Audio Drama

Review: Doctor Who – The Stuff Of Legend (Studio Version)

Posted on by indiemacuser

Review by Jacob Licklider

The Stuff of Legend is an interesting release from Big Finish Productions, at least in terms of what it is.  Big Finish began working on Doctor Who 25 years ago and to celebrate in September they hosted multiple live performances of this audio drama.  As a celebration, it’s a great idea to get people together for an exclusive event.  This review, however, is not of the live show of The Stuff of Legend, I am an American so had no real way of being there.  This is a review of the studio version released the same day as the live show premiered so the rest of the world could hear it.  It’s a great way to keep the story available outside of the few able to get tickets, however Big Finish then made the decision as well to record the live version which is also available to purchase, meaning that several die hard fans will definitely be double dipping (though there are at least some cast differences and the atmosphere between the versions will likely be different).  If you are using this review to determine whether or not you should purchase the studio version of The Stuff of Legend it is imperative that you understand that this is a version professionally recorded in studio and as such will not have the feeling of the live performance.  This is also a review limited in ability to determine which version you should be purchasing as I have not heard the live version.

Continue reading →

Review: The New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield – The Eternity Club 1

Posted on by indiemacuser

Review by Jacob Licklider

The New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield are entering a new era after the passing of the late great David Warner who was co-lead five of the seven volumes in the range.  Despite still being advertised as a Doctor Who range, The New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield are going back to having Benny on her own, though with several Doctor Who aliens featuring in the range to keep it connected.  The premise of this eighth series is The Eternity Club, one of those series that was clearly thought up as a four disc box set and split into four single releases, though this is slightly easier as The Eternity Club is presented as eight, half hour adventures from different writers.  The tone is also considerably different from what has come before, both adventures in this first installment in The Eternity Club are considerably light affairs, playing heavy on the comedy and pastiche elements.  The main pastiche is the premise being a Victorian style gentlemen’s club at the edge of the galaxy which is allowing Bernice Summerfield entrance, though her inability to pay member’s fees means that she is being put into the role of a servant for the other members of the club.  The club itself is made up of Doctor Who aliens with an association with war, most notably Sontarans, Draconians, and Drahvins.  This feels like an idea that later releases are going to play around with more, the second story of this release hints at it with the Drahvins, but it feels like an idea that hasn’t quite been explored.  James Goss is at the writing helm for this release and it’s especially interesting to listen to this after Goss’ previous work with Benny.  Goss as a writer isn’t always one that I would associate with comedy, but the style here is a more laid back, observational humor about the culture of gentlemen’s clubs with the second half wishing to examine the place of gender roles in the universe for much of the comedy.  The directorial duties fall to David O’Mahony who provides a new touch to the series, his style also quite working with the comedy.

Continue reading →

Review: The War Doctor Rises – Morbius the Mighty

Posted on by indiemacuser

Review by Cavan Gilbey

Now I like The Brain of Morbius quite a bit, as I imagine many fans do, but I have never quite understood the frequent clamouring for the eponymous villainous Time Lord to return. He’s a great presence in that debut serial because he was a brain in a jar, seemingly punished by the people of Gallifrey with great anger and viciousness thus leaving him reduced to such a state. His appeal stems from this great mystery about who he really was before becoming a Futurama celebrity head-in-a-jar, putting him back in a humanoid body just makes him essentially another Master or Omega really. Now Big Finish have brought back the character a couple of times, most recently with the Dark Gallifrey stuff giving him a whole three dedicated episodes; which I haven’t heard. But bringing him to the Time War offers up a potentially interesting set of interpretations of what you can do with him; is he a resurrected weapon, a manipulative background player or even a Dalek sympathiser?

After having heard Morbius the Mighty, the latest entry in the War Doctor saga and penned by Tim Foley, I’m not entirely sure of why this story needed to have him as a villain.

Continue reading →

Review: Doctor Who – The Trials of a Time Lord

Posted on by indiemacuser

Review by Cavan Gilbey

Earlier this year we saw the release of The Quin Dilemma, a story which celebrates the rich audio history of Colin Baker’s Sixth Doctor. Now it’s the turn of Season 22 and 23 to get a homage with The Trials of a Time Lord, a fortieth anniversary celebration penned by the team of Rochana Patel (episodes 1 and 2), Katherine Armitage (episodes 3 and 4) and Stewart Pringle (episodes 5 and 6). Now for context, Season 22 and 23 are among two of my favourites from the classic era of the show so I naturally had a lot of expectations for this story to be a proper celebration of that era. Did it deliver? Yes, and then some!

Continue reading →

Review: Torchwood – Endgame

Posted on by indiemacuser

Review by Cavan Gilbey

It’s been a while since we last saw Toshiko Sato in a Torchwood release, with Naoko Mori last appearing in 2022’s SUV. But we return to one of the more underrepresented members of the classic team with Endgame, which appears like your typical Tosh story on the surface; we’ve got a tech based threat and a cast of characters who spend most of  the runtime slightly underestimating her. Now the Tosh audios are a specific strain of stories that I do follow fairly closely, so I’ve usually got relatively high expectations when it comes to stories featuring her. Suckers, Cascade and Instant Karma all show just how interesting she can be when written well, and Endgame makes for a pretty interesting entry in the Tosh line-up.

Firstly I think first time writer for the range Tom Black has a brilliant grasp on the types of threat that feel natural for this series; a simulation of world threatening and extreme situations which goes awry because of mankind’s fatal hubristic flaws. It feels like the perfect story idea for a one hour audio, and Black’s small cast and sense of entrapment really makes the concept come alive. His focus on governmental bickering and inability for arms of state to actually work together for the betterment of innocent civilians feels pretty well chosen given current events, and Tosh fits really nicely in this story as we get to see how her ability to lead and manage a situation are shut down by people who simply believe that their rank gives them rights over others.

However I do think that Tosh is slightly underserved by the story itself, she doesn’t really get to do much until the end when the numbers of participants in the ‘simulation’ have been thinned out a bit. Naoko Mori continues to put in a great performance as the character, oozing professionalism and a strong sense of duty but the story doesn’t quite give her the opportunity to show that off until the final sequence of the episode.

The character that I ended up getting most interested in was Gerard Marsh, as played by Ed White. The supposed creator of the simulation who gets to slowly seem more and more sinister as the plot goes on, with Black writing in some good red herrings surrounding Marsh’s true motivations and morality. White does a good job at playing a dark reflection of Tosh and what she could very easily be had she abandoned her sense of good and justice.

Endgame partially feels like they just needed to get a new Tosh story out but I’m not going to complain about that because it’s generally a good little morality piece. Tom Black sets himself up for being a particularly strong new entrant to the series and I eagerly await to here what he writes next.

8/10

Order on CD/Download from Big Finish

Order on CD from Amazon

Review: Torchwood  – Art Decadence

Review: Torchwood – The Restoration of Catherine

Check out the rest of our Big Finish reviews!

Review: Doctor Who – Deathworld

Posted on by indiemacuser

Review by Cavan Gilbey

The Three Doctors is a beloved story from one of Pertwee’s most popular seasons, debatably one of the most popular seasons for the classic in general; it’s certainly one of mine. As much as I love Season 10, I had never really read any of the production history behind the season, so it was something of a surprise to discover this alternate take on that iconic first multi-Doctor story. Deathworld, originally penned by Bob Baker and Dave Martin and adapted for this new audio release by John Dorney. If you expected this to resemble to that original TV  serial then think again, because this is a very different beast. I’m not entirely sure if this the equivalent of fandom sacrilege but this is way more interesting than The Three Doctors for me, although it is so clearly un-filmable on the 70s era budget.

Continue reading →

Review: Torchwood – Art Decadence

Posted on by indiemacuser

Review by Cavan Gilbey

Every so often we’ll get a Torchwood release where we get to explore some hitherto unknown department or station. Sometimes this works really damn well, such was the case with Double or the Torchwood Soho range, other times it can turn out fairly lacklustre like Dollhouse (which should work so well given it’s tone and concept) or The Dying Room. So I had no idea what to expect when heading in to Ash Darby’s latest script, especially since I have found them to be a relatively inconsistent writer; however they always have some amazing concepts and I sang the praises of Sigil when I reviewed it a while ago. Art Decadence was not the story that I was expecting, and I mean that as high praise.

Continue reading →

Jodie Whittaker to make Big Finish audio debut as the Thirteenth Doctor

Posted on by indiemacuser

Big Finish Productions, in partnership with BBC Studios, today announces the first ever Thirteenth Doctor audio dramas as Jodie Whittaker returns to the Whoniverse alongside Mandip Gill as Yasmin Khan. 

Continue reading →

Review: Torchwood – The Restoration of Catherine

Posted on by indiemacuser

Review by Cavan Gilbey

Norton and Andy, Andy and Norton. A double act which continues to always provide a pretty entertaining hour of sci-fi comedy antics as they bicker and fight their way through a series of bizarre occurrences. This month the pair have something of a love triangle to construct as the world ends unless the wedding bells ring in James Goss’s new outing for the pair.

Continue reading →

Review: The Fourth Doctor Adventures – Metamorphosis

Posted on by indiemacuser

Review by Cavan Gilbey

A new boxset for The Doctor, Harry and Naomi is upon us and we’ve come across a more fantastical theme for the trilogy of stories that form the middle chunk of this thirteenth season of Fourth Doctor Adventures. We’ve got the returns of two classic villains, the first of which feels quite well timed given the events of the TV show and the 60th anniversary celebrations, plus an episode which just be one the most silly conceptually we’ve had from this series in a while.

Continue reading →