The Rosemariners (2012)

The final story of the third series of Lost Stories concludes with a Second Doctor adventure which was written by Donald Tosh who was the story editor on Doctor Who during the mid-1960’s. This is a Lost Story but it’s sort of a Lost Story/Companion Chronicle because it is told in the style of a companion chronicle but has a longer running time and also has more people in it. The story sees the Doctor, Jamie and Zoe arriving at a research station that is about to be closed down. It’s always good to hear Frazer Hines’ impression of the second Doctor because it’s so spot on and always a joy to listen to. The story seems like it’s going to be the fitting end to the series with Frazer Hines and Wendy Padbury back together and David Warner thrown into the mix but yet despite the great actors that have been cast ultimately it doesn’t work and what we have is a bit of a mess. It’s mainly due to the script which was adapted for audio by Tosh and it would have helped if someone like Alan Barnes or Jonathan Morris were involved because they could manoeuvre it so that the story moves at a pace that wouldn’t be out of place for the fifth or sixth Doctor.

The performances are relatively good. Frazer Hines and Wendy Padbury can always be relied upon to deliver a solid performance and it felt like they are back in 1968/69. One of the few goods things I can say about this story is that the feel of this story (especially the first episode) has a feel of the second Doctor era. It’s always a joy to hear David Warner who has a wonderful voice and he does the best that he could with what is a relatively unremarkable role. Clive Wood is also perfectly fine as Rugosa but again his character is relatively standard and isn’t one of the best written characters that has been put in a Big Finish play. It’s nice that there is a relatively small cast and set of characters because it provides an intimacy that you don’t get very often but thats about the best thing that I can say

It’s not my favourite Lost Story as I just got so lost (forgive the pun) with what was going on that after a while I kind of stopped caring with what was going on and despite having to listen to this story from the beginning at least four times I just couldn’t get into the story. It’s not as bad as The Hollows of Time because that was truly terrible but I can’t say that I could recommend this to anyone. Personally I think that like The Masters of Luxor, this story would have been better in its own special release and not with the series. The way that I judge whether a Lost Story is any good or not is whether I wish it had stayed lost. It happened once or twice in the first series and unfortunately it happened here.
Rating 5/10