4.64

5

Nov 09, 2015

This review is taken from my blog where I review adult colouring books from a mental health perspective - colouringinthemidstofmadness.wordpress.com
This book is from my personal collection so get ready for some terrible Doctor Who puns that will have you groaning by the end but a lot more enlightened about what’s included in this book and whether you’ll like it or not. So, without further ado, grab your sonic screwdriver, jump aboard the TARDIS and travel through time and space into my review. This review is taken from my blog where I review adult colouring books from a mental health perspective - colouringinthemidstofmadness.wordpress.com
This book is from my personal collection so get ready for some terrible Doctor Who puns that will have you groaning by the end but a lot more enlightened about what’s included in this book and whether you’ll like it or not. So, without further ado, grab your sonic screwdriver, jump aboard the TARDIS and travel through time and space into my review. Allons-y! *Sorry*

Just like Bad Wolf, messages about this colouring book have been scattered throughout time and space, or at least the last couple of months on the internet since its publication was announced, and all of it was leading up to 3 days ago – publishing day! Rest assured, River Song would be pleased, because there aren’t any ‘spoilers’ within this review. This book is the perfect colouring ‘companion’ to the entire television series of Doctor Who, not just the newer series that got many of us (me included) hooked. This book is paperback with a card cover and has lots of gorgeous blue foiling on the front, it is 25cm square, the same size as other leading colouring books. It contains 45 images, though it feels like many more (one could describe it as almost TARDIS-like), which are all printed single-sided onto off-white medium thickness, fairly smooth paper. Water-based pens do bleed but this doesn’t matter because the only thing on the reverse of each image is a quote, the episode name, doctor number and year, so just put a protective sheet behind in case of bleed through and ‘fantastic’ you’re good to go! The spine of the book is glue-bound and tight, but it will ease up with use and the images are borderless so a little is lost into the spine but this is very small and pales into insignificance when battling aliens and trying to patch up cracks in the space-time continuum.

The Doctor Who Colouring Book starts with a lovely “This book belongs to…” page and then shows a number of items that are hidden within the images for you to hunt down in a time-travelling treasure hunt. This book contains images of everything you’d expect, and more! There are Daleks, Cybermen, Sycorax, Ood, Adipose, alien planet landscapes and images of inside and outside the TARDIS. There are also images of each Doctor in order from the first to the current, twelfth. These images are all of a right-facing portrait outline of each Doctor and contained within are images of that Doctor, their assistant/companion and some of the main features from their episodes, be that accessories, technology or even their nemeses. The final one of these is of Missy, because who could forget her?! The Doctor’s biggest enemies are featured in multiple images each so you’ll certainly get your fill of Daleks, Cybermen and Weeping Angels. Some of the images are scenes as you’d expect but they’re not specific stills from the TV series, more representations. There are mandalas (“The round things, I love the round things, What are the round things?, No idea!”) of various characters including Daleks, Ood and the TARDIS and many more images, a good cross-section of which are photographed below.

In terms of mental health, this book isn’t geared up to be calming or relaxing but if you’re a Whovian then you’re sure to get a huge amount of enjoyment out of it and that can only be good for your mental health. The images are drawn in a variety of line thicknesses which range from thin to medium thickness and are mainly thin, but not spindly so they’re all very colourable as long as you’ve got fairly good vision and fine motor control. None of the lines in the book are wibbly-wobbly, but they’ll all take plenty of timey-wimey (I’m not even sorry about that one). This book would not only be good for adult fans but also older children who can cope with the intricacy and detail which is fairly considerable in a number of images, “Don’t Blink” or you’ll go over the lines. Again, there is variety within this which means this book is ideal for those of you with fluctuating conditions who need simpler and more intricate images for days of different ability when you’re weary from time-travel, or buoyed up by another victorious battle. The image content is ideal for anxious colourers because most of the images are of characters that have specific colour schemes and you could easily either colour them from memory or google them in order to find out what colours they “should” be. Of course, this is just a guide and you could definitely colour your cyber men green and have a neon pink TARDIS if you chose and I’m sure it would look spectacular.

As you can tell from my pun-tastic review, I’d highly recommend this book for all Whovians and I’m sure Matt Smith would say that “Colouring Books are cool”, especially this one! Exterminate your boredom and worries and get stuck in to this book which is nowhere near as bad as ‘yoghurt, baked beans, bacon or bread and butter’ and perhaps it’ll become something amazing in your life like ‘fishfingers and custard’. Grab your jelly babies, break out the fez (wrap up in your mega long scarf for good measure) and get out your sonic colouring pencils and ‘Geronimo!’ you’re in for some Wibbly-Wobbly Timey-Wimey fun! ...more

4

Jan 04, 2018

To start, the book is sewn together and the pages are not perforated. If you want to take the pages out to color you’ll probably have to cut the threads apart instead of using an x-acto knife or the like. Some of the illustrations go all the way to the binding.

The opposite side of each page is nearly blank- only having a quote from the show and a small picture of the reverse page- nothing to really color so you can feel free to use pens and markers. That’s a big plus in my book because I love my To start, the book is sewn together and the pages are not perforated. If you want to take the pages out to color you’ll probably have to cut the threads apart instead of using an x-acto knife or the like. Some of the illustrations go all the way to the binding.

The opposite side of each page is nearly blank- only having a quote from the show and a small picture of the reverse page- nothing to really color so you can feel free to use pens and markers. That’s a big plus in my book because I love my Sharpies! The paper is thick, but if you use Sharpies or any other markers or pens that tend to bleed through I would put a piece of construction paper or craft paper between the pages.

The illustrations are anything from fully developed space scenes with a floating Tardis to
mandala Daleks. Silhouettes of the Doctor’s incarnations are filled with different memories of his time as that Doctor. Sadly on the silhouettes I find that some parts are too small to color for my liking. I’m constantly having to keep the pencils sharp to keep in the lines and having to concentrate way harder than I want.

While I am having fun coloring a page full of Cybermen into a psychedelic 60s masterpiece and a rainbow of Adipose falling from a spaceship, a couple of those filler pages could have made way for a few missing favorite characters: River, Donna, & Jack. But then again not every character can fit inside of one book, so there had to be a compromise somewhere. It has an okay mix of classic and new, of course with more of the new Doctors and villains, but I think both fans will be happy.
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5

Nov 08, 2016

The details on the images are outstanding, the paper is thicker and of higher quality compared to other adult coloring books I have. I would still insert a blank paper under the images if you want to use Sharpies.
I used a combination of both colored pencils and fine point Sharpies, the images are absolutely lovely! If you're a DW fan, you will most definitely want this.
They're time consuming, they take me days to complete but while doing it, I am completely relaxed yet focused. I still have The details on the images are outstanding, the paper is thicker and of higher quality compared to other adult coloring books I have. I would still insert a blank paper under the images if you want to use Sharpies.
I used a combination of both colored pencils and fine point Sharpies, the images are absolutely lovely! If you're a DW fan, you will most definitely want this.
They're time consuming, they take me days to complete but while doing it, I am completely relaxed yet focused. I still have plenty more to complete and look forward to each one with anticipation. ...more

5

Apr 07, 2016

Haven't colored in this yet, but it looks like it's going to be lots of fun! The image with the sci-fi-ish looking city and the rocks in front really sold this book to me. Trying to figure out what that city's supposed to be from the show--is it on Gallifrey maybe?