The Ultimate Evil written by Wally K. Daly and directed by Helen Goldwyn

 

What’s it about: With the TARDIS working perfectly, the Doctor and Peri decide to take a holiday. But where? A long-forgotten piece of equipment in the TARDIS storage locker sends them to the peaceful and idyllic continent of Tranquela - home of the Doctor’s old friend Ravlos. But the land where they emerge is far from peaceful. A hate ray is regularly sweeping Tranquela, turning its inhabitants into savage beasts, and there is only one place it can originate - the planet’s other continent, home of Tranquela’s old enemies, the Amelierans. Or is that the only place? Because somewhere far above the planet events are watched by the slimy super-salesman, Mordant, who has his own unscrupulous plans.

Softer Six: The Doctor is appalled that there is nothing with the TARDIS, which means that he has no tinkering to do and nothing to pass his time whilst he is in the vortex. At the moment if you name anywhere in the universe and he could land you there in a millisecond. Sounds rather farfetched to me, given previous form. The hours, years and lifetimes that the Doctor has spent trying to keep the TARDIS functioning are beyond the comprehension of a human. Now he has nowhere in particular he wants to go and no task to perform and this is the time the TARDIS chooses to turn on him. As an opening scene, it is rather witty but it does expose the paucity of the agonising TARDIS scenes that plagued this era where the Doctor and Peri stood around bitching and griping at each other. It takes the Doctor 20 minutes to join the story, which is agonisingly faithful to season 22. He has no respect for the finest scientific instruments in the galaxy, shoving them back in the cupboard as if they were so much junk. The Doctor got his holiday ball from a particularly disreputable representative of the planet Salakan, the slimy super salesman Mordant.

Busty Babe: It’s Peri’s suggestion if the Doctor has nothing to do that he should take a holiday. He doesn’t comprehend the notion, but she has been pushing for that for ages. Peri sarcastically mentions that the locals of every planet want to turn her into a rock garden the moment she arrives…but that isn’t too far from the truth. Peri has been put off holidays for life, given every time she is promised one something horrible happens to her. Peri reminds the Doctor that at one point in this story she was heading for certain death and the Doctor brushes over that by reminding her that the fact that she isn’t means that banging on about it is irrelevant. This characterisation is so troubling.

Standout Performance: Colin Baker is as committed to his portrayal of the Doctor as I have come to expect. This is one story where perhaps he should have phoned it in. Once he is under the influence of the violence ray and turned into a homicidal maniac, the Doctor begins snarling and growling and spitting out threats. Colin sounds thoroughly demented and absolutely terrifying. It’s appalling characterisation of a great Doctor being brought to life by a theatrical actor. The result is quite nasty on the ears.

Dreadful Dialogue: I’m going to break down one piece of dialogue that will expose everything that is inherently wrong with this script, and the dialogue in particular. ‘Don’t be impertinent, Ravlos. You are simply a scientist and you should know that is no way to address a ruling family member’ You have hackneyed phraseology, a consonant heavy SF name, exposition and dialogue expressing something it expects us to know. It’s breaking every rule in the book. The trouble is you could point at practically every line and come to the same conclusion. It’s like SF from the 50s, not the 80s. ‘So, the Amelerians have indeed created a weapon to destroy us.’

Great Ideas: The Salakans want to drain the wealth of any planet they happen upon and so they find the planets needs and provide it for them. Usually, it is an addictive and one that only they can provide so they are in bondage to them. Thought bubble travel does sound amazing. That concept has far more potential than anything else in The Ultimate Evil. Building a society that has that level of sophisticated technology would have been much more satisfying.

Musical Cues: I love the mad organ stings that play throughout the most melodramatic moments of this story – somehow giving all the pomp and nonsense even more of a sense of occasion.

Isn’t it Odd: There’s a scene where one of the affected Tranquelans is clearly being played by Nicola Bryant in her natural accent. There’s nothing done to disguise the fact and the fact that Bryant has played parts before for Big Finish with her English accent seems to have been forgotten.

This is one of those dreadful mid 80s worlds where the characters talk in exposition to try and paint in details but you don’t really get to experience the culture and society that they are trying to build for you. Think Karfel but less smoothly written. Oh yes. ‘And if we are to discover it is the work of the Amelerians?’ says one characters, as if we are supposed to know what that means. You need to build a world through its characters, and then give them an excuse to sketch in details of the world around them. Remember Garron and the Graff in The Ribos Operation; the excuse to tell us about Ribos is there because one is trying to sell the planet to the other so it makes absolute sense that he should be providing a detailed account. You can’t just dump your audience in a science fiction setting and start spouting ridiculous sounding names for places and people and expect us to care. It was the formula in some of those 80s stories and so bravo for this lost story for emulating it authentically.

Just when I thought no stone would be left unturned in the season 22 rulebook…the Doctor announces 30 minutes into the story that his old friend Ravlos resides on the planet of Tranquela! He’s in the address book next to Azmael, Dastari, Magellan, Stengos, and Tonker Travers. Apparently Ravlos’ wife is fantastic at Sucksos. She gets pretty dirty when its on the go.

Another cliché…the peace-loving people of xyz planet, I’ll be so happy to see them again…open the TARDIS doors…oh my why are they trying to kill us? Sigh.

It’s very peculiar that the most horrific moment of the episode (the Doctor attempting to murder his old friend, Twin Dilemma style) all takes place from the point of view of the villain so we can only hear it taking place on a tinny screen with his laughing over the action. Perhaps that is a comment on how absurd the whole thing is, or perhaps by obscuring the madness of Colin Baker’s performance is the only way for this story to survive with its dignity intact.

There’s a very dark thread of disabled shaming taking place in the Colin Baker era that doesn’t sit at all well with me. Sil was a repulsive little capitalist that couldn’t walk. Magellan was a hideously deformed scientist that was only interested in defiling Peri and causing all out war. Davros has his hand blown off and the Doctor cracks a joke at his expense. And now we have the Dwarf Mordant, who wants to cause mass murder on a scale that is inconceivable. This era seems to be saying that if you aren’t fully formed and beautiful, evil is your dish of the day.

The Tranquelans and the Amelarons are the living embodiment of ill defined, utterly unrelatable alien races that Russell T Davies talks about when he describes the planet Zog and precisely the sort of crass scientific nonsense that he was trying to avoid in series one of the new series in fear of alienating the new audience. Give me one reason to understand, relate or care about anyone on this planet. Just one. I think I understood less about how this culture works at the end of the story than I did at the beginning. In the second episode we are facing all out war between the two factions and the whole planet may go up in carnage. At least that way we never have to visit this dreary backwater again.

Standout Scene: ‘Let’s squeeze the life out of you!’ So, whether the original season 22 had come to fruition or when the alternative reared its head 18 months later, Colin Baker’s Doctor was always going to turn evil and start behaving in a homicidal way. Either by death ray or Crozier’s mind control. Eric Saward really wasn’t too fond off the character, was he? I’ve always found the way the Doctor abuses Peri in Mindwarp discomforting but (and I never thought I would say this) thank goodness that is what we got because the thought of him turning beserk and attacking people with a shard of glass is too hideous to contemplate. Colin would have really gone for it as well, as he always does. It would have been an irredeemable act for the sixth Doctor. He commits domestic abuse on the TARDIS once under the hypnotism of the death ray, and she refuses to obey his commands. That might be the worst thing he has ever done in an any incarnation. The end of episode one features the Doctor screaming ‘raaaaaagh!’ and ‘I’m going to kill you!’ Was Eric Saward genuinely going to let Waly K. Daly put out something as irresponsible as this? Doctor Who is no longer a hero but a violent, murderous thug. Calling a story ‘the ultimate evil’ and then giving over the cliffhanger (the moment of optimum peril) to the Doctor behaving in an abhorrent fashion suggests that he is the recipient of that title. I’m just not sure why you would ever do that.

Result: ‘I couldn’t cope with turning you into a beast, my love…’ Any story that begins with the premise of an alien ray that turns the population of a planet into murderous fiends has got to be taken with a pinch of forgiveness because it is precisely the sort of concept that plays out in those fabulous low rent B movies that you can usually find hanging about in Pound shops. I can’t really defend how stupid an idea it is, but I just went with it and the result was that I quickly relaxed into how campy and outrageous the story was and in that way I got a great deal of enjoyment out of it. Everybody is on the joke; from the director to the actors to the music. Everybody knows this is a piece of old tat but is determined to make it as entertaining as possible. It’s very like Mission to Magnus in that respect, but pacier and even less subtle. If that is even possible. Living up to every cliché in the season 22 book (The Doctor joins the action late, the planet is less than fully realised but characters talk about it as though it is, scenes of protracted violence), The Ultimate Evil is doing exactly what it says on the tin a little too well. Whilst there have far been better Lost Stories in terms of plot, character, dialogue and even production, this is surely the most authentic in terms of tone, content and execution? It’s impossible to care about the people of Tranquela and their dreary little continent and so when they started getting bumped off in spectacularly violent ways I was cheering. I think the story wants us to find the violence shocking and unfair (if that was the case it needed to work harder to enamour itself to me beyond lists of details of religion, rebels and rituals) but truthfully those were the funniest and most enjoyable scenes. In that case think of this as the ultimate Doctor Who snuff movie. I can’t bring myself to hate this. It is every single hideous cliché in the book packaged together in a two-hour spectacular and quite, quite hideous. But on those terms, it is so much fun to listen to. Wally K Daly was a respected writer away from Doctor Who and so I can only assume that he was just provided what he thought the script editor wanted by looking at the work around him. I’d say he did that a little too well. The Ultimate Evil might be the ultimate so bad it’s good Doctor Who story, edging out Time and the Rani: 2/10 (or 8/10 depending on your mileage for absolute horseshit)

A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife Talks to Joe Lidster about SJA's The Nightmare Man

Joe Lidster talks candidly about his time working on The Sarah Jane Adventures, and his conception, execution and revision of the series four story The Nightmare Man. It is a fascinating conversation packed with insights and tips about writing for television. I hope you enjoy. 

(All calls were recorded online and so sound quality can vary. Be kind).

Episode One 

Episode Two 

Tartarus written by David Llewellyn and directed by Scott Handcock

 

What’s it about: 63BC. Following the overthrow of Catiline, Cicero and his wife retire to the coastal town of Cumae, safe from the threats of Rome. But when a stranger and his companions arrive at Cicero’s villa, new dangers lie in wait and Cicero finds himself plunged into a realm of gods and monsters. His only hope of returning home lies with a man known as the Doctor. But can Cicero trust him?

An English Gentleman: I’m going to say something that might stun people rigid simply because it opposes what I usually say about Peter Davison on television but I think that overall he has had the most consistent run of stories in the last couple of years. Colin will always be my favourite (and has probably had higher highs overall); McCoy has suffered of late and McGann is propping up the interminable boxsets about the Time War. Davison has quietly, successfully carved a niche out of the main range where he and his fellow regulars have produced some really solid work, especially in the last five years of the main range. Equilibrium, The Entropy Plague, The Secret History, The Waters of Amsterdam, Aquitaine, The Peterloo Massacre, The Memory Bank & Other Stories, Cold Fusion, Dalek Soul, Time in Office, Ghost Walk…all excellent and most of the stories I haven’t mentioned that are part of these trilogies are all fairly decent too. It might sound dismissive to say this but he is a Doctor you can rely on; Davison will always give a fine performance no matter what the quality of material and those involved in his line of late (Scott Handcock) are the best that Big Finish has at the moment. He’s going to depart the main range on a high.

The Doctor has a massive geek on for Cicero and has brought his companions to this place and time just so they can meet him. He’s like a dreadful fanboy when he finally catches up with him, completely star struck. When his mind is turned against him the Doctor sees the Cybermen and shouts out ‘there was nothing I can do!’ The death of Adric obviously lingers on. There is some marvellous tension between the Doctor and Cicero in the second episode where they discuss the people who have died as a direct result of their actions and then they conflict on who should be leading their journey. The Doctor is used to being the one who makes most of the decisions, and so is Cicero and neither of them is happy to abandon the position. When they need to play a flute to continue, the Doctor admits that he used to play the recorder and Tegan shuts him down immediately. The Doctor’s conversation with Cicero at the end is very telling; Marc has gone off on adventures with the TARDIS crew but when asked how he is doing by Cicero the Doctor’s tone grows dark and he suggests travelling with him can be dangerous. If we never hear any of Marc’s adventures it is enough to know that he had some time with the Doctor, Nyssa and Tegan and met a sticky end. This coda to his adventures rather avoids the trouble of having to tell those stories.

Mouth on Legs: She’s on form at the beginning of this adventure; pointing out inconsistencies like some terrible online reviewer. Tegan is immediately suspicious when she hears that the Doctor has brought her to within 30 miles of Pompeii and Vesuvius but he soon assuages her concerns. She wonders why they have never worn clothes to fit into the historical period when it has never bothered them before (think of The Visitation when she walks around 16th Century England in that ghastly air stewardesses’ uniform). Finally, she makes the point that that when they usually take a dive into history it is when something important is going to happen and she wonders what that might be this time. She’s been at this malarkey too long now. In history, Tegan finds that she cannot bite her tongue when it comes to the subject of slavery and her objections. The most blasphemous thing that Tegan could say in this time period is that there is no such thing as the Gods and so of course, she says it. ‘Is she always like this?’ asks Cicero. ‘Yes!’ cry the Doctor and Nyssa. She’s the only member of the group that doesn’t talk absolute gibberish, apparently.

Alien Orphan: Nyssa and Tegan have a quiet moment when they ponder the last time the Doctor mentioned Adric and think it is healthy to see him smiling and enjoying himself. At one point Nyssa thought him very cold hearted for not mentioning Adric, but instead she knows now that he shields how he feels. It’s Nyssa who first touts the idea of Marc coming with them and freeing him from the life of a slave. Of course, she does, she’s the most humane of all of the Doctor’s companions. I love how everybody is smart enough to think themselves around this environment but it is Nyssa who picks up the most clues and starts to use her observations to their advantage. It’s Nyssa that manages to lure a bull into a pit and a great bull fighting sequence.

Standout Performance: Big Finish continues their tradition of summoning some prestigious talent and to secure Samuel Barnett whilst his star is ascending is no small feat. It’s worth noting that Cicero has remarkably chemistry with all three of the regulars and they make a hugely enjoyable team to listen to. Barnett might not capture the fusty, scholarly tone that you imagine that you might imagine from a historical figure like Cicero but he gives a rich, funny, and utterly committed performance. It reminds me of Dean Lennox Kelly from The Shakespeare Code. Not at all how you imagine the person to be, but irresistible to be around.

Sparkling Dialogue: The Doctor, Nyssa and Tegan all take a stab at trying to explain something technological…
The Doctor: ‘The maintenance panel for a battle droid!’ ‘Come again?’ Nyssa: ‘It’s the on/off switch for a giant robot’ ‘No you’ve still lost me’ Tegan: ‘It’s where the magic happens!’
‘This Australia seems most unorthodox.’
‘To have hope when you’re a slave is the worst thing of all.’
‘Very convenient having the Gods provide the solution right at the last minute! They even have a name for it! Deus Ex Machina!’

Great Ideas: Cicero is not just important to the Roman Republic and the record of his work will live on long after he meets a decidedly unpleasant end. Orator, lawyer, politician, terrible poet. Cicero writes everything down and if he even has an inkling of the truth about time travellers it could change human history forever. A scholar of many subjects that we take for granted these days; rhetoric, philosophy, politics and considered one of the greatest Roman prose stylists. For the purposes of the story, he is the celebrity historical of the week and it is important that he is exposed to a little of the future as possible. But it’s worth noting Cicero’s impact on history, how his philosophical thinking has embedded into the human consciousness and that his works are considered some of the most influential in European culture. Tartarus is the land of the tormented dead…which sounds like the ideal location for a Doctor Who story, if not the sort of holiday destination the Doctor should be aiming for. There are no real horrors where they are; it is just holographic devices that are tuned to their individual brainwaves, using their memories against them. Tartarus was sent from Zorth in the Phraxus galaxy, in the constellation of Zandrabar (can you imagine more cheap sounding SF names?). Her mission was to search for those that might lead her people because after centuries of wars the leaders grew cynical and corrupt. They needed new minds. The holograms are a series of tests, to select the new leader. Cicero failed as a leader because executed men without trial and the Doctor allowed one of his team to perish. Marc is selected to lead the Hive.

Isn’t it Odd: Creatively there doesn’t seem to be a good enough reason to make this two extended episodes rather than the standard four episodes aside from the fun of playing about with the form? There’s a perfect cliffhanger around the 22-minute mark where a character is attacked by a creature from mythology that would have served as a perfectly competent cliffhanger.

Standout Scene: Wonderfully, the climax of this story sees Cicero playing James T. Kirk and having to try and battle words with a computer. As the King of rhetoric, he is more than up to the task. Listening to one of the Greats cross logical swords with a silky voiced computer makes for an enchanting, but also satisfying conclusion to this two-hour trailer for the Cicero series.

Result: Brilliant performances all round and some outstanding direction make this an absolute joy to listen to and another fifth Doctor win. David Llewellyn has written a smart, peppy script with plenty of marvellous dialogue for the cast to enjoy and we bounce from one exciting set piece to another so things never get dull. Cicero’s narration of events (think Marco Polo) means that we can cover some ambitious ground without the story feeling rushed and it is marvellous to get his unique two millennia old perspective on some science fiction concepts that we might otherwise take for granted. The story is something of a puzzle box to be worked out with lots of aural set pieces along the way that would have made this prohibitively expensive had the script been written for television but that allows the story to have the epic nature of Greek mythos on audio. I’m not sure I understood a lot of what was going on, because this kind of Star Trek style holodeck setting is more enjoyable for the atmosphere rather than the technobabble and so I just enjoyed the romp and the gorgeous chemistry between all the leads. The direction is confident throughout (I expect nothing less from Handcock) and by the end of the story you might think that Davison and Barnett are so awesome together you might find yourself wishing the Doctor had Cicero as his companion. What actually happens is something similar, but more surprising This is the best David Llewellyn scripted story I have listen to: 9/10

VOY – Manuveres

 

Plot – People think I am completely crazy because I consider season two to be peak Voyager. Let me try and explain that a little, because on the surface that is a ridiculous statement. There’s no Seven of Nine for a start. This was Michael Piller’s final involvement in the Trek franchise, the man who salvaged TNG and made a show to be proud of, who brought DS9 to life and thus created one of the finest SF shows of all time and who saw the inception of Voyager through to its execution. Seasons one and two of Voyager are a little ponderous, but they are also the show at its bravest, the only time it truly flirted with serialisation and when there was some genuine conflict driven from the initial premise. It’s not as stylish or as overtly entertaining as some of the later seasons (my other favourite period is season five, which is the over time when the show gained a rare period of confidence) but it is trying to turn this show into a serial with consequences, where travelling through the Delta Quadrant is tricky and where a number of secondary characters like Carey, Seska and Suder can have a real impact on the show. All of this goes out of the window with Jeri Taylor and her season three innovations but for a while, despite some serious stumbles, Voyager is attempting to be bold.

People decry the Kazon as one of the least effective races that the franchise delivered and I do think there is a sound argument in that, however in stories like this where they inflict some genuine damage on Voyager they do prove to be violently effective at times. The shot of the Kazon shuttle hanging out of Voyager’s belly is an effective one, as is the scene in Basics where a Kazon kamikaze agent blows himself up to cause the ship some serious damage. They aren’t subtle or especially compelling, but they can have the blunt consequences of a pipe to the head at times.

The idea of using transporter technology as a weapon is a fantastic one, and much more should have been done with it. Beaming your enemies out into space…why hasn’t that been tried before?

Character – Cullah is the one Kazon character that had any kind of an impact on the show and that is mostly because the actor had that Marc Alaimo ability to be both very charming and utterly slimy. The sexual politics between him and Seska was really interesting too because she had a great way of grabbing him by the balls and either massaging them or gripping them painfully depending on whether he was doing what she wanted or not. This could have (and should have) been taken so much further than it was but I do admire the effort of having a season long recurring bad guy who is a thorn in Janeway’s side. With Seska by his side he almost manages to use Voyager to manoeuvre the Kazon enemies out in the open an assassinate them and he successfully manages a takeover of the ship at the end of the season. In terms of being a threat to Voyager, he (and Seska) are probably the ultimate expression of that. ‘Listen to your woman, Cullah’ is just about the worst thing that he can hear but that’s all he ever does because ultimately she is the better tactician.

Seska is essentially a pantomime character (or a Scooby Doo one that pulls its mask off in the final act) but the truth of the matter is that in Martha Hackett’s hands she is incredible fun. She knows exactly how play it so Seska is both completely in control and pretending to be submissive. She has a great line in winding up the men around her with a long string and getting them to do her bidding. She’s the ultimate Voyager villainess, not the Borg Queen. Hackett is having fun and that makes all the difference. ‘Yes Maje…’

Performance – I really hate what happened to Robert Beltran on Voyager, it’s a systematic emasculation of an actor to the point where he just doesn’t care about the character is playing or the show he is a part of. Instead Beltran is given so little of note to do in the final four seasons that the actor openly criticises the lack of attention his character has had and sleepwalks his way through the second half of the series. And yet episodes like this show just what he has to offer when he is given the opportunity. Beltran can be cheeky and sly and a real bit of rough when he wants to be, whilst marrying that with great sensitivity. This is one of his best episodes and as a showcase for the potential of Chakotay it is doing some very interesting things. For more examples of just how fascinating this character might have been, check out State of Flux and Resolutions too. Honestly, in later years there are episodes where he essentially turns up, delivers a few lines of technobabble and departs. I wonder why he wasn’t challenged as a n actor. Perhaps he looked over his shoulder at episodes like Manuvers and remembered the good old days. The moment where he is beaten up and drugged and yet still manages to expose Seska’s sexual manipulation to Cullah is an unusually savvy moment for the character and Beltran seizes the chance to play it to the hilt.

Great Dialogue – ‘I find it more than a little self-indulgent for Chakotay to assume this is all about him.’

‘Don’t flatter yourself! It was never that good!’ – poor Chakotay is truly emasculated by the women in his life in this episode.

Production – Somebody in the production team has decide that this show is far too ponderous for its own good and pulled in David Livingston to direct a handful of episodes in season two and bring a bit of bite to the show. The raiding sequence is the best action scene in Voyager to date. I love the way we cut from the Kazon climbing from the shuttle that has stabbed its way inside Voyager to Tuvok entering the cargo bay from above and firing his gun. It feels almost cinematic in its approach.

Best moment – There’s a fantastic scene between Torres and Chakotay where they discuss their previous relationships with Seksa and how personal these developments feel. A great example of the smart characterisation that can come with serialised storytelling.

What works so well about the climax is how it is entirely Maquis tricks that allow Voyager to catch up with the Kazon and extract Chakotay. It’s one of the few times where the premise of the show is allowed to have a direct impact on an episode.

The ending is worthy of note for Janeway chewing out Chakotay for his actions because he is setting a precedent for people to head off on personal vendettas when they feel like it. She explains beautifully that what he did was commendable but the way that he did it was not.

A reason to watch this episode again – Brilliant fun; an episode that proves to be exciting, engaging and surprising. Maneuvers is where season two all starts to click into place. The Seska storyline has been bubbling along nicely for some time, her relationship with Chakotay a highlight of the first season and Janeway has been attempting to deal with the Kazon and their Klingon-esque politics. This is where the show suddenly decides to step up and show the consequences of all that, plus throw in some dynamic action and deliver some of that punch and promise of Caretaker. You might be told that just because this has the Kazon in it that it is automatically bad but this a great character show for Chakotay and one where he gets to show off his Maquis skills, manipulate his ex-lover and to bamboozle the villains. It even ends on an awesome soap opera cliffhanger that promises more fireworks in the future. I love the scenes between Janeway and Torres too, which reveals a growing affection between the two of them and exposes just how much Torres cares about Chakotay. Seska is always welcome, and I was surprised how well her relationship with Cullah has stood the test of time. It’s a crying shame that they got rid of this pair in the great season three shuffle because they really brought something unique to the show. Voyager needed to be more like this in its first two years, but Manuvers sees the series stepping up a gear and the rest of the season is (mostly) following this level of quality.

****1/2 out of *****

DS9 – Past Tense Part II

 

Plot – This is a scathing commentary on the near future where the social structure of America sees the rich dining out and enjoying themselves and the poor locked into homeless areas where they can be quietly abandoned and forgotten. Where a lack of jobs is fundamentally tearing the class system into two and the lower classes simply can’t find a way of pulling their lives together no matter how badly they might not want to. This was made 20 years ago but it could just as easily be talking about America today. It’s frightening how much of this bleak prediction of the future has come true.

Character – This is a hostage drama where both the prisoners and the ones who have kidnapped them are equally well characterised and given an appropriate amount of depth. What I love about this scenario is that you have characters that are acting out violently because they have been herded like animals (BC), characters who are behaving uncharacteristically because they are desperate to be heard (Webb), characters who are part of the system and have completely forgotten how to care (Vin), characters that try and help out when they can but are too scared to act out in case they lose their jobs and end up in the same situation (Lee) and characters that just want to get home to their family and don’t want to get caught up in things either way (Bernado). Add in Sisko and Bashir who have been caught in the web of history and need to make sure that things turn out the way they are written in the history books whilst trying not to have any record of their presence and you have a huge cast of awesome defined, well-motivated characters. Your standard Star Trek episode will have one or two interesting guest stars if you are lucky, but Past Tense strikes gold with a double length episode that can afford the time and the luxury of casting to really get this aspect spot on. What is especially good is that everybody in this story agrees that the Sanctuary District is a bad idea and society trying to hide away its social problems and by the end of the story everybody is working together to try and bring it down, albeit after having lost some characters along the way.

It’s often considered that Sisko really comes to life in the third season and whilst I wouldn’t entirely agree with that I would have to say this is the season where Avery Brooks really starts bringing some passion and vitality to the role. Past Tense sees Sisko at his absolute best; commanding, terrifying, humane and improvising. Sisko holding the saw off shotgun on BC and threatening him into submission with a deathly serious look and then throwing Vin against the wall and railing against the injustice that he has helped perpetuate are by far Avery Brooks’ best scenes to date. He’s powerful in a way that William Shatner, Patrick Stewart and Kate Mulgrew could only dream of being.

Even more important is the characterisation of Bashir, who has really started to come into his own. Gone is the pantomime jock of season one and the comedy buffoon of series two and in steps a mature, confident, sweet man who desperately wants to ace his work as a Doctor. Bashir is a much-underrated character and in episodes like Past Tense you can see precisely why he took the path of being a healer; he brings a sense of calm to proceedings; he steps in to help people who are struggling and he is wonderfully warm and gentle with both Dax and Sisko. You can feel Siddig sighing with relief to be handed material this good after being the butt of the joke for so many episodes in the previous two seasons. He would go on to enjoy some of the best episodes of DS9’s entire run (Cardassians, The Wire, Our Man Bashir, Inquisition, Dr Bashir, I Presume, Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges).

Great Dialogue – ‘Why do they sound so surprised? I mean if you’re going to treat people like animals, you’re going to get bit.’

Production – Dax looks hotter than ever dressed up in a trouser suit. She always the most gender fluid and sexually ambiguous of Star Trek characters and somehow dressing her up like a man really suits her. Her relationship with Chris is one of the few things that is a little undeveloped in this episode but I am perfectly convinced that he is completely besotted with her so when he opens his channel to the homeless it isn’t such a stretch to discover his motive.

The show is building up to the attack by the soldiers on the processing centre throughout. They try and avoid it through any means necessary and a great deal of the suspense of the episode is how it finally becomes inevitable. And Frakes directs it as a swift, brutal and bloody attack so it doesn’t disappoint. Even Sisko gets shot.

Worst moment – Sweetly, Frakes has to try and turn the Paramount lot into different periods of history and so doesn’t even disguise the fact that he is doing it on the cheap and sets up the camera in the same place each time Kira and O’Brien arrive but just changes the set dressing a little. Frakes’ direction elsewhere is so filmic and stylish and so this has to be a deliberate choice. It adds an element of humour to the story (‘oh gee the money has run out’) and means that we can see just how relaxed the crew are at creating a time period with a car or a hippy van or some snappy music.

A reason to watch this episode again – A unique episode that feels very little like Star Trek as a whole and more like a movie in its own right and the episode that scored Jonathan Frakes the right to start directing Trek movies. The truth is this is better than all but one of the movies that he went on to direct, and I would question whether even First Contact is as powerful and as affecting as Past Tense. It’s a riveting character drama, a commentary on homelessness that has become practically a prediction of the future and an episode with enough action, suspense and conflict to power most seasons. This isn’t hyperbole, and the DS9 crew were justifiably proud when this episode was released and baffled when nobody seemed to be paying it any attention (everybody was too busy looking at shiny old Voyager that had just debuted). There are a handful of DS9 episodes that you could essentially rip out of the show and hold up as exceptional drama in their own right (Far Beyond the Stars, The Visitor, The Siege of AR-558) and Past Tense most definitely belongs on that list. It’s a two parter which uses its time to build a vivid picture of the near future, that populates its cast with strong, memorable characters, that tackles hard-hitting dialogue and ideas and that saves some money for frightening action sequences. I’m in awe at how well this has stood up and at just how prescient it was 20 years ago.

***** out of *****

VOY – Child’s Play

 

Plot – Of all the plotlines to pick up and run with on Voyager, they went with the Borg children. I’m not here to discourage this show from flirting with serialisation again though and it is a terrific step in the right direction to see real consequences, both emotional and plot wise, on this show. I don’t care that that makes Voyager something a soap opera – here it is a sad day when they let go off their little broodling of Borg and almost lose Icheb to his parents – but the best of TNG, DS9 and Voyager has often been grounded in character like this.

The episode does a fantastic job of presenting us with the story of Icheb’s parents and how they lost him, characterising them in a realistic way, exploring his tentativeness about returning and dealing with Seven’s inevitable loss. It is so convincing it feels that halfway through the episode we might be able to close this one down at about the half an hour point. So, when the twist comes it feels like a real knife to the gut because we have been entirely hoodwinked by the previous half and hour of gentle and probing drama. It’s expertly done.

Character – After his introductory episode I wouldn’t have thought that Icheb would go on to be one of the standout characters of the season but this episode goes a long way towards achieving that. I love that instead of thinking like a child for his science project, he dares to create something that could potentially make Voyager a safer and more sophisticated craft on its journey through the Delta Quadrant.

Performance – Any episode that asks Jeri Ryan to look longingly just off camera and emote is in luck as she is genuinely one of the finest actresses the franchise ever had the fortune to dish up. Fortunately (because this is not always the case in series six and seven) it is paired with a dramatic and satisfying script this week and Seven gets to make one more step closer to humanity. Bringing the Borg children on board and having Seven look after them means that now she is in a maternal role, and this is the episode the shows those strings being cut and has her experience the loss of losing a child. Powerful stuff, but Ryan plays it with restraint for the most part which makes it more effective and then with some furious injustice towards the end of the episode. She’s quite magnificent. This is all rolled up engagingly in Seven’s backstory where she was separated from her parents through some quite questionable decisions on their part…which makes Seven even more unwilling to let go of Icheb and even more determined to get him back when it turns out that he has been utilised in a similarly thoughtless way by his parents. This is great character growth, and I don’t often say that on this show.

Mark Sheppard and Tracey Ellis are superbly cast as Icheb’s parents. If you’re going to try and do this sort of sleight of hand well then you need actors of some ability to pull off the emotional material before revealing who they really are. Manu Intiraymi gives a solid performance in this episode. Like Ryan in series four, he’s trying to show a character who has had all of his individuality stripped away but is trying to find his voice again. He does that by coming across a little robotically but that isn’t a criticism of his acting, I think it is a conscious choice. Certainly, in series seven he would start to explore more emotions.

Great Dialogue – ‘Bred to kill Borg?’

Production – Wowzas, despite the slightly dated CGI, Voyager manages to pull of the visual of a colony on the edge of extinction with an enormous hole gouged out of it by the Borg. What is so striking about it is that it isn’t a visual that is added for dramatic value like the teaser of The Best of Both Worlds Part I, it is just an establishing shot that tells the history of the colony dynamically whilst adding some real atmosphere to the story. I would expect nothing less of Mike Vejar, he was the king of adding striking visuals even when the script doesn’t demand them.

Best moment – I practically get a hard on when Janeway and Seven get serious with each other and I am in no way attracted to either of them. They are just so strong when they are in conflict and the argument over whether Icheb should remain with his parents or not is on one of their greatest moments.

I wish they hadn’t done that – The only moment that really jars is that the rather important plot point that Icheb was on a ship when he was assimilated comes after he has left to be with his parents. If it had come any sooner than the story could not have played out as it did because Seven would have had a reason to investigate that discrepancy.

A reason to watch this episode again – If they were going to kill off Icheb in a grisly fashion, then this was the episode to do it in. His eventual fate was entirely unjust, especially after the sort of ending he could have gotten here. Child’s Play is a superb episode of Voyager and precisely the sort of thing they needed to be doing in the sixth season when they were the lone voice of the franchise. A meaty story with a great twist, pulling together some well crafted character continuity (Seven) to inform some touching development (their mother/son relationship, which is really cemented at the end of this). Add in some marvellous direction and music and the sort of location work that only Star Trek with its impressive budget can pull off and you have a top dollar episode that is surrounded by some real mediocrity in the latter half of this season. If they were all like this and Muse, perhaps fans would have been crying out for more seasons. Jeri Ryan is particularly strong and I never fail to be impressed by how much emotion can be sifted from her restraint (she reminds me of Rene Auberjonois, but I would be hard pressed to tell you who was the better actor). Finally, Mark Sheppard turns up in Star Trek so he can put every single cult TV show on his resume (Doctor Who, Battlestar Galactica, Supernatural, etc). I love the fact that it looks like the kids are staying and Icheb is leaving, when the show takes precisely the opposite direction. The twist when it comes is a real surprise and the last act has some real fire about it. This really is a forgotten gem.

****/12 out of *****

The Nimon Be Praised! Discuss The Colin Baker Doctor (TV & Big Finish)

 

The Nimon Be Praised! Discuss The Colin Baker Doctor (TV & Big Finish) 

Set sail to the mid 80s with Jack and Joe as they tackle the most controversial of Doctors. Was he an ambitious failure on television? Did Big Finish successfully salvage his reputation? And which Nimon picks Colin as his favourite Doctor? 

1hr9m - Chris Chapman’s Scorched Earth is discussed 

1hr14m - Paul Magrs & Steve Cole’s The Wormery is discussed 

1hr25m - Nev Fountain’s Peri & the Piscon Paradox is discussed 

1hr39m Clayton Hickman and Gareth Roberts’ The One Doctor is discussed 

Marvellous stories all!

TNG – Descent Part I

Plot – Borg with names, laser weapons and fighting hand to hand combat feels instantly wrong and uncomfortably like this species are being taken in the wrong direction. Whilst I applaud Ron Moore’s attempt to do something completely different with the species, in doing so he has forgotten everything that made them so effective in the first place. It reminds me of Steven Moffat’s efforts with the Weeping Angels in Doctor Who. Every time he brings them back he tries to innovate them in some way and every time we see them again they become less scary and less effective than they once were. The Borg of Q Who? were terrifying, unknowable and relentless. They were truly a force to be reckoned with. Now they are just like people with standard weapons, individual personalities and a less than impressive fascistic leader. None of this is a shift in their favour.

The trouble with TNG at this point is that it running on empty a little bit. Voyager was having exactly the same problem at the end of its sixth season but at least it had some kind of continuing narrative with the Borg that was trying to weave into the fabric of the show. TNG has had six years now where the show has bounced from one story to the next and built up quite a picture of the Alpha Quadrant. The problem is it hasn’t tried to do anything particularly innovative narrative wise with those building blocks. So here we about to head into the last season of the show there is a suggestion that Lore is attempting to create a new race of Borg to bring down the Federation. It’s not exactly compellingly presented but it is a bold idea (albeit total fanwank) and if the show had grabbed hold of that as the premise of the final year and had an ongoing narrative in place dealing with this new threat we might have had a show with real focus. Instead it is another idea that is tossed up in the air and completely dismissed at the beginning of season seven. In comparison, DS9 is firing on all cylinders at the end of season six (the invasion of Cardassia, the death of Jadzia, the destruction of the wormhole) with an episode that has devastating consequences for the final year. I don’t understand why this show (which had the capacity) wasn’t making bolder creative decisions like that. The one positive here is Picard’s decisions regarding Hugh being questioned and criticised. It’s about time somebody took him to task about that.

A fleet of fifteen Starships to take on the Borg. Fifteen? I’m glad those shipyards are at full capacity before the Dominion War.

Character – The idea of Data experiencing negative emotions is a really interesting one, but something that would become a bit of a crux (and not a positive one) in the movies. However, at this point it is a fascinating exercise, especially when the consequence of his anger is to murder and attack. He’s technically one of the strongest lifeforms in Starfleet and so the thought that he might enjoy inflicting harm on people is quite a tense one. The suggestion that Data has been looking at extreme pornography to try and turn himself on is amusing, although I am pleased that we never got to watch those exploratory scenes. Brent Spiner really leaps on the opportunity to show real emotion after repressing them for the past six years. He’s typically excellent.

Picard’s anger about the Borg remains one of the best things about TNG, and shows that Roddenberry’s approach to characters in the future is a flawed one because he did not want ‘perfect’ humans to experience negative emotions like anger or hatred. And yet this is the best of Patrick Stewart’s performance as Picard; that fear of assimilation, his shame at committing murder and his newfound anger towards a species that used him as an instrument of war. It only comes up in one scene here (it is far more pronounced in I, Borg) but it is just as riveting.

Performance – Brent Spiner is superb in this. He has been given the chance to emote before on the show but never the chance to show such a range of powerful emotions. He proves to be quite sinister when that childlike façade drops and he gets to play angry. This is his chance to cut loose and play human in a way that he never has done before. Season seven would see these opportunities come up time and again – and with a frequent misunderstanding of how the character works. Masks is an especially egregious example, and the movies would take it to an absolute extreme.

Great Dialogue – ‘Not the apple story again’ moans Stephen Hawking as he is forced to listen to Newton bang on about his achievements in science in a very witty opening that sees Data playing poker with some of the greatest scientific minds that the human race has ever conjured up. It does go to show just how frivolous the show has become at this point because there is little plot or character point to this frippery but that doesn’t really matter when the resulting scene is as enjoyable as this. ‘The Uncertainty Principle will not help you now, Stephen’ chides Einstein as he is about to clean Hawking out.

Production – When the Away Team beam down to the output and discover the crew manning the outpost dead I was surprised by the lack of tension, atmosphere and, well, blood that was on display. Alexander Singer (whose praises I sang recently for his direction of The Adversary) directs this with a casual abandon that surprises me. We’ve seen scenes like this play out countless times over TNG’s last six seasons and there have been times when it has been terrifying (think exploring the Borg Cube). Even the shock appearance of the Borg is wasted and lacks punch. It’s like opening a cupboard and finding a child standing there playing a game. The aesthetic of the entire episode is so spotless and bloodless. TNG needed to get a lot dirtier.

Worst moment – The cliffhanger. Once upon a time TNG dared to suggest that it would kill off the Captain at the hands of the First Officer and send a mighty fleet of Borg ships to sector 001 and invade the Earth. It was insidious and dramatic and unforgettable. Now, the show is pushing camp to a new level by having Brent Spiner play the super villain and command his own army of dreary robots. ‘The Sons of Soong have come together…and together we will destroy the Federation.’ He’s even made Data sound like a dreary super villain.

A reason to watch this episode again – You’ve got two plots in play in Descent and one is infinitely more interesting and less embarrassing than the other. Data’s newfound anger manages to create some tension and uncomfortable moments that befit a season finale and capitalises on the chemistry between the crew that is the best of this show. The return of Lore and his new collection of individual Borg drones is standard science fiction drivel of the sort that TNG would normally avoid (or at least portray to such a pretentious level that it would elevate the b movie ideas to something resembling drama) and it leaves the season on a particularly sour note that this is how we are heading into the final season. I have said before that TNG hit its zenith with the climax of season three and every subsequent finale is worse that the last after that. This is the one of the weakest of all because it does have some potential but the writer and director seem to squander any attempt to create tension, excitement or drama and instead this leaps from one functional plot point to another until the episode throws in a truly schlocky cliffhanger at the last minute. Descent is not TNG’s finest hour and it has taken the one truly terrifying element of this show (the Borg) and reduced them to a bit of a joke. There’s no momentum or pace to any of this, no real drama. It feels like TNG has lost its pulse.

** out of *****

Subterfuge written by Helen Goldwyn and directed by Samuel Clements

 
What’s it about: London, 1945. Winston Churchill campaigns for re-election. His new strategic adviser assures him that Britain has a bright future under his continued leadership. It’s a vote he can’t possibly lose. But the Doctor knows that he must. The Monk is meddling, altering history for his own selfish ends. With spies and aliens in the mix, Winston realises victory may not be so simple. But at least he can trust his old friend... can’t he?

The Real McCoy: ‘It was all going so well until you showed up’ could be levelled at pretty much every Doctor. Maybe that’s what should be written on his gravestone. There’s a lovely little arc here that sees the Doctor being welcomed by Churchill at the beginning of the story and condemned by him at the end. He’s irresistibly drawn to Churchill throughout his lives. The Doctor knew immediately that the Monk was involved but waits, patiently, until they are alone until he deploys that low purr of his to threaten him away (the Monk isn’t impressed, he calls the Doctor theatrical). This story puts the Doctor in the interesting position of trying to protect somebody he considers a friend (Churchill) whilst objecting to his politics and actively trying to sabotage his career for the good of the nation (and history, and to defeat the Monk). I have been critical of Sylvester McCoy’s ‘in pain’ acting on audio for what feels like my entire life and so it pleases me to report that here, right as the Main Range is dwindling down, he has finally convinced me. The end of episode three is quite discomforting because McCoy’s screaming sounds utterly authentic. When the Doctor’s part in Churchill’s downfall is revealed he has to face the music. He tries to explain that what he did was for the greater good, but for Churchill it is the ultimate betrayal. It’s very nicely underplayed, and a very dramatic closing scene.

Churchill: A far more reasonable depiction of Churchill than we have seen in the past. I object to the cuddly Uncle persona that was wheeled out in Victory of the Daleks (one of many things to object about in that story). Goldwyn wants to write a man with integrity and ambition but doesn’t forget that he could also be sexist, racist and a thoroughly objectionable man in his own right. He’s written to be completely out of touch with the times and pushing against the sort of progressive thinking that the country needs to prosper in a post war environment. But he’s also written as a man who absolutely has faith in his beliefs, who has warmth towards his friends and genuinely wants to protect his country. I’m not sure if this is in line with either the television or previous Big Finish versions of the character, but it is the most responsible and acceptable I have come across yet.

The Monk: Saunders has been Churchill’s advisor since the start of the election campaign and he’s been quite the fresh perspective. He’s been fine tuning policies, emphasising nation concerns rather than international ones (I’m sure that would be right up Churchill’s street). He threatens to murder Churchill if the Doctor opens his trap and exposes him. He wants rid of the social reforms that the opposition are touting, much to the Doctor’s disgust. When the Monk says that the welfare state gets off to a good start (implying that long term it is not tenable) it is hard to argue with him at the point we are now with poor government backing. He sighs that there is always some kind of war going on on Earth. Sob stories don’t really do it for him. Goldwyn gives the Monk his own cliffhanger, which is only reserved for very special villains (the Master in The Daemons). When he asks what he wants he boils it down to money, power, respect and the satisfaction of a job well done. My own personal take on the Monk is that he was always considered a bit of a joke and looked down upon. He’s the ultimate awkward child that never fitted in. That’s why he tinkers with time; to prove that he can make a difference, to stick a finger up at Time Lord law and to show that he was worth paying attention to. He’s clever but he’s also socially backwards.

Standout Performance: Ah Ian McNiece. Unmistakable. Indomitable. Utterly reliable. I love the mix of McCoy at his most still and menacing and Hound at his most energetic and silly. You’ve got a Doctor who is trying to take all of this very seriously and a Monk who refuses to, whilst having a plan up his sleeve the whole time. It’s a marvellous contrast.

Sparkling Dialogue: ‘Those liberal principles will go horribly awry’ ‘It depends on your point of view.’
‘This namby pamby goodytwoshoes let’s make everyone equal nonsense doesn’t work. You know that. All beings are not created equal. Look at us – we’re Time Lords! We’ve got the right to make these decisions’ ‘A sense of entitlement is not a qualification’ ‘Societies work better in the long run with clear social strata’ ‘Rich and poor, strong and weak’ ‘Carrots and sticks’ ‘The needier people are, the more helpless and hopeless, the easier they are to control.’ This is a wonderful moment when the Monk and the Doctor battle over the right to mess with the natural order of things. He tries to explain to the Monk that interfering with the timeline always has consequences that you cannot foresee but he might as well be barking at a brick wall. The Monk has watched humanity make the same idiotic mistakes over and over again and abjectly, iditotically failing to evolve. You can see the problem, they’re both right. It’s unusual for a writer to try and get under the skin of the Monk like this and to justify his actions (without apologising for them) and Goldwyn manages that without halting the flow of the story. Get her in touch with Chibnall, will you.

Great Ideas: This story wastes no time in setting up the key players; Churchill, the Monk and the Doctor are all in orbit of each other before the pre-credits sequence has finished. A spaceship crashed three years before the Second World War (‘rubbish timing’ says the Monk) and they have been trying to repair it and escape ever since. Setting the story in the 1945 election is a triumphant move because it was such a shocking moment in history. The Conservative Party thought they were onto a winner on the back of the triumphant defeat of the Germans but in fact were handed a bludgeoning by the Labour Party, their first outright majority in Parliament. It was proof that you cannot coast on popularity alone. Subterfuge is set before the election, with a Time Lord on either side of Churchill trying to tip the result.

Isn’t it Odd: This is nothing to do with the story itself but given it seems that I have a little rant on every release I review these days I thought why make this one any different? It took me over an hour to try and choose which story to purchase and review next. Over an hour. It reminded me of how much of Big Finish’s immense back catalogue that I will probably never get around to and given that I am a crazed completist and started this blog to try and review everything that Big Finish brought out (trust me that was a lot easier 15 years ago) that doesn’t sit too well with me. Has Big Finish brought out too much, saturated the market and frightened off potential new listeners with their heft back catalogue of adventures? Unless you are extremely well off I would suggest that keeping up with everything is a scarcity that only a few bold people (with a lot of time on their hands) would attempt. Most, like me, are probably picking and choosing according to their taste. I wouldn’t miss a Colin; I’ll review all of the main range to its demise and most of the stuff produced by Scott Handcock I will check out at some point (his is the benchmark for quality as far as this output is concerned). There is too much, that is what I am saying in a roundabout way, and they are overloading genuinely fantastic writers with a heavy workload that stretches their talent thin at times. I’ve noticed fresh blood seeping into the peripheral ranges, and pleasingly a stronger female presence in the creative team and one thing I will say that is absolutely in Big Finish’s favour is that they have allowed writers, actors, and sound designers to continue working creatively in the 2020 pandemic. And I am certain their output has kept people entertained and occupied when they have been stuck at home. So less of a rant and more of a balanced opinion about Big Finish. They are the reason this blog exists, and they have given me more pleasure than practically any other avenue of Doctor Who. But they have also over saturated the audio market and the quality of the product has lessened as a result. Take of all this what you will. Where are you with Big Finish?

Standout Scene: It should be one of the big hitting scenes like the Doctor threatening the Monk when he suggests he will assassinate Churchill or Churchill’s reaction when he realises the Doctor has been working against him…but I’m going to go for something far less predictable. There’s a lovely narrative thread running through this about a spy trapped behind enemy lines, stealing art treasures, trying to get rich and giving the British a bloody nose whilst doing so. It’s quite subtly done compared to the fireworks elsewhere but there are some really pleasant scenes of the Doctor and Churchill smarting out this mystery together that are fantastically well written. These scenes of investigation can be very dry and dull but Goldwyn makes them charming, well-reasoned and very enjoyable to listen to. Sometimes it isn’t the powerhouse scenes you have to get right (because those big confrontations sometimes write themselves) but all the connecting material that can pale into insignificance in companion. Not so here.

Result: ‘In essence, everyone was double crossing everyone else!’ Helen Goldwyn is a writer and director that I always get excited about; somebody who writes with wit and warmth and economy and directs with energy, humour and pace. Whichever end of the production she is focussed on, you can pretty much rely that it is going to be worth a listen. Here she opts to remove the Doctor’s companions altogether and sets him up with Churchill and Meddling Monk, who is cheekily acting as a Conservative political advisor. See, already you’re already intrigued. The pacing of Subterfuge is excellent, and Goldwyn knows to introduce a twist in the tale at least once an episode. The Monk is trying to ensure Churchill wins the 1945 election and the Doctor is trying to make sure he loses, and it takes an ambiguous stand on which is a good or a bad thing (although we are supposed to back the Doctor so you could absolutely read this as anti-Churchill). This is the best performance that Sylvester McCoy has given since Muse of Fire and proves that if the material is up to scratch that he can still deliver the goods. I was starting to wonder. His chemistry with McNiece and Hound is excellent and he gets several beautifully written moments of antipathy with both of them. When the seventh Doctor is angry, be scared. The Big Finish Monk has always been more morally questionable than the one on TV (remember when he sold out the human race to the Daleks and had three of the Doctor’s friends murdered?) and whilst Hound veers on the wrong side of clownish at times, this is another antagonistic and nasty portrayal of the man. He’s unpredictable and unpleasant and shares some of Churchill’s more questionable ideas. Garden’s Monk tried to justify his actions, he wanted approval. Hound’s Monk is much more honest with himself. This reminded me a bit of The Mark of the Rani. No wait, hear me out. It’s three giants of Doctor Who, all pitted against one another, some terrific extended dialogue scenes and lots of double crossing. With a period backdrop to keep things visually (aurally) interesting and a science fiction subplot. I was only going to listen to half of this today and come back to but I was so compelled I listened through. It feels like the Main Range is starting to find its feet right at the point the plug was pulled. This really is excellent Doctor Who, and a timely reminder to a prickly old cynic like me of just how good Big Finish can be: 9/10

Revolution of the Daleks written by Chris Chibnall and directed by Lee Haven Jones

Oh Brilliant: ‘I was in prison for being me…right at the point where I wasn’t sure what that meant’ The prison scenes, besides being full of fun cameos and being incredibly well shot, have a twofold character purpose. The time incarcerated gives Whittaker’s Doctor to come to terms with the huge revelations that were hurled at her in the previous episode. Perhaps she hasn’t even tried to escape – we see no evidence of that here – as she tackles with the huge issue of her identity. So, we can then skip into the next season with this 19 year ponder from the Doctor and it doesn’t feel as though she hasn’t given the idea a chance to sink in. Also, in character terms it means we get to see how the companions cope without the Doctor and revealing some do much better than others. It would take the work of someone with an ice-cold heart to not smile at the sequence where the Doctor and Jack break out of prison together. It feels like old times and Whittaker and Barrowman look great together (I looked over at my partner during this sequence and he was grinning from ear to ear). He face when he suggest that she doesn’t want to know how he smuggled the vortex manipulator into the prison is priceless. The look on the Doctor’s face when it is clear that Ryan wants to leave is telling. She can’t hold onto these people forever. They have their own lives to lead. Whilst locked away she keep thinking that if she isn’t who she thinks she is then who is she? Her nuclear option solution is suicide and I love that this Doctor is willing to think dangerously and outside the box. What we needed at this point (after an episode that told us that everything we know about the Doctor is basically a lie) is a demonstration that she is still the same person that she always was. The Doctor herself was unsure what that meant anymore but realises the second she hears the word Dalek exactly who she is. There's nothing more Doctorish than materialising the TARDIS in the skies above the Earth around a bunch of massacring Daleks and taunting them to kill her, whilst having a plan up her sleeve to be rid of them all. 

Captain Beefcake: Jack’s back and it is like he has never been away. Should there have been more ceremony and the story revolve entirely around him or is it better that he simply walks back into the series as if he owns the place? I prefer the latter because Jack has never been lacking in confidence and what this does so effectively is tie this iteration of the show seamlessly with the Russell T Davies era (almost as if the Moffat stuff had never happened). He can drop references to Rose and Gwen and his death, he can handle the Daleks, flirt with Graham, advise Yaz and joke with the Doctor. It’s a very enjoyable turn from a character that simply fits this version of the show like a glove. Barrowman might think he is God’s gift to Doctor Who in public but within the show he gives all the other actors their space to do their thing and understands he is there to provide energy, jokes and a little sexual tension.

The Fam: What’s surprising is that this episode is more about how Yaz wasn’t coping with the Doctor’s absence than it was about Ryan was. Given that this was his finale episode, it felt a little remiss to not show just how well he was adapting to life back on Earth rather than just having him tell us. However, the scenes of Yaz pouring over data in the other TARDIS vividly depicts her distressed state of mind at the thought of losing the Doctor, and Mandip Gill plays those scenes with an energetic frustration. We saw back in Can You Hear Me that her mental state can be very fragile and her sudden, sharp wrench away from the woman she clearly has plenty of feeling for, and the life of adventuring, activates her anxieties. It’s some of the most interesting scenes we have seen with the character so I hope this is going somewhere. She’s not ready to let go, she’s sleeping in the TARDIS. Is Yaz in love with the Doctor? It would certainly seem that way when her reaction to being separated from her for 10 months is to shove her violently away (that’s a great moment of tension) and then looking away in disbelief. The conversation between her and Jack feels very much like the one that Martha had with Jack in The Sound of Drums at times where we realised he loved the Doctor as much as she did. When Yaz is talking about having something and then having it taken away isn’t anything to do with the adventures, it’s about the Doctor. She explicitly says that. Interesting seeds laid for series 13.

Sparkling Dialogue: ‘This country can be your shop window for global sales.’
‘Can we stop there and pretend there’s no bad news.’
‘Daleks are not the pets of the Doctor.’

The Good: You’ve got hand Chibnall some credit; he’s got nuts. To parody Star Wars in the opening five seconds in such a silly way in the wake of Star Wars announcing a wealth of new spin off material and Doctor Who being scaled back in 2020 means that Chibnall is very confident in his vision of the show now.

The Specials in the past have always been unique episodes in their own right but Revolution of the Daleks, pleasingly, is a direct continuation of Resolution and picks up the pieces of that story left behind and runs with it. I loved Resolution, and this gives it even more worth. The melted down Dalek (one of the things I was a bit unsure about from the previous episode) looked really menacing in the half dark of the lorry, and the idea of using the Dalek shell and creating a hybrid drone to protect the country is a phenomenal one that beggars the question why it hasn’t been considered before. The Dalek emerging from the smoke to the mocking crowd and then subduing them suggests a much darker, more insidious kind of episode. Perhaps if this was Torchwood we could have done without the Dalek mutants altogether and had a tale of a corrupt businessman using these weaponised shells to secure power. Even better are the scenes outside Downing Street where the new security drones are rolled out publicly to ensure the security of the nation. This stuff is pure trailer fuel. Of course, the public starts taking selfies with the things. They are so absurd looking after all. The suspense here is waiting for the moment when the mutants (already revealed) are united with their mass-produced shells and the carnage begins. Talk about a PR nightmare. The introduction of the Death Squad Daleks with an impressive glide through the vortex and then swooping inside the saucer and around a squadron having a conflab is the best direction of the episode. It’s very cinematic in its intentions. The bridge scenes look awesome too; Dalek versus Dalek conflict should always be this epic. I particularly liked the shots from above where the shooting looked like a 2D video game.

I’m a sucker for a returning villain but not as much as I’m a sucker for a camp one and Robertson is turning out to be the ultimate villain of the Whittaker era. Some effort was made to tone him down in the early scenes of this episode to give the scenes where he acquires the Dalek and factory builds thousands more some gravitas but he returns to form throughout the episode and weasels his way through to the finale. It’s highly unusual for any character to rub shoulders with the Daleks like this and survive, which makes me think that Chibnall has a long game with this character. I wouldn’t have gotten rid of Harriet Walter as the new Prime Minister so quickly because the early scenes between her and Noth are quite wonderful and their relationship could have been something the show could have returned to. His reaction to the Dalek mutant is the one time where the audience can completely get on his side; he’s disgusted and thinks Leo is insane for cultivating it. Of course, his fear is that something will threaten his security Empire rather than for the protection of the human race but Noth’s performance here is still very good. He’s joyous when he struts onto the bridge and tries to make a deal with the Daleks. I was certain he was going to die at this point so imagine my surprise when he makes it out of this story alive and uses the whole exercise as a bump up the political platform.

The prison sequences ensure some fun cameos can ensue and my favourite came in the form of the gag about the Silence. That was a genuinely witty use of an old foe. Although the Angel appearance ahead of next season was useful too. And the Pting! I will never not love an appearance by these terrifying nightmares.

The Bad: Does this mean that Robertson has his people set up in roadside cafes up and down the country just in case alien artefacts are being transported? This episode is far less interested in the idea of possession by a Dalek mutant than Resolution was and so those scenes are only a fraction as effective. The direction lacks the same trippiness and it is the point where this episode starts treading a familiar path as far as the drones are concerned, turning this into you typical Dalek shootout. Chibnall has difficulty inserting his character scenes into action episodes seamlessly. The pacing is chopped up by these extended character moments. The scenes of the Daleks coming to life and killing people were directed in lots of tight shots that don’t reveal the scale of the horror. It feels like the director was having to shoot these scenes in cramped sets and couldn’t pull back because they edges would be visible. It’s an astonishingly poor last showing for Graham, who has been one of the biggest highlights of the last two seasons.

Standout Scene(s): The extended dialogue between the Doctor and Ryan in the TARDIS. It felt very like a scene between the Doctor and Victoria in Fury from the Deep where he knows that she is going to leave him and neither one them can quite say it. Now the Doctor is a woman and the companion is a man but the emotions are the same. Ryan is ready to move on and the Doctor doesn’t know how to feel about that but to thank him for being such a good friend. The performances are restrained and say so much more than the (admittedly excellent) dialogue. It is their best scene together by a country mile.

The whole sequence of the Daleks surrounding and pouring into the TARDIS in Earth’s sky. There was a time when we could only dream of action like this. Plus, Whittaker has never been more the Doctor. She’s so wonderfully caustic when revealing her plan to the captured and soon to be killed Daleks.

The hug got me at the end. Godammit.

Result: Revolution of the Daleks is everything I would expect from a New Year’s Special. There’s so much going on here and some things are handled with real dexterity and other things don’t quite come together but the overall piece is full of fun, energy, excitement and emotion. It’s a thrilling ride with some awesome set pieces and a chance to see this set of regulars have one last exciting adventure against the Daleks. It starts out as a political thriller using the Dalek blueprint in an intriguing way and those were some of the best scenes because the latter half becomes an 80s tale with Dalek civil war coming to Earth, albeit with an enormous budget to make the devastating look spectacular. Fortunately, Jodie Whittaker is waltzing through this story; confident, intelligent, commanding. The Doctor gets so many opportunities to strut her stuff in the latter half of this episode; confronting the villain of the piece, standing up to the Daleks, formulating a frankly insane and terrifying plan (she loves playing it dangerously – remember the Cyberium?) and then conniving a plan where she gets to spit bile at the racially geared Daleks and trick them in the process. Add in moments of introspection, and a devastated reaction to losing friends at the climax. She’s loving this part and she’s utterly compelling. Jack is back and as much fun as ever, not taking over as I feared he would but instead becoming a warm addition to this family. Chris Noth continues to play one of my favourite New Series villains; slimy, camp an occasionally bonkers. And the character moments for Ryan (in the TARDIS) and Yaz (with Jack) are some of the best scripted moments for this TARDIS team since they first joined the show. The pacing and direction are occasionally off kilter, but the overall effect is that of an overstuffed delight with lots of memorable scenes. Huge kudos for the moment the Daleks all fly into the TARDIS. The last ten minutes are my favourite with two companions choosing to leave the Doctor rather than being forced out through some dreadful science fiction hoops to be forced out of the TARDIS. This story might not have feature Graham and Ryan as you might have thought but their last scene together is just about perfect. Revolution of the Daleks isn’t though, but it kept me highly entertained throughout: 8/10