Audio

Review: Doctor Who – Once and Future – A Genius For War

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Review by Jacob Licklider

Big Finish Productions’ third installment of their 60th anniversary celebratory series, Once and Future, has been released and puts degenerating Doctor into his Seventh incarnation, played by Sylvester McCoy for A Genius for War.  A Genius for War is interesting because the TARDIS is intercepted so the Doctor can go on a mission for the Time Lords led by the General and Veklin, played by Ken Bones and Beth Chalmers respectively, as Davros, played by Terry Molloy, has an offer for the Time Lords.  The TARDIS being taken by the Time Lords means that this is an episode that feels more like a side step for the series, and as such Jonathan Morris is allowed to tell a complete Time War story in one hour, however, there is some oddities with the characterisation of the Doctor.  Past Lives characterised the Fourth Doctor as not the Fourth Doctor due to the Doctor being a future Doctor in the body of the Fourth Doctor, but The Artist at the End of Time altered the characterisation so the Fifth Doctor acted as the Fifth Doctor.  Jonathan Morris doesn’t quite take either approach, A Genius for War blending the portrayal to play to McCoy’s strengths but also feel as if it was rewritten for a different Doctor.  This is certainly a possibility as Morris could easily have pitched this as a War Doctor story, the War Doctor on Big Finish is at least similar in the types of stories he has to the Seventh Doctor, so the rewrites while extensive wouldn’t have been as complicated as say rewriting the story for the Fifth Doctor or Eighth Doctor for instance.  Morris’ script makes the Doctor take charge of the mission to find Davros and then blends several past and future stories into a single hour.

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Big Finish Audio Review: Jekyll & Hyde

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Review by Cavan Gilbey

The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson is a corner stone of the gothic
horror genre. A compelling novella telling the tale of one man’s struggles to fight human nature’s
violent impulses as well as being a great study on the psychology behind public and private
personas. Of course there have been dozens of interpretations across all the major mediums; tv,
film, stage and even a small handful of video game adaptations. I’ve always been partial to John
Barrymore’s silent film adaption from 1920 and I was introduced to the story by seeing a local drama
society perform a stage adaptation, but I only read the novel relatively recently. Dr Jekyll and Mr
Hyde is one of those stories we are just born knowing due to its wide-spread integration into
cultures across the globe.

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Review: Gallifrey War Room – Allegiance

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Review by Jacob Licklider

With the release of Gallifrey: Time War: Volume Four the general consensus was that the series was over. Romana was punished to chronicle the Time War, Gallifrey was in the throws of a fascist dictatorship under Rassilon’s thumb, Leela was captured, and Narvin was essentially sent off to his suspected death. And then the Gallifrey One convention for 2022 happened and Big Finish Productions announced not one, but four new Gallifrey box sets under the series name War Room with the first set releasing this August, over a week ago at the time of writing. Yes, I am a bit late because this released while I was sick, so here we are finally taking a look at Gallifrey: War Room: Allegiance.

978-1-83868-835-6 Continue reading →

Audio Review: Survivors – New Dawn 2

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Review by Ian McArdell

Survivors: New Dawn sees three further adventures for Abby Grant and Jenny Richards. Some twenty years on from the initial outbreak of ‘The Death’, this sequel series has caught us up with the two remaining central characters from the show.978-1-83868-771-7

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Review: Doctor Who – Dalek Universe 1

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Review by Jacob Licklider

The Dalek Protocol started off the Dalek Universe miniseries with a fairly standard but enjoyable tale with no real connection to what would become the series at least based on the first set. And a day later, Dalek Universe begins itself properly with the first three stories in the miniseries being released to acclaim. To make what’s most likely going to be a long review short, Dalek Universe 1 is a brilliant start to the miniseries and if you haven’t already, go do yourself a favour and buy it. This is one of those sets that I cannot critically evaluate without losing my restraint on spoilers so from this point forward. You have been warned. Each installment of Dalek Universe 1 is truly part of a miniseries, blending together which helps as two of the episodes are from John Dorney, and the third deals with the character fallout from the previous two episodes before moving along to what will eventually become the conclusion of the set while transitioning into the second set. An interesting note, this set barely features the Daleks, like The Dalek Protocol before it, they are an off-screen presence bar a few scenes, the writers instead electing for setting this around the time of The Daleks’ Master Plan and dragging the Tenth Doctor out of time into his own personal timeline.

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Review: Dalek Universe – The Dalek Protocol

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Review by Jacob Licklider

Hype is an interesting phenomenon. When Big Finish Productions announced Dalek Universe, of course there was going to be hype: it’s three whole box sets starring David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor, the return of Anya Kingdom, and a two-hour Fourth Doctor prologue with Leela and K9 to boot. This is the type of release that is designed to build hype, yet now that it is April and the first release is out, The Dalek Protocol starring Tom Baker, Louise Jameson, and John Leeson, and some of the trouble with extreme hype is that is can actually put off listeners. For The Dalek Protocol it is imperative that before you purchase or listen, you understand that it was never actually intended to be part of a bigger series. Recorded in 2018, the behind the scenes on the release are enlightening as Nicholas Briggs was simply commissioned to do what he loves and tribute Death to the Daleks while bringing back Anya Kingdom. This means that the ending of the story feels final, the Doctor and Anya don’t get to reunite which is important as the Doctor hasn’t even met her yet, and that there really aren’t apparent threads which will be carrying over to Dalek Universe proper. As a part of the series, it seems the most disconnected which is fine as it was never written to be a part of a greater whole, so listeners should be wary of those expectations before going in as you will not enjoy it nearly as much when that is in play.

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Audio Review: Carolyn Seymour in Conversation

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Review by Ian McArdell

Carolyn Seymour in Conversation is the latest in an occasional range of in-depth interviews with Big Finish’s biggest stars. Perhaps best known in cult television circles for her starring role in the first series of Terry Nation’s Survivors, Carolyn Seymour has worked extensively on both sides of the Atlantic, on both stage and screen. In 2014 she reprised her role as Abby Grant in the audio continuation of Survivors, and has since appeared across a number of their ranges, most notably the Doctor Who spin-off Counter-Measures, where she plays the returning villainess, Lady Suzanne Clare.


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Review: ‘Vicious Dogs Attack Me In Sleepless Nights of Summer’ audiobook (A collection of prose from ‘Clerks’ actor Scott Schiaffo)

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In ‘Vicious Dogs Attack Me In Sleepless Nights of Summer’ his bold collection of ‘prose, tales, and streams of semi-consciousness’, actor and musician Scott Schiaffo (Clerks, Vulgar) takes you through the depths of existential angst, addiction, and near-death experiences. This book reflects a troubling time in a gifted man’s journey. Schiaffo released this book of collected poetry and short stories in 2014. The book is a culmination of material written during 1986 through 1998, when the author was deep in the throes of alcoholism and drug addiction. He has now released a new audio book version for Audible; read by the author himself (also available on CD, Kindle or the original Paperback)

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Audio Review: Children of the Stones

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Review by Ian McArdell

Children of the Stones is a new podcast audio drama, produced by BaffleGab for BBC Radio 4, and based on a story first presented in the 1977 HTV television series, which starred a pre-Blakes’s 7 Gareth Thomas. Famously terrifying, it follows the story of the Brake family, a father and son who move to Milbury; a village famous for its prominent circle of standing stones. This new interpretation, from writers AK Benedict and Guy Adams, comprises ten episodes which vary in length from twelve to twenty-one minutes, and runs to just over two and a half hours. The bones of the tale remain as before; although the writers have shifted a few of the pieces around to suit more modern ears.


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Audio Review: Dilation (B7 Media)     

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Review by Ian McArdell

From writer and director Max Hochrad, Dilation is an unusual and thought-provoking time-travel tale told as a one-off, 75-minute drama. Continue reading →