If the Missing Adventures were a series of comic books, "The Dark Path" would no doubt be called "The Secret Origin of the Master". While we aren't afforded a glimpse at the Doctor and Koschei's days at the Academy on Gallifrey, we do at least get to experience the defining moment when the Time Lord becomes the evil villain we all know and love. In a way, it's appropriate that this book should come out the same month as "Lungbarrow", as both offer previously unseen glimpses into the formative times of two of the series' most enigmatic characters.

Unlike the delightful "Lungbarrow", however, "The Dark Path" doesn't work quite so well. And, in fact, it falls into a trap many comic books fell into -- the idea that one single moment should have the power to so completely redefine a person's behavior, attitude and goals. Were the person already unbalanced, this might be believable. But, in the first half of "The Dark Path", Koschei is no such thing -- on the contrary, he is portrayed as self-assured, intelligent, sophisticated. While he does seem a little colder and more standoffish than the Doctor (more Time Lordish, really), he is by no means unstable or impressionable enough to be so deeply affected by a single event. This is perhaps not helped along by the fact that author David A McIntee is rather less than successful in crafting a realistic, meaningful relationship between Koschei and Ailla: we, as readers, just can't really understand *why* the revelations Koschei faces in "The Dark Path" would be so traumatising, on the basis of just a hundred and fifty pages or so.

McIntee also does a rather underwhelming job at handling what is, in fact, a pretty interesting plot. Many of the novel's more intriguing avenues -- the meeting of the Empire and Federation cultures, or the transformation of the alien crewmembers into humans, for instance, go largely unexplored, used mostly as just another complication to tie up thirty pages rather than a chance for real characterisation. McIntee approaches these sorts of events asking "How does this affect the plot?" rather than "How does this affect the characters?", and that's rarely the proper order of priorities, at least for this sort of thing. As it is, the Darkheart could be any old device used to hold the world at ransom... the next CVE or Doomsday Weapon or whathaveyou. McIntee opts for too many conventions of the genre, and this makes what should have been a very special book just another romp in space and time with the Doctor.

Characteriwse, McIntee continues to have difficulty crafting an interesting supporting cast -- literally none of the players he introduces are memorable, and that includes (as previously alluded to) Ailla, who really needed more depth to fill the important role she plays. The Doctor and Koschei are both better handled; McIntee's Second Doctor, in fact, is one of the better portrayals of the Missing Adventures, while Koschei recalls the suaveness of Roger Delgado rather nicely. Jamie is serviceable, but Victoria has little to do in the novel -- indeed, McIntee's attempts to pay her some attention by focussing on her increasing desire to leave the Doctor feel trite and irrelevant.

While more enjoyable and less tedious than most of McIntee's novels, "The Dark Path" is nonetheless something of a misfire. It is perhaps hampered both by an overuse in general of the Earth Empire and the Adjudicators in Doctor Who books over the past year or so (and there's still "So Vile A Sin" to come...), as well appearing at the same time as a far better origin story in "Lungbarrow", but it shoots itself in the foot a bit, as well, by offering too much we've seen often before... and that includes, sadly, the revelations of the Master's past offered up herein.

6/10.

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