"Doctor Who: The Whispering Gallery" one-shot on sale in February

Married writing team Leah Moore and John Reppion have been fans of "Doctor Who" for nearly as long as they can remember, so it should come as little surprise that the couple will to try their hand at writing the classic British sci-fi hero for IDW Publishing. CBR News caught up with Moore and Reppion, who told us the idea for the upcoming one-shot "Doctor Who: The Whispering Gallery" came to Moore in a dream."We were trying to come up with a pitch to send in to IDW and having a really hard time thinking of anything," Leah Moore told CBR News. "Everything we could think up had already been done, or was not the right kind of story. We went off to bed one night after brainstorming fruitlessly for hours, and I went to sleep worrying that we'd not be able to think of anything and miss out on writing it altogether." Little did Moore know, that very night she would dream up a two-page spread that would become the basis for not only the plot but also the title of their story. "I woke up and said loudly, 'I know what we are doing for Doctor Who!' which woke John up. We got it turned round in a week or so after that. Pretty fast for us.""The Whispering Gallery" takes place during the tenth doctor's travels with companion Martha Jones, on a planet where showing emotions has been outlawed. "It's not based on Earth, so we get to do some aliens and monsters which is always fun," Moore said. Though the inhabitants of the planet have good reason for playing things close to the vest, the good doctor is not about to let that suppression stand. "The story kind of picks up on the consequences that the Doctor's actions have on the universe, and the people he touches, and then we get to see how it pans out eventually."John Reppion told CBR his earliest Doctor Who memory was an inflatable version of the doctor's familiar spacecraft, the Tardis. "It may even have belonged to one of my Uncles before me, I'm not sure," Reppion said. "Doctor Who is just part of the fabric of UK mainstream culture, really; it's like being asked when you were first exposed to cowboys or something like that. Doctor Who has always been there so far as I remember. The Doctor of my youth was Sylvester McCoy." Reppion also has fond memories of the Marvel UK "Doctor Who" comic book crossovers with the likes of Death's Head and the Transformers.For "Whispering Gallery," Moore and Reppion are joined by superstar artist Ben Templesmith, and the writers revealed that it was he who first brought them into the fold. "Ben actually approached Leah via the modern miracle of Twitter and asked her if we'd be interested in pitching for a Doctor Who one-shot with him as the artist," explained Reppion. "Naturally, we were thrilled and said yes immediately. Ben is a fantastic artist and we both really admire his work, so it's great to be able to work with him on such a brilliant little project. "He has done some fantastic demo images of Martha and the Doctor which he posted on his blog at the beginning of November.""Doctor Who: The Whispering Gallery" is not the only new project on Moore & Reppion's horizons. "We've got two big miniseries coming out with Dynamite Entertainment next year, one of which is 99% written, and will be finished in the next few weeks, and the other is only 40% written at present," Reppion said. The writers weren't at liberty to go into any more detail about the projects, other than to say they have a distinctly classic, British feel. "We've got tons and tons of stuff on the horizon but, again, nothing we can really talk about at the present moment. If people keep their eyes on www.MooreReppion.com, we'll let you know as soon as we're allowed to make any statements." Moore and Reppion said they had such a blast writing "Whispering Gallery" that they'd write more Doctor Who comics in a heartbeat. "Doctor Who: The Whispering Gallery" hits stands February 29 from IDW Publishing.