Paradise 5 (2010)

2010 TOMS TARDIS AWARD WINNER

• Best Lost Story 

Now being over half way of the Lost Stories series it’s fairly easy to know what to expect with these stories. However the last story ‘The Hollows of Time’ was an appealing adventure. Totally devoid of anything enjoyable I would rather sit through Underworld that Hollows. I wasn’t aware of PJ Hammond before I saw his episode of Torchwood in 2006 and when his second story From Out of the Rain aired in 2008 I became a fan of his and when I saw that his story was going to form part of the series I became tremendously excited. Hammond being the busy guy that he is was too busy to be involved with the re-writes and so it was given to Andy Lane to take responsibility for this story. A few things were changed to make this work for radio. The first being that in the original Paradise 5, the original P5 was suppose to take place during the The Trial of a Timelord series and so there was quite a fair bit with the Inquisitor and the Valeyard but Big Finish felt that this wasn’t really relevant and also added to the budget. Another change was that in the original it had Mel as the companion not Peri.

The story is set on the holiday resort called Paradise 5 where the Doctor and Peri are trying to meet up with the Doctor’s old friend Professor Albrecht Thompson. Something is going on and its down to the Doctor (as usual) to find out what. Despite this it is Peri that is given a lot to do in this story and drives the plot forward. The thing that I am really impressed with about this story is how it mixes drama with dark humour. The cherubs sound like Gremlins but are nicer. For me they are on par with those little marshmallow looking things from Partners in Crime (2008 TV). The big shock came for me when it was revealed that Professor Albrecht who the Doctor was looking for was in fact a Cherub. A problem that I have is how things were tied up. I thought that the fact that Gabriel and Michael were just in it for money seemed to be a slight cop-out. I was expecting them to have their soles owned by the Elohim but this wasn’t the case. This made their eccentricity that less tolerable.

I think that the Elohim were well realised in this story and were a genuine threat throughout this adventure. Their purpose in the story was believable. The idea that there is a war between angels and demons and that people on Paradise 5 are being used to help fight this battle isn’t that dissimilar to certain plots in other sci-fi but thanks to the music and the direction of Barnaby Edwards it helps add to the dark tone that the story has. Colin Baker and Nicola Bryant both seem to be enjoying this story and in particular for Baker it was nice to see a more Big Finish type of Doctor. Alex MacQueen was probably for me the best of the guest stars. I’ve seen him in shows like Holby City and The Thick of It and thought that his portrayal of Gabriel was perfect for the story. The relationship that Gabriel had with Michael made suggestions that they may have been more that just friends.

PJ Hammond’s story is a good one but credit must also go to Andy Lane. Having written the best story of 2010 (so far – March) it was a good idea to get Lane to work on this and episode one is all of Lane’s work and to be honest, I wouldn’t have guessed because it all blended in together. After a poor Hollows of Time and a disappointing Leviathan it was nice to have Paradise 5 bring this series back to good form.