At the end of the previous adventure ‘The Wreck of the Titan’ we were presented with the notion that the Doctor and Jamie are in the Land of Fiction as featured in the 1968 adventure ‘The Mind Robber’. I therefore assumed that this story was going to be very strange. It has to be said that this series has been a bit of a disappointment because nothing seems to have happened to explain what’s going on with the Doctor and Jamie. At lot was riding on this story and it fell to Mike Maddox to give a satisfactory conclusion to this series. Also a fact here, this is the first story to feature the Cybermen in the main series since The Girl Who Never Was way back in December 2007.
The whole story about the story arc was explained. Shortly after Zoe was returned to her time by the Timelords in ‘The War Games’ she went to the ship doctor and was told that her body was two years older. Due to the fact she is a genius she works out what happened and shortly after that a fleet of Cyberships appear and creates a way to the Land of Fiction and takes the Cybermen with her. That way the Cybermen can’t hurt anyone. She becomes Mistress of the Land of Fiction and uses the characters to fight them. She creates another porthole for the Doctor and lures him there. She creates Jamie to be of some help and when asked why she made him so that he couldn’t remember any of the adventures he had with the Second Doctor she answered that it was suppose to be a mystery otherwise the Doctor would have left and not helped. There was some wonderful imagery that was created in this story. Cyber versions of Mermaids (Cybermaids ?) and Werewolfs gave a new fresh side to the Cyberman character. It was great to have the Cyberplanner back because it always sounds creepy. There were a lot of red herrings thrown in to try and keep people guessing. There was a possibility that everything that had happened after The Mind Robber up to this story was all fake. That is all took place in the Land of Fiction. This was clearly something that wasn’t going to be the case because it would just silly if it were true.
The music was used brilliantly. It was needed to help distinguish between the two castles where the Cybermen and the fictional characters were. Also the use of the same eerie music that was used in ‘The Mind Robber’ actually sounded better in this story than in the TV adventure. The music sounded like it came from a 1950’s Hollywood Robin Hood movie and I loved every time it was played. It’s not very often that I mention music in a review but in this case I felt it was warranted because it helped to such a lot. I also found the cliffhangers to be quite effective. Especially the first one where the Cybertronic Oliver Twist quotes the infamous like from that story “Please Sir, Can I have some more?”. It sounded quite strange coming from a Cyberman but that’s one word that can be used for Legend of the Cybermen.
Frazer Hines put in his best performance from the three stories. His story moved quite substantially in this from not remembering the adventures he had with the Second Doctor to been reminded of them to finding out he’s in fact not real. There were three different sides of the Jamie character and Hines did a great job in being believable. Wendy Padbury did a great job playing Zoe in a full cast adventure since The War Games in 1969. The fact that Padbury created a way into the Land of Fiction and was made mistress was totally believeable. She is the only character that would have been able to do this. Padbury has done a Companion Chronicle and also did ‘Davros’ in 2003 for Big Finish so she is no stranger to working on audio and does a good job as both fictional Zoe and Mistress Zoe. Colin Baker does a good job. Its his best outing out of the three but well below what we have come to expect from Mr. Baker. His sadness at certain points in this story came across as sincere and heartfelt.
The Legend of the Cybermen is a curious story. It’s the best story of the three but that’s not really a compliment. If I had to pick a fault with the story is that it spends too long getting started. The first episode has too much of Jamie and the Doctor running around the void. Its only when the Artful Dodger turns up that it really gets going. The thing about this story is that it has a lot of loose ends to type up and it does this effectively and in a way that a simple mind like mine can understand.
Hopefully this wont be the last time that we have the Sixth Doctor and Jamie in a series. Whilst it didn’t take off like I hoped there were certainly some big plus points like the two actors themselves.
The whole story about the story arc was explained. Shortly after Zoe was returned to her time by the Timelords in ‘The War Games’ she went to the ship doctor and was told that her body was two years older. Due to the fact she is a genius she works out what happened and shortly after that a fleet of Cyberships appear and creates a way to the Land of Fiction and takes the Cybermen with her. That way the Cybermen can’t hurt anyone. She becomes Mistress of the Land of Fiction and uses the characters to fight them. She creates another porthole for the Doctor and lures him there. She creates Jamie to be of some help and when asked why she made him so that he couldn’t remember any of the adventures he had with the Second Doctor she answered that it was suppose to be a mystery otherwise the Doctor would have left and not helped. There was some wonderful imagery that was created in this story. Cyber versions of Mermaids (Cybermaids ?) and Werewolfs gave a new fresh side to the Cyberman character. It was great to have the Cyberplanner back because it always sounds creepy. There were a lot of red herrings thrown in to try and keep people guessing. There was a possibility that everything that had happened after The Mind Robber up to this story was all fake. That is all took place in the Land of Fiction. This was clearly something that wasn’t going to be the case because it would just silly if it were true.
The music was used brilliantly. It was needed to help distinguish between the two castles where the Cybermen and the fictional characters were. Also the use of the same eerie music that was used in ‘The Mind Robber’ actually sounded better in this story than in the TV adventure. The music sounded like it came from a 1950’s Hollywood Robin Hood movie and I loved every time it was played. It’s not very often that I mention music in a review but in this case I felt it was warranted because it helped to such a lot. I also found the cliffhangers to be quite effective. Especially the first one where the Cybertronic Oliver Twist quotes the infamous like from that story “Please Sir, Can I have some more?”. It sounded quite strange coming from a Cyberman but that’s one word that can be used for Legend of the Cybermen.
Frazer Hines put in his best performance from the three stories. His story moved quite substantially in this from not remembering the adventures he had with the Second Doctor to been reminded of them to finding out he’s in fact not real. There were three different sides of the Jamie character and Hines did a great job in being believable. Wendy Padbury did a great job playing Zoe in a full cast adventure since The War Games in 1969. The fact that Padbury created a way into the Land of Fiction and was made mistress was totally believeable. She is the only character that would have been able to do this. Padbury has done a Companion Chronicle and also did ‘Davros’ in 2003 for Big Finish so she is no stranger to working on audio and does a good job as both fictional Zoe and Mistress Zoe. Colin Baker does a good job. Its his best outing out of the three but well below what we have come to expect from Mr. Baker. His sadness at certain points in this story came across as sincere and heartfelt.
The Legend of the Cybermen is a curious story. It’s the best story of the three but that’s not really a compliment. If I had to pick a fault with the story is that it spends too long getting started. The first episode has too much of Jamie and the Doctor running around the void. Its only when the Artful Dodger turns up that it really gets going. The thing about this story is that it has a lot of loose ends to type up and it does this effectively and in a way that a simple mind like mine can understand.
Hopefully this wont be the last time that we have the Sixth Doctor and Jamie in a series. Whilst it didn’t take off like I hoped there were certainly some big plus points like the two actors themselves.
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