The Deadly Assassin

It may give the surprise away, but you have to use a photo of the decaying Master on a cover for 'The Deadly Assassin', don't you? It's such a gruesomely eye-catching creation. The story is also such a head-to-head battle between him and the Doctor, that I quickly decided to do one of my two-level compositions, so I could give each equal weight in the illustration. When I saw the official cover previewed I gave a sigh knowing I was likely to use the same photos of the Doctor and Master - that shot of the Tom Baker in Time Lord garb is a classic - and although when I came to do my picture research I found alternatives with each character looking downwards I decided in the end they didn't work as well as shots of both looking out at the viewer.

The question then was what to put in the two panels. I had thought to construct a scene of the president being shot down, but when I came across the image of Goth, Spandrell and Borusa together, I knew it was too good an opportunity to include all the major suspects on the cover. I expanded the shot with some extra Time Lords and Runcible to hide the join. I was still thinking I could do the assassination image in the top panel when I realised that the title would obscure most of this portion of the illustration. I initially put in a shot of the Panopticon set with Time Lords and guards, but it seemed a bit repetitive of the bottom panel. I'd already grabbed some screenshots from episode three to potentially use on the back cover, and looking through these I thought one of Goth aiming his rifle would tie into the assassin of the title nicely. He's kind of squeezed into the space a bit, but it just about works for me.

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