The latest Companion Chronicle sees us return to E-Space which was featured in three stories during Tom Baker’s last season as the Doctor. One of those stories, Full Circle was written by Andrew Smith who was possibly the first fan to write for the series. 30 years later, Smith was asked by Big Finish to write another Doctor Who story in the E-Space universe. With Big Finish plundering the lesser known aspects of Doctor Who history, it was only a matter of time before they used the E-Space.
This was the third Romana story after The Beautiful People (2007) and The Pyralis Effect (2009) and this was the one that I felt nailed the character down the best. There was a sense of the pompousness that the character had on TV. The story is quite simple which is a relief because after the opening few minutes I did wonder whether we were going to get a very bizarre adventure. There was the talk about CVE (CHARGED Vacuum Emboitment) and a nice reference to the Zero Room which only got one mention in Castrovalva (1982). The story is set a few months after Full Circle and gives the listener a rough guide as to how much time has passed during the E-Space Trilogy. The story sees the Doctor, Romana and Adric (no mention of K9) arrive on a planet just when there is an invasion on the planet. The Farrian are after a rare mineral/thing that can only be found in E-Space. It’s your basic, straight forward story of an invasion and the Doctor and Romana doing their best to stop them. For a brief moment after the Farrian were mentioned, I thought I missed an adventure because the way that Ward was talking about them I thought maybe I should have known they were in a previous adventure. The story was very well balanced. There was a fair amount of sci-fi terms but that was mixed with normal dialogue. “Adric had been shot!”. There was a small cheer from me in my car when I heard that. Sadly it was only in his leg and at the rate that Alzarians heal he was back to his whiny best before long. Even though Matthew Waterhouse wasn’t playing the role I found the character irritating.
Lalla Ward’s performance in this story is very good. I think that out of the three she has done, this has to be the best. The dialogue was spot on for her and she delivered it well. It was interesting that she doesn’t seem to remember how many of these she has done. It’s probably not something she keeps a note of but for someone like me I knew exactly how many she had done. I was particularly impressed with Suanne Braun who played Marni Tellis. The character went on a very big adventure being stuck with the Doctor in the TARDIS. Braun gave the character a rough edge but still made her likeable. Even though they didn’t meet until the very last moment, their stories mixed well together and held the same sort of tone and interest.
The Invasion of E-Space is another fine Companion Chronicle release. It had everything that I would want from a Big Finish play. It was good to go back to the E-Space because I thought that it had more potential that was seen on TV. I think it was a gamble asking Smith to write a story because he hadn’t written a four part adventure since 1980 but credit to him, he did a solid job. After a mixed series it’s nice that The Invasion of E-Space shows a return to form. Good writing, Good acting and good directing helped make this the second best release from this series so far. Good Stuff
This was the third Romana story after The Beautiful People (2007) and The Pyralis Effect (2009) and this was the one that I felt nailed the character down the best. There was a sense of the pompousness that the character had on TV. The story is quite simple which is a relief because after the opening few minutes I did wonder whether we were going to get a very bizarre adventure. There was the talk about CVE (CHARGED Vacuum Emboitment) and a nice reference to the Zero Room which only got one mention in Castrovalva (1982). The story is set a few months after Full Circle and gives the listener a rough guide as to how much time has passed during the E-Space Trilogy. The story sees the Doctor, Romana and Adric (no mention of K9) arrive on a planet just when there is an invasion on the planet. The Farrian are after a rare mineral/thing that can only be found in E-Space. It’s your basic, straight forward story of an invasion and the Doctor and Romana doing their best to stop them. For a brief moment after the Farrian were mentioned, I thought I missed an adventure because the way that Ward was talking about them I thought maybe I should have known they were in a previous adventure. The story was very well balanced. There was a fair amount of sci-fi terms but that was mixed with normal dialogue. “Adric had been shot!”. There was a small cheer from me in my car when I heard that. Sadly it was only in his leg and at the rate that Alzarians heal he was back to his whiny best before long. Even though Matthew Waterhouse wasn’t playing the role I found the character irritating.
Lalla Ward’s performance in this story is very good. I think that out of the three she has done, this has to be the best. The dialogue was spot on for her and she delivered it well. It was interesting that she doesn’t seem to remember how many of these she has done. It’s probably not something she keeps a note of but for someone like me I knew exactly how many she had done. I was particularly impressed with Suanne Braun who played Marni Tellis. The character went on a very big adventure being stuck with the Doctor in the TARDIS. Braun gave the character a rough edge but still made her likeable. Even though they didn’t meet until the very last moment, their stories mixed well together and held the same sort of tone and interest.
The Invasion of E-Space is another fine Companion Chronicle release. It had everything that I would want from a Big Finish play. It was good to go back to the E-Space because I thought that it had more potential that was seen on TV. I think it was a gamble asking Smith to write a story because he hadn’t written a four part adventure since 1980 but credit to him, he did a solid job. After a mixed series it’s nice that The Invasion of E-Space shows a return to form. Good writing, Good acting and good directing helped make this the second best release from this series so far. Good Stuff
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