The Tomfiles: #6 - The Rebirth of the Sixth Doctor - Part 1

In the first of a two-part Tomfile, I take a look at Colin Baker’s time as the Doctor both on screen and on audio and see what has happened to the Sixth incarnation of Britain’s most loved alien.

Colin Baker made his first appearance in Doctor Who in the 1983 Peter Davison story Arc of Infinity. He then appeared as the Sixth actor to play the TV Doctor on March 16th 1984. Over the course of the next two years the show would suffer due to lack of support from BBC management. After the show was cancelled in 1989 many fans seemed unsympathetic towards Colin Baker’s Doctor. However since 1999 the Sixth incarnation has undergone some what of a re-evaluation and is now considered one of the best Doctors in the Big Finish range.

During his time as the Doctor on television it wasn’t so much Colin Baker himself that was the problem, it was just the wrong time for him. The BBC was being run by people who cared more about their reputation and what people thought of them than providing programming that the licence paying public would want to see. The budget for the show in 1984 was the same roughly as in 1963 and there seemed no desire to increase it to produce better production values and a more attractive programme. By the time Colin Baker had become the Doctor for his first full season in 1985, the show had returned to its traditional Saturday tea time slot. Except this time the show would be 45 minutes long and run for half the time it had done before. The main problem with the show at the time was the critics were out to get the show and would use anything to form an argument no matter how feeble it was. For example, it was accused that the Doctor pushes two guards into a tub of acid when if you actually watch it you will see that one guard falls into it and pulls the other one in. The only bad thing that could be said was the line that the Doctor uses and that it “You’ll wont mind if I don’t join you!”. Also strangling your companion is a pretty bad thing to do at 6pm on a Saturday night. I suppose it’s a sensible thing to say that making the Doctor different from previous incarnations was a pretty smart thing to do to try and breathe new life into a show which at that point had been running for 22 years. But I think they went to far with the outfit. The ‘outfit’ was out of date back then and is still out of date and it’s the one of the few things that you could get embarrassed about.

Colin Baker only had 31 TV Episodes to his name and 14 of them were in the mixed story ‘The Trial of a Timelord’. But despite that short run he did have some good stories. For example The Mark of the Rani is well worth a look. It sees the return of the Master following his firey ending at the end of Planet of Fire. It also sees the introduction of the Rani as played by Kate O’Mara. What is so good about this story is the location filming, it is some of the best in Doctor Who. Then there is the Two Doctors. Forget the pointless reason for filming the location footage in Spain or the point for bringing Patrick Troughton back at all. It was alright when the show was celebrating the 20th Anniversary but two years later it seemed rather a mute point. But to see a truly wonderful Colin Baker story then look no further than Revelation of the Daleks which saw Davros and had everything in the story and that is why it is one of the better Dalek stories of the 1980’s. Following the return of Doctor Who in 1986, Colin Baker was axed from the role in payment for the return of the show in 1987. To me his treatment was disgusting. I can understand why he decided not to do the regeneration sequence but what they did to make up for that was a joke. It would be over 20 years before the glimmer of the 6th Doctor would shine. Colin Baker made a few appearances as the Doctor like in 1989 when he starred in the Stage play The Ultimate Adventure and in 1993 to celebrate the 30th Anniversary of Doctor Who he return to appear in a bizarre Children in Need special.

On March 6th and 7th 1999, Colin Baker joined Peter Davison and Sylvester McCoy in recording the first official audio adventure for Doctor Who. The Sirens of Time wasn’t that bad but compared to today’s standards its quite poor. It wasn’t until the third story Whispers of Terror that Colin Baker got his own adventure for the first time in 23 years. In this story the Doctor is reunited with Nicola Bryant as Peri. This story like The Sirens of Time wasn’t anything special. Colin Baker’s third story was The Marian Conspiracy which is an important milestone because it was the first companion to created specially for audio. Dr. Evelyn Smythe had never been seen or mentioned in TV Doctor Who and so we were able to know her story from the beginning. For those of us who weren’t really watching Doctor Who when it was on originally this is the first companion that we have seen from the beginning. I really liked this story and it wasn’t really the plot that I liked. It was the relationship between the Doctor and Evelyn that made this so memorable. The opening seen really set it up for me, Smythe trying to do her job and the Doctor interrupting to try and satisfy his curiosity. As the story progresses it just gets better and better and shows what potential this partnership has. The next adventure was the Spectre of Lanyon Moor. this story was special because it had the Brigadier in it but the story was another good one. The story was a really good one for the Doctor and started to show what he could do.


The Apocalypse Element was another solid story and it saw the return of Lalla Ward as Romana. The next story it also featured the Daleks and in my opinion was better than the previous story the Daleks appeared in which was The Genocide Machine. Evelyn Smythe took a rest in the next story which was The Holy Terror and featured Frobisher who had only appeared in other Doctor Who media. I didn’t listen to this when it was released and it was one of the last ones that I did and I actually liked it. It was a gentle and nice story which wasn’t really meant to be taken seriously and it doesn’t take itself too seriously. I don’t think he should be a full-time companion because I think the American Penguin character might get a bit to annoying after a few adventures. He should come back for the odd adventure maybe every 18 months or so. The next story wouldn’t be until the summer of 2001 due to the first series of Paul McGann adventures. This was Bloodtide which was the best so far for Colin Baker. He was superb as well as Maggie Stables and also the return of the Silurians was another bonus point. Baker’s next story immediately followed Bloodtide and it was even better which I thought would be impossible. Project: Twilight was a vampire tale set on Earth, what this story showed was that with a nice strong story Colin Baker can show what sort of Doctor he can be and even considering the early ones Colin Baker has had more impressive stories than he ever did on TV. The final story of 2001 was a comedy and it was a much more obvious one than The Holy Terror. This story was called The One Doctor and it saw the Doctor reunited with Mel for the first time on audio. It was a really good story and was a fitting end to a quality year for the Sixth Doctor.

The start of 2002 was given over to Paul McGann’s second series of adventures, building on the success on the first season. As a result, Colin Baker only had two adventures that year and neither of them were particularly memorable. The first was …ish which was a wordy story in more ways than one. It featured Peri as the companion whereas I think Evelyn would have suited this story much better as her character is a teacher. The next story was The Sandman which saw the return of Anneke Wills to the series. Wills played Polly between 1966 and 1967 overseeing the change of William Hartnell to Patrick Troughton. The story was a really hard one to get through and I think that Baker suffered because of that. You have to give Big Finish credit for trying this sort of story but it just didn’t work. So as a result of these stories 2002 was a disappointment when you compare it to the previous year. I think if there had been more CB stories then it might have been a better year for him. The use of the wrong companions for the wrong stories also didn’t help the stories.

2003 was a very good year for the Sixth Doctor. The first story of the year was Jubilee which is what the 2005 Christopher Eccleston story Dalek is based on. This story saw the return of the Daleks following their so-so story The Time of the Daleks. This was another superb story which allowed Colin Baker to shine. Any opportunity that a Doctor has to battle the Daleks or a famous monster then they run with it and this one was no different. A short while later saw Doctor Who go all musical in Doctor Who and the Pirates. With any other Doctor then this story would have flopped badly but with Colin Baker in the main role it became a glorious and fun filled adventure. The addition of Bill Oddie also added to the enjoyment. The next story in the 6th Doctor range was Project: Lazarus which is a truly superb story that is better than Twilight which I thought was not possible. The story was perhaps one of the darkest and most gruesome stories that I have ever known in Doctor Who. This story also featured two Doctors which is obviously something that shouldn’t happen very often and when it does then something special or different should happen. In this case the 6th Doctor had been cloned and it was the Seventh Doctor that had to save the day. What I liked most about this story was Colin Baker’s performance. It was unlike any performance of this character that we had seen for quite sometime and at times it was quite off-putting because we are not use to seeing him that way. McCoy was also good in this story and his Doctor served the story well.

In the run up to celebrate Doctor Who’s 40th Anniversary and Big Finish’s 50th release. Three adventures were commissioned with the 5ht, 6th and 7th Doctors all facing foes from the Doctors past. For the sixth Doctor it was Davros in Davros. This story was the best of the trio and what absolutely fantastic because it gave Colin Baker and Terry Molloy (Davros) the chance to have so good dialogue together. Also Wendy Padbury is in it as Lorraine Baines who with Bernard Horsefeld playing her husband played the typical characters of thinking they could control Davros when in fact they couldn’t. Colin Baker made a guest appearance in Zagreus but the following month saw The Wormery. This is not only the worst 6th Doctor story but it is one of the worst Big Finish stories to date. Despite the fact that it had Katy Manning (Jo Grant) in it the story was confusing and didn’t interest me in the slightest. Not very often that I give a story 1/5 but this one was an easy decision. After three years of Doctor Who stories featuring the Four Doctors who were aliving and willing to do these stories it was the Sixth Doctor that had developed the best. He still sounded like the Doctor and Colin Baker put in the same passionate performance that he always did on TV and with the right scripts it was possible to see what Baker could have been like if he was given the chance.

As 2003 rolled into 2004 we were treated to what would be Evelyn Smythe’s last adventure in terms of chronology (because us Doctor Who fans love to put stories into order). Arrangements for War was a fitting story for Evelyn but the story helped expose how different the Doctor and Evelyn are as characters despite how well they have bonded. Following the events that occurred in Project: Lazarus it was obvious that this story would see Smythe change it some way. I wont say it was one of my Top 5 but it is an ok story that works well and Colin Baker yet again puts in another fine story. Medicinal Purposes was the next story and this is one of the stories that would go into my Top 5. I love when Doctor Who does historical and in this one it was in a period of history that I remember vividly from school. Burke and Hare were two Grave Robbers who stole dead bodies for people to do medical research on. What Big Finish did that was clever was insert the Doctor and Evelyn into it. This was a good story because it gave the Doctor a good opponent to try and work against. Not Burke or Hare but Dr Robert Knox who we thought at the time was another Timelord because he had a TARDIS but he in fact wasn’t from Gallifrey and he had won the TARDIS in a game of cards. Knox was played by Carry On legend Leslie Philips. Philips was absolutely superb and was a fitting opposition to Colin Baker. Another note of interest was David Tennant who played Daft Jamie. This story was good because it gave Colin a chance to do all sorts of emotions ranging from anger to sympathy. Hi s relationship with Daft Jamie was a poignant one and what made it even sadder was that the Doctor knew of Daft Jamie’s impending death because its in proper history.

The next story was The Juggernauts. This was with Bonnie Langford and saw Mel separated from the Doctor. This story was another strong script that enabled Colin Baker to not only develop a better relationship with Bonnie Langford’s Mel character but to also have some very good scenes and dialogue with Terry Molloy’s Davros. The story also sees the return of the Mechanoids. Their only appearance was in the 1965 William Hartnell adventure The Chase. The next story for the Sixth Doctor was Catch 1782. This was similar to the Juggernauts in that the Doctor and Mel become separated. Where Catch was different was in that the Doctor took more of a back seat in this one as Mel tried to regain her memory whilst the Doctor tries to find her. Its an interesting piece that works because the stories doesn’t feature aliens trying to slaughter another race of aliens or someone trying to invade but just a simple rescue mission that takes on an emotional twist. The next story that features the Sixth Doctor is Thicker Than Water and is a sequel to Arrangements for War. This features both Bonnie Langford and Evelyn Smythe. This isn’t a story that I remember well and it doesn’t really have anything to do with the acting it is just that the story doesn’t really reward the listener with anything in my honest opinion. 2005 was on the whole a very good year for the Sixth Doctor. For me the best story for Colin Baker was The Juggernauts though Catch 1782 comes a close second.. This year was another solid display from Colin Baker and he continues to be able to change peoples attitude towards his Doctor.

In the second part, we look at the Sixth Doctor adventures from 2006 to 2008 and also the special adventures Real Time, Her Final Flight and Cryptobiosis.

The Darkening Eye (2008)

This is the first story to feature a companion from beyond the fourth Doctor era. I am surprised it has taken so long but quite glad that they have done it. It also nice that they chose the best companion from the Fifth Doctor’s era to read this story. I don’t quite know whether using stories featuring the fifth Doctor onwards is a good idea. The companions used are ones that we hear once or twice a year (or more) and that has occurred for the last ten years. Sarah Sutton gives a good performance as Nyssa. Sarah Sutton played Nyssa from January 31st 1981 in The Keeper of Traken to February 23 1983 in Terminus. Originally she was only intended to appear in The Keeper of Traken but due to the need of more companions with the departure of Tom Baker’s Doctor in the next story it was decided to keep Nyssa on as a full-time companion. Nyssa is my favourite companion because she is rationale and doesn’t fit the normal stereotype of the female companion. Another thing that I liked about Sutton’s performance is the voices that she does (or doesn’t do). Her Tegan voice was the best and they seemed the easiest thing to do, the tone that she used for Adric was spot on and the Doctor was not memorable.

The use of death is not the cheeriest of subjects due to its dark and often negative images. The Dar-Traders morbid descriptions in this story help make them the sort of alien that despite having no malice you would not want anything to do with them. The return of the Dar-Traders was a good one because I think that there is a lot of potential for this creature. The idea that the Doctor and his companions all have death signatures makes sense because they have all dealt with death. The Doctor has died four times at this point, Tegan has felt the death of her Aunt (in Logopolis), Nyssa lost her father and others (in The Keeper of Traken) and Adric lost his brother (Full Circle) and would die in Earthshock.

Stewart Sheargold wrote a strong story because of the descriptions that he gives creates a very dark and miserable idea of what the spaceship was like. A series like the companion chronicles depends on the descriptions of the writers and thanks to Sheargold this story works. The bits that he sticks in are valid points, what I mean by that is the line that Adric makes that just because we don’t understand a races rituals or beliefs then that doesn’t mean that it’s wrong which makes sense. When you look at the Dar-Traders then you would think that they have a morbid fascination with death except to them it’s probably perfectly normal. A new word seems to have been created especially for this story because I had never heard of it before Trakenite. That is something that seems obvious to Nyssa but it just seems to have been plucked out of thin air. Ken Bentley is directing his first Companion Chronicles even though he has directed a regular story this is a different discipline but does really well. The story has some really good moments which are important to the story and work and that’s thanks to Bentley.

The best thing about this story is the return of the Dar-Traders. I really liked the Dar-Traders when they last appeared in The Death Collectors. They sound superb and it’s a shame that they are used in audio because they would be brilliant on TV. The cliffhanger was also very good in this story and totally came out of the blue. It genuinely led me to wonder how it was going to conclude because we all know he dies in Earthshock. The conclusion was not a disappointment and it was the second part of this story that was the better half. The introduction of Damasin Hyde helped move the story along and added a threat to the companions. I think it would have been better if another actor played Hyde instead of using Sutton. It did slightly devalue the character no matter how much it added to the story.

Overall this was an enjoyable story, its does have its faults but the use of Nyssa was a good idea and the story was sound.

The Raincloud Man (2008)

The final story of 2008 sees a sequel to the March story The Condemned and follows on from Return of the Krotons. The Raincloud Man is written by Eddie Robson who even though he hasn’t been writing for Big Finish for long (Blood of the Daleks in 2007) he has become one of the best writers for the range. This is perhaps the only other story that I was looking forward to more than The Condemned. The only way it was going to this is by having a different focus to before. As a result story is less serious one that The Condemned but it was still entertaining.

Back in Manchester the 6th Doctor and Charley encounter DI Menzies who is still as entertaining as she was previously. What I felt in this story was how much of a rounded character she seemed, back in the Condemned she was bordering on the annoying whilst managing to be entertaining I think that because it seemed to have gone down well with either everyone at Big Finish or the fans it was decided to have her modified slightly different. I wondered what the name Raincloud Man meant. It didn’t seem to have any relevance but the idea that the name refers to the bad luck that this guy brings at casinos is very smart and works well into the setting of the story. I liked the idea that the story is set in Manchester because normally stories that are set on Earth are in rural areas or in London whereas to set a story in the North of the country is quite different. There were some memorable moments in this story and the best one was the scene where The Doctor is gambling his life and stuff in a game of Top Trumps, now in a normal show like Coronation Street or Holby City this would be a silly thing to do and would totally waster any potential the story had left however it worked in this story and it gave several minutes of superb action that genuinely had me wondering just exactly where the story was going and more importantly whether the truth about Charley would come out.

Colin Baker was on fine form in this story, I think that even with a weak script he can still put in a fine performance. I love the fact that he knows there is something not quite right with Charley but he still travels with her, more to try and find out the truth than anything else. I am quite enjoying the fact that the relationship seems to have softened between the Doctor and Menzies. There is still a level of banter that helps create some comedy but ultimately it doesn’t distract from the main story. The Top Trumps scene was played really well as he didn’t know quite exactly whether he was in control of the situation and ultimately that is what helps heighten the tension. India Fisher was also very good in this story, I think that the Charley character is perhaps the strongest character that Big Finish have created. It seemed that she was destined to just be useful for a short time with the Eighth Doctor but with the introduction of C’Rizz in 2004 it shows that the character of Charley is one that has limitless potential and with the interaction with the Sixth Doctor it has given a new lease of life to the character. India Fisher plays the posh adventuress very well and has also done very well in trying to keep the truth from the Sixth Doctor since she appeared in The Condemned. Her storyline of when the revelation is going to appear is gripping stuff and she seems so different from the Charley that appeared in the 2001 Storm Warning story.

Anna Hope was the star of the story for me, she played DI Menzies well in the Condemned. She showed in this story that the character had taken in what happened during The Condemned and it has helped her to do her duty of protecting Manchester. She is a character that works very well in perhaps any story that you could think off due to the way that the character has been written and how Hope portrays the role. As I was listening to the story I was hoping that she would stumble on board the TARDIS and become a companion because I think she would be very good. Unfortunately she didn’t but there is still hope (no pun intended). I think that if they bought back the role of Menzies that it would be as a short term companion. Give Hope 3 stories to see whether its just a novelty thing or whether she would work well as a companion. The other guest stars were all very good and all had a massive roles in the story. I thought that Michael Fenton Stevens was very particularly good as Brooks with Octavia Walters also good as Carmen. I though that Steven Hansell was funny as the Bouncers and Jeremy James was also very good as the Tabbalac Leader.

Eddie Robson has written a good story which did well to try and maintain the interest in the Doctor’s quest to find out the truth about Charley. Robson has developed Menzies enough to make it seem like she has the potential. I don’t think that Robson has written a poor script and he managed to keep that trend going with this story. The characters in this story were very strong and all contributed to the development of the story. Nicholas Briggs was superb as director. He generally is as previous stories like The Nowhere Place that he can effectively create tension and helps push the story along at the right sort of pace. Being the Executive Producer of the range and probably being behind the Charley storyline means he has an idea of where the storyline will be going and how much is going to be revealed in this story.

Overall this story isn’t quite as good as The Condemned it is still an enjoyable four part story that rounds off a fantastic year for the Sixth Doctor. This story arc has been the biggest success of 2008 and hopefully they give it a satisfactory conclusion at some point in 2009.

2008 Tomstardis Awards

BEST DOCTOR - Colin Baker
BEST COMPANION - India Fisher (Charley Pollard)
BEST MAIN RANGE STORY - The Haunting of Thomas Brewster
BEST MAIN RANGE WRITER - Eddie Robson (The Condemned)
BEST MAIN RANGE DIRECTOR - Barnaby Edwards (The Haunting of Thomas Brewster)
BEST MAIN RANGE COVER DESIGNER - Alex Mallinson (Brotherhood of the Daleks)
BEST MAIN RANGE MUSIC & SOUND DESIGNER - David Darlington (The Condemned)
BEST GUEST STAR - Andrew Sachs (Adric – The Boy That Time Forgot)

BEST EIGHTH DOCTOR ADVENTURE - Brave New Town

BEST COMPANION CHRONICLES STORY - Here There Be Monsters

SPECIAL RECOGNITION - Gary Russell

The Tomfiles: #5 - Big Finish Review of 2008

Big Finish really shone in 2008 for me. The first thing I have to say is that the stories have ranged from ok to fantastic. The first release of 2008 was The Bride of Peladon which was written by Barnaby Edwards. Edwards has directed many BF audios since July 1999 and it was nice to see him finally pen a Doctor Who story. In my review in Blog 44 dated January 27th 2008, I said; "The Bride of Peladon is a well written story with good characters and a good pace to it" The use of a familiar monster from Doctor Who's past was always a dangerous thing because if you don’t rise up to peoples expectations then its just going to be a terrible four part adventure. Also it saw the departure of Erimem (Caroline Morris). She had been in Doctor Who since 2001 and her partnership with Peri had been one of the highlights of the Fifth Doctor stories. Following on from C'Rizz departure and Charley's (supposed) departure it seemed that the Doctor was leaking companions. That wasn’t the case when February came around because it was The Condemned which saw the Sixth Doctor without Evelyn and more importantly with Charley Pollard who has spent seven years travelling with the 8th Doctor. After listening to the story I rated it 8/10. I thought that the explanation of why the Eighth Doctor doesn’t remember his time with Charley during his sixth incarnation would have been explained but it wasn’t yet.

March's release was The Dark Husband which featured the Seventh Doctor, Ace & Hex. This story was the weakest story that has been produced in 2008. It moved too slowly and as I commented on in Blog 55 dated March 30 2008 "Knowing what kind of person David Quantick is, I was expecting a slightly different kind of story and that is what we got but the only thing that let this story down was there just wasn’t any pace to it" April saw the introduction of Thomas Brewster. This was a three-part story arc starting off with The Haunting of Thomas Brewster. The only thing that I didn’t like about this story was the music, it just went on for too long and after a while it just got annoying. The surprise at the end that Brewster had stolen the TARDIS was an unexpected one. May's release was Assassin in the Limelight which saw the return of Evelyn Smythe who hadn’t been heard from since September 2007 in 100. It was a bit of a disappointment really as it was just a bit lacklustre. It was the final story in a trilogy following Medicinal Purposes in 2004 and Pier Pressure in 2006. It was nice to hear Evelyn back and also even better to hear Leslie Philips come back.

Moving on to June's release which was The Death Collectors. This was a three part story followed by a single part story. The three part was really good it had all the characters and a good plot what let it down was the single part story. It is the only time that I haven’t listened to a story all the way through, that was because it was just bizarre and uninspiring. July's release was the second part of the Thomas Brewster story-arc. The Boy That Time Forgot didnt feature Brewster until the end of Part 4 but his actions at the end of the previous story. This story does have a twist to replace the absence of Brewster. Adric. He travelled with the Doctor between 1980 and 1982 and was killed off in the story Earthshock, or so we thought. This story deals with the idea that Adric did survive and became lord and master of some weird earth. The Adric in this story was Andrew Sachs who played Manuel in the BBC comedy Fawlty Towers. His inclusion instead of Matthew Waterhouse seemed to annoy a lot of fans but to me it was a masterstroke piece of casting. Was just behind The Condemned in my favourite story of the year. August saw the second story to feature the Sixth Doctor and Charley in The Doomwood Curse. Whilst it was an enjoyable piece it wasn’t as good as The Condemned. Both Colin Baker and India Fisher excelled in this story. The use of a character like Dick Turpin could have made this release a doomed one but actually it wasn’t and turned out to be quite a good follow up to The Condemned.

The first release of September saw the release of Kingdom of Silver which saw the return of the Cybermen to the main series. This story wasn’t the greatest one to feature the Cybermen but I thought that it was entertaining. Also with this release was Keepsake which was a single part story. Now I am not a fan of these single episodes, I just don’t think that they work because you cant tell a story in 25 minutes. I have to admit that I was wrong in this case, it was actually quite good. It had nothing really to do with Doctor Who even though it featured the 7th Doctor. October saw the conclusion to the Thomas Brewster story arc in Time Reef. It was sad to see the exit of Brewster as I think he was a good addition and his conflicts with the Doctor were entertaining. Time Reef (which was a three-part story) wasn’t as good as The Boy That Time Forgot but it would have been impossible to beat. A Perfect World was really good as it was just the right exit for the character who lost his mother and didn’t have anyone really. Two good single part stories in a row, things are looking good except....

November saw the 45th Anniversary of Doctor Who and Big Finish chose to celebrate this milestone with four single stories. Like 100 back in September 2007 the story Forty-Five had links to the number 45. I wasn’t really looking forward because in the past single part stories have tended to be poor. However I was wrong with this as all four stories were fantastic. The final release of the year was The Raincloud Man which featured the 6th Doctor and Charley in their third release of the year and whilst I enjoyed it I found that it wasn’t the best of the three. The main problem was that there was a bit too much humour in it for my likening. The return of DI Menzies was very good and I wish that she would become a companion but maybe she will return in the future. One of the best things that Big Finish have done is to use a story arc in their stories. Similar to what the TV series has done, you have had the Thomas Brewster story arc which worked brilliantly and was finished in similar style. There was also the Charley Pollard storyline which is still continuing. The thing that links both stories is that they have been told in a intriguing way.

THE STAGEPLAYS
This year saw the arrival of three audio adventures based on stage plays. The first was The Ultimate Adventure which starred Jon Pertwee and Colin Baker when it appeared on the stage but was just played by Baker for this audio. It was strange to have songs in between action scenes but it did actually work. I'm not sure about the alliance between the Daleks and Cybermen. I think with their confrontation in 2006 this attempt seemed a bit weak. The Second was Seven Keys to Doomsday which was quite good in the way that they used the same actor who played the role on stage. Trevor Martin was really good as the Doctor, it had a William Hartnell feel to it and by that I mean it had that feel that it took several days. The third and final release was Curse of the Daleks and was perhaps the most curious release of this season. The story was a Doctor-less release and despite the fact that it took me a few attempts to get somewhere with this story, once I did get into it I actually found it quite interesting. It was eerie and it was the best story of the series. I had heard about these stories in various Doctor Who forms but never knew much about it. These three releases were brilliant and well worth the money.

THE COMPANION CHRONICLES
The companion chronicles entered a new form this year. January saw the final story the second series. The Catalyst was a Leela story and was a bit dull. July saw the third series begin. What was different about it was that there were 12 releases with one coming out each month. So far the stories have been really good and hopefully this new format will work. 2008 has been the best year for Big Finish. The quality of stories have always been high and even with weaker stories like The Dark Husband the releases have been enjoyable and worth the money.

Home Truths (2008)

Home Truths is a unusual story that begs some questions. The first question that comes to mind about this story is why would someone who only appeared in nine episodes be classed as a companion? Then that question becomes irrelevant as the most interesting story of the series. The story has quite a different approach to previous companion stories. This sees a young scientist called Robert who goes into a house and talks to Sara Kingdom. What occurs is at times terrifying and at times mind-boggling.

The story sees The Doctor, Steven & Sara arrive in a house. The inhabitants are dead and things only work when you wish them. As the story moves on its shown that the two dead bodies actually killed themselves because they thought it. The noises were very spooky and when the woman’s body was discovered her eyes were open and when the body was revisited the eyes were closed. When that happened I really wanted to know what happened. It was nice that it was Sara who wished for that to happen. The main theme about this story seems to be forgiveness. Sara visits the fact that she shot her brother in the Daleks Masterplan. She revaluates her actions and you get the feeling that if she could revisit the moment where she shot her brother then she wouldn’t have pulled the trigger.

The character of Robert was well played by Niall Macgregor. At times he seemed cold and destined to finish his job. The job seemed to be whether to kill Sara Kingdom or let an old woman just live out her last few days in the house. This was a tough decision that Macgregor played But it is Jean Marsh who steals the show. I think that the character of Kingdom was a really good character for TV. I think that she would have worked well in stories past the Daleks Master Plan and it was a shame that she would killed when she was. Her voice works well on audio and it seemed like Marsh had played Kingdom last year not 43 years ago. She did old Sara and she did frightened Sara which was really enjoyable to listen to. But the best compliment that could be given to Marsh is that she helped create the atmosphere. Yes the music and sound effects did a bit of the job but Marsh was able to sell the whole thing and create an impression in my mind of this house that has some dark secrets.

Simon Guerrier has written for Big Finish before with the 2006 story The Settling which I personally enjoyed and I think that the new style that was on show here really work and Guerrier did a good job. It could have gone badly wrong but I was enthralled throughout. The chemistry between Sara and Robert was a sort of bitter enemies trying to be friends thing which I thought worked really well. Lisa Bowerman also did well in this story. Her previous story Here There Be Monsters was quite slow and I wasn’t keen on it however she certainly deserves praise for keeping this story entertaining and the pace constant. It may have took a while to get started but once it did it didn’t stop.

The open ended finish was totally out of left field because all other companion chronicles have a beginning middle and an end. Hopefully they will revisit the character of Sara Kingdom either in this series or future series. This is the best Companion Chronicles story of the series and possibly the best of the 13 that have been released. Superb.

The Juggernauts (2005)

The Juggernauts sees a three familiar classic Doctor Who elements return. This story is the first to feature the 6th Doctor and Mel since the One Doctor back in December 2001. Mel has not been the most well loved companion in Doctor Who history partly because she was just annoying. Since she made her debut for Big Finish the character of Mel has undergone something of a renaissance. Her good form continues in this story. This story has been written by Scott Alan Woodard who makes his first contribution to the range. Another return to the series is that of Davros. Genius creator of the Daleks, no character created in the Doctor Who has the magical madness that this one armed blind madman has. Davros has a habit of infiltrating his way into societies. The Juggernauts sees the 6th Doctor and Mel separated during to an incident on board a medical spaceship and after Mel gets into an escape pod she loses complete contact with the Doctor and tries to begin a new life on a colony on the planet Lethe. Soon she joins a team lead by Dr Vaso and when the Doctor lands and finds Mel he is shocked to discover that Dr Vaso is in fact Davros.

Another thing about this story that I liked was it was the first adventure since Remembrance of the Daleks back in 1988 that Davros and the Daleks featured in the same story. Also what Scott Alan Woodard had to do was as well as have the Doctor, Mel, Davros and the Daleks was to find a use for the Mechanoids who have only appeared once in Doctor Who history and that was back in 1965 in the William Hartnell story The Chase. They are massive things that don’t really have much of a purpose apart from getting in the way but in this story they served a purpose in terms of plot and emotionally. To be honest, apart from pleasing long time fans I don’t really see why they would be included. That said I did find them strangely useful.

What I like about this story is that the characters are so well written and there is such a good pace to it. The idea that Davros is using the inhabitants as Mechanoids was a stroke of genius and was a nice emotional plot twist that helped elevate Davros’ evil plans to a whole new level. Also the fact that Mel has basically started a new life on this planet and has adapted to the environment that she has found herself in shows a new side to the character that was never shown on TV.

Acting wise this story was very good. Colin Baker was also on top form and his relationship with Mel is not as childish or light hearted as it does in this story. It was interesting where the Doctor tried to convince Mel that the person she thought was Dr Vaso was in fact the evil genius who created the Daleks. He has a relationship with Mel that just never came out during their short time on TV. Bonnie Langford who despite all the critiscm that she has received for the role has come back to Doctor Who and played the Mel that should have appeared on TV. This is her best story to date because she actually spent most of the story doing what her character was originally meant to be good at, being a smart-aleck with computers.

Of the guest stars it is Terry Molloy who is the best. His version of Davros is absolutely fantastic and it worked on TV and also works on audio. When he was Dr Vaso it was also good because it shows that Molloy isn’t just good at playing evil genius’ but can play nice characters. His version of Davros wipes out David Gooderson who played it in Destiny of the Daleks back in 1979. Other roles in this story worked really well and helped create a good atmosphere that made it seem like it was a really nice place to live or at least be based at. Also there should be some credit to Nicholas Briggs who did the voices for the Daleks and for the Mechanoids. Other people of worth include Bindya Solanki who perhaps is most well known for appearing in the BBC soap Eastenders. Here she plays Sonali who is a nice likeable character. Klaus White plays Geoff who is another character who is well written, he forms a… feeling for Mel. Peter Forbes plays Kryson. Forbes has starred in Big Finish plays before. He played Dan Curver in the third series of Dalek Empire back in 2004. I quite liked the character Kryson. Other characters include Paul Grunert who played Brauer and Julia Houghton who played Loewen. Bother characters contributed well and were well written and well acted characters.

If there is a problem with this story is that Mel does very good in the first half of this story and carries it very well. What then happens is once the Doctor arrives and once Mel realises who Dr Vaso really is then her usefulness kind of falls away at the waist side. Aside from that it is a superb first story from Scott Alan Woodard. He has written a story that never gets boring at any point and that is not something that happens very often. Gary Russell also should be applauded for creating an atmosphere that varies from a spaceship to a colony without even dipping in quality.

Overall this was a really good story. The Mechanoids were a weird choice due to the fact of their solitary appearance 40 years ago but it surprised me that it worked and with the Daleks and Davros it served up to be one of the best stories of 2005. It shows that 1) Colin Baker is a superb Doctor, 2) Bonnie Langford’s renaissance as Mel continues and 3) There is a use for the Mechanoids after all.