wonderful six hours of television, because I know there's a lot of people out there that haven't seen it yet. However, you will have to excuse the occasional transgression, such as some of the references on the opposite page.

On the subject of Season 26, and the conceptually similar S25, there seems to be some conflict recently between the 'followers' of the older adventures and the newer brand of story. A conflict that is a great shame. Certainly current, 'state-of-the-art' Doctor Who has evolved away from the familiar conventions of Doctor-as-scientist, Doctor-as-wanderer and Doctor-as-Time Lord to assume some-thing closer to Doctor-as-demigod. This isn't necessarily better or worse, just different. And whilst I am, shall we say, fond of the new concept I was a fan before Season 25 and have appreciated all eras that has gone before. Let's face it, Doctor Who is simply a bloody good TV show, and despite some hiccups, smaller then some people think, has been for the last 26 years.

Well, that's Doctor Who, now, what about Burnt Toast. To be topical the theme of this issue is black humour. Laughing at dead things, chortling at mutilations and chuckling at torture. The current boom of horror has certainly contributed to the interest in this 'sick' brand of humour, both generally and of course in Revelation of the Daleks and Ghost Light, but as you'll see it goes a lot further back then that.

And remember, when you smile, I want to see those teeth...