The Valley of Death is the second of the Lost Stories from the Fourth Doctor Box Set, this story came from the idea of Philip Hinchcliffe who was producer of Doctor Who from 1974 to 1977 and oversaw some of the greatest Doctor Who stories of the classic era. This story has a certain similarity to ‘The Seeds of Doom’ in that it spends a part of the story in an restricted environment before moving to more surburbian surroundings. In this story the Doctor and Leela join an expedition led by the grandson of some explorer from over 100 years before. However once they get to the jungle things start going slightly wrong. We actually get to meet the grandfather that Perkins the younger had been talking about. What we have is a fun idea that for the grandfather only a few weeks had passed but to the Doctor and the crew it had by over a century. This was due to a time bubble that was a convenient but effectively used and became quite important over the course of these adventures. That is one of the good things about this story is that there is nothing that seems pointless. It’s a straight forward adventure which doesn’t rely on complexities to tell a story which is what I like about the Hinchcliffe era of the show.
The story is far more enjoyable than ‘Foe from the Future’ because it only has four episodes as opposed to Foe’s six. The story has a stronger for half because I found that whilst the story was in the jungle it felt quite good yet when it moved into London and the business with clones of humans in order that UNIT wouldn’t fight for fear of killing the Doctor and others it seemed to stumble a bit. The story is still quite enjoyable because of Tom Baker who’s infectious personality appears in abundance throughout this story. Louise Jameson has impressed me in the stories that I have heard this year. In the companion chronicles that she has done there has always been something missing in her performances and its clear that it was someone of Baker’s stature because Jameson’s performances have been great. The supporting performances were also very good David Killick plays the role of Cornelius Perkins very well. It’s clear he is a very stupid character who has more money than sense though he thinks he has honourable intentions. Killick makes you believe this. Another good character was Valerie Carlton as played by Jane Slavein (who appeared in the 1993 radio play ‘Paradise of Death’). As the only other female character she started off as an unlikeable journalist but by the end had shown herself to be a strong and very likeable character.
It’s not a perfect story because as I mentioned earlier it does start to lose some momentum in the early stages of the second half but you sort of go with it as Tom Baker is wonderful as the Doctor and is complimented by Louise Jameson. As with all the Lost Stories that Big Finish produce I find myself asking if we have missed anything by this story not being on TV and to be honest for the first time my answer is yes and no. There are things that would have looked great on TV but there’s a feeling that they just wouldn’t have been able to pull it off like Big Finish have done.
The Tom Baker section of Big Finish goes from strength to strength and this something to be enjoyed.
The story is far more enjoyable than ‘Foe from the Future’ because it only has four episodes as opposed to Foe’s six. The story has a stronger for half because I found that whilst the story was in the jungle it felt quite good yet when it moved into London and the business with clones of humans in order that UNIT wouldn’t fight for fear of killing the Doctor and others it seemed to stumble a bit. The story is still quite enjoyable because of Tom Baker who’s infectious personality appears in abundance throughout this story. Louise Jameson has impressed me in the stories that I have heard this year. In the companion chronicles that she has done there has always been something missing in her performances and its clear that it was someone of Baker’s stature because Jameson’s performances have been great. The supporting performances were also very good David Killick plays the role of Cornelius Perkins very well. It’s clear he is a very stupid character who has more money than sense though he thinks he has honourable intentions. Killick makes you believe this. Another good character was Valerie Carlton as played by Jane Slavein (who appeared in the 1993 radio play ‘Paradise of Death’). As the only other female character she started off as an unlikeable journalist but by the end had shown herself to be a strong and very likeable character.
It’s not a perfect story because as I mentioned earlier it does start to lose some momentum in the early stages of the second half but you sort of go with it as Tom Baker is wonderful as the Doctor and is complimented by Louise Jameson. As with all the Lost Stories that Big Finish produce I find myself asking if we have missed anything by this story not being on TV and to be honest for the first time my answer is yes and no. There are things that would have looked great on TV but there’s a feeling that they just wouldn’t have been able to pull it off like Big Finish have done.
The Tom Baker section of Big Finish goes from strength to strength and this something to be enjoyed.
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