Mr. Who Character Poster

Or as canonically titled by Adam Hargreaves, the Dr. Men.

So it's probably old news by now but the Mr. Men and Doctor Who have an agreement which will see 12 books published which tells the tales of each doctor in the format of a Mr. Men story, and art style of course.

I in the last month was able to purchase all four current books. I have to say that even back in the days when I would collect Mr. Men books I had never been so hyped for these newcomers. I enjoyed all of them (but on a critical note was a little disappointed reading Dr. Twelfth) and was impressed with how Adam Hargreaves handled the cast and material of Doctor Who, not to say that the BBC didn't have any input with the stories most probably.

Now I love both the worlds of Doctor Who and Mr. Men, I also love drawing characters. It's fairly obvious what was to come and so with my own additions to the cast, this was created.

TARDIS illustrated by Adam Hargreaves

I couldn't resist drawing these characters and adding my own spin to this alternative reality, by adding actual elements from Mr. Men into this universe. First of, for each Doctor, a Mr. Man or Little Miss would be added to the cast as a travel companion, in this case Mr. Bump. Making a monster out of the Mister Men is not an easy task, but luckily Cartoon Network's 'The Mr. Men Show', created a sketch about a film titled 'Gamma Goo From Planet Nine', starring Little Miss Scary as Dementicon. This is now adapted into the Mr. Whoniverse by making Dementicon an actual alien invader rather than Little Miss Scary in costume.

This piece saw me select already existing villains from the Dr. Men series to appear alongside Dr. Fourth in this poster. Most of them had made an appearance alongside Tom Baker's Doctor, most noteably The Daleks, who appear in the same book as Dr. Fourth. Of all Daleks, the obvious choice was Dale, I do hope we haven't seen the last of him; I know we won't see such but perhaps he would end up in the Dalek Asylum. Associated with the Daleks and introduced in Tom Baker's era is Davros. I think it would be criminal not to include Davros in something Tom Baker related. I gave Davros the rarely used rectangular body identical to Mr. Grumpy and like Dr. Twelfth, gave him a prominent nose.

Zygons only ever did appear alongside Tom Baker until their return for the 50th anniversary special, it made sense to include them in the poster. And although Anthony Ainley's incarnation of The Master did not appear until the final season of Dr. Fourth's run, I doubt that despite the mentions of 'Death' and 'Extermination', Adam Hargreaves would get away with including The Master's rather deformed incarnation.

The Cybermen were an unusual case. They appeared in 'Dr. First', although did not match the designs of The Tenth Planet (William Hartnell's only episode with the Cybermen). They better resembled the Cybermen of Patrick Troughton's era, so it makes me wonder if they would be expected to appear like this to all Doctors or if it was simply a design choice made out of personal preference. I should like to think there are several designs scattered across the cosmos (and will probably interpret them) but for the sake of their similarity to the 'Invasion Cybermen', I'll allow Patrick Troughton like Cybermen to appear alongside Tom Baker's.

And now we come to what people will probably agree to be a pleasant surprise, Sutekh the destroyer! One of my favourite Tom Baker episodes and classic villains. While he might be a bit intimidating for Misterland, I could not leave him out.

The final addition was K9 the robot dog, which made his iconic debut in the days of Tom Baker and even stayed with Sarah Jane Smith, thus his reintroduction to modern Whovians in 'School Reuinion'.

I had drawn all of these characters traditionally but when it came to giving this artwork life via Photoshop, I wanted to put the TARDIS in somewhere. So on this rare occasion an illustration from Dr. First was sample and the TARDIS was given minor tweaks to fit in with the rest of the illustration. Also in the background is Gallifrey, though toned down so the characters can stand out better.

There was a lot of fun to be had with adding effects to this piece, most of which were done using a radial gradient tool. Several areas were given a rather neon glow and then in the back the stars were made the same way, as well as Gallifrey.

This is by far one of the most beautiful things Doctor Who or Mr. Men related that I have ever created and there is more to come, although not up to this standard you will be seeing more of these characters in the future... or maybe the past?