UNIT: Dominion (2012)

One of the most anticipated releases of 2012 if not for many years. It’s a four hour epic with each episode is around an hour long. This story was written by Nicholas Briggs & Jason Arnopp and it’s the latest story in the UNIT series which originally ran for four stories in 2004 and 2005. Big Finish are doing several ‘special releases’ and this was one of two that I have been looking forward to for months (other being Dark Eyes). After having a series of somewhat Doctor lite stories recently it was delightful knowing that we were going to get significantly more of the Seventh Doctor. The benefit of having each episode an hour long is that it means that the story can have time to grow and we can really get involved in the story. That’s on the basis that the story is interesting and worth listening to and that’s the case with Dominion. This story sees the return of Klein who became a scientific advisor to UNIT at the end of The Architects of History back in 2010. In that story Klein has had certain aspects of her memory wiped. The Doctor is currently travelling with Raine and Ace is on Gallifrey and so we get about a dozen words out of Sophie Aldred which is probably the best thing to do.

One thing that UNIT: Dominion plays on is the authouritive figure that is fame hungry and wanting to take all the limelight when things are important and Colonel Lafayette (Julian Dutton) is the one given the task of playing it here. Dutton plays it brilliantly as every time he speaks you know he doesn’t know what he’s doing as is going to meet a sticky ending and that is exactly what happens when he addresses the Skyheads. It’s sort of what happens to the US president in Sound of Drums (2007). There are several superb creations that in the run up we were given teasers to were absolutely outstanding on audio. The Mindleeches sounded absolutely creepy  and when they first encounter the UNIT soldiers it’s because of Private Phillips that they come across as a truly terrifying monster. The Skyheads were visually well realised and also worked quite well on audio.

Alex McQueen plays ‘The Other Doctor’. Best known for appearing in shows like The Inbetweeners, The Thick of It and Holby City (also he appeared in Paradise 5). His very first seen is something that wouldn’t be out of place in a Little Britain sketch. This style continues throughout. It’s clear that he is up to something and that is what I liked about the character early on. As the story progresses I start to like this other Doctor even though it’s clear he is up to something. As the story moves along it becomes clear that the Other Doctor is in fact The Master. The cliffhangers for parts one and two were relatively good but part three was by far the best because the other Doctor’s true identity was revealed. I don’t know whether other people saw this coming but I certainly didn’t. I was pleasantly surprised and didn’t see it coming at all. McQueen was brilliant from start to finish and whoever it was that decided to ask him to star in this deserves a pat on the back because it was brilliant casting. McQueen played it with the right mix of menace and campness that the character should be played with. Sylvester McCoy is on his usual standard form in this and after missing him so much during the mini-series earlier this year it was good that he is quite involved in the story and doesn’t just turn up in the final quarter. It’s also good to have Beth Chalmers back in the Doctor Who universe as I quite liked the character during the Seventh Doctor batch of Lost Stories. Here she seems to be slightly better written for which would make sense as the Lost Stories wouldn’t have been originally written for Raine. Here Chalmers is given the chance to play the role of companion and thrives. However the big USP of this was the return of Elizabeth Klein who appeared in the 2001 story Colditz before return for a series of stories in 2010. Tracey Childs is a superb actress and one of the things that I liked about her 2010 run was how she managed to fool people in thinking that Klein was a good character before remembering she that was a Nazi. Childs plays the role brilliantly and it’s because of her that the character has become so popular and will hopefully return in future stories.

This story has superb and strong central performances but there are also very strong supporting performances. In no particular order let’s start with Julian Dutton who played Colonel Lafayette. I really liked the character and thought that he was played well. His demise was inevitable and it could be argued it could be predictable but I don’t mind as I thought it was enjoyable. Next is Sam Clemens as Major Wyland Jones. Wyland-Jones is the Colonel’s replacement and within about 20 seconds we are meant to realise that the colonel was actually far easier to get on with than the Major.  Bradley Gardner plays Sergeant Pete Wilson is intended to be the likeable and the character that the listener is supposed to connect with. When he shoots Klein in part four I thought that it only worked because he was so well liked and such a nice person. Had it been someone else then it wouldn’t have worked but Gardner does a good job with it.

There was a moment when it seemed that Klein had been killed and I was shocked because I thought that it was a shame but then it turns out that she is only wounded. I’m glad that they didn’t kill her because it would have ruined the story for me as I think that there is potential for future stories for the character and actually at the end the Doctor gives Klein a space time telegraph which he gave the Brigadier in the 1970’s. This means that future Klein stories are inevitable rather than possible.

The story is a very good one and there was a very real possibility that it was going to drag and run out of steam quite quickly but I honestly can’t say that at any point during the four hours of drama I never once got bored, never once got confused and never once stopped caring about the characters. It’s a credit to Jason Arnopp and Nicholas Briggs to pull this feat off. I had very high expectations of UNIT: Dominion and thought that they were met very quickly. UNIT: Dominion is a currently priced at £30 (£25 for download) and its incredible value for money. At around 238 minutes it works out as around 12.5pence per minute. If you want value for money and want an epic story to go with it then UNIT: Dominion is as good a place to start. Definelty one of the best releases of 2012.

 

Rating - 9/10

Army of Death (2011)

Army of Death is the final story of the Eighth Doctor series and also of 2011. It’s a surprising decision to have a story so mired in the themes of death at such a festive month. This is Jason Arnopp’s first story for the main range after his highly enjoyable contribution to the ‘Recorded Time and Other Stories’ release back in December 2010. This story sees the Doctor and Mary Shelley arrive on the planet of Draxine where there are two citystates called Garrak and Stronghaven. Garrack is pretty much on its knees thanks to its leader President Harmon who as it turns out was the leader of a cult. Whereas Garrak is in physical ruin, Stronghaven is in the middle of a political upheaval. Their president has been assinated and the replacement is also in trouble. As you would expect, the Doctor and Mary are caught in the middle of the story.

Paul McGann is fantastic in this story. His character’s attitude seems to have changed since Lucie Miller’s departure and McGann has had his best year since joining Big Finish in 2001. I thought that his best scene was President Vallan but to be honest all his scenes were well acted. Julie Cox puts in her best performance so far with the adventure. I must admit that I wasn’t sure whether the character would work considering how short a time she had in ‘Company of Friends’ but to the credit more of Miss Cox than the writers, the character has worked and despite the uncertain conclusion for the character. Mary Shelley has been one of biggest surprises of 2011. The big name in this release was that of David Harewood who is perhaps best known in Doctor Who circles as playing Naismith in the David Tennant two-part finale ‘End of Time’. Some people have an instantly recognisable voice and Harewood is one of those. He gives a very good performance which fits in well with the mood of the story. Mitch Benn is another name that I was familiar with. His involvement in this story was leaked out somehow by the man himself. Benn is perhaps most recognisable to British listeners for his contributions to the BBC Radio Four show ‘The Now Show’. I have to admit that despite being a regular listener and fan of that show I struggled to notice him in this. Now I know who he plays I may go back and listen to it again

Army of Death might not be the chirpiest story of the year or of recent times but it has to be said that it’s a solid story and whilst most people might be going wax lyrical about The Silver Turk, I think that Army of Death is the more satisfying. Arnopp has managed to get the most out of the Mary Shelley character which has been something that hasn’t really happened in the previous stories. It’s been a rocky year for the Eighth Doctor (emotionally) but it looks like 2012 will be a good year for him and Mary Shelley looks like she could be a fine companion.

Short Trips - Volume IV (2011)

The final Short Trips volume comes in the same month as Recorded Time and Other Stories which was a collection of stories. Ok so they were full cast stories but still it’s this is another release made up of multiple stories. Like the previous three volumes all these stories are written largely by new authors which is something that I approve of. The thing that has remained consistant is that there has been a wide variation in terms of quality because when they are good they are really good and when they are not then they are poor. I wondered what we would get this time.

The first story is A Star is Born by Richard Dinnick and to be honest this story doesn’t get the fourth volume off to a great start. I like William Russell and I could listen to him for hours (and do with the Target Audios) but I found this story slightly difficult to follow and with a running time of nearly 25 minutes I thought it was almost 10 minutes too long. The beginning of it was quite interesting and the idea that someone left their home planet many years ago does echo ‘The Ark’ but then the story starts to get unstuck and ultimately I didn’t like this story very much. Then we move onto the Second Doctor story which is Penny Wise, Penny Foolish by Foster Marks which is about this guy who is mining and is buying planets so that he can fulfil an order to allow him to make money so he can buy more planets and do the whole thing again. It was a very interesting and more importantly enjoyable adventure which was short and snappy and was also pretty straightforward.

The third Doctor story is Lost in the Wakefield Triangle by the wonderfully named Vin Marsden Hendrick. It sees an alien race try to invade a garden shed. Yes, only in Doctor Who would a shed being used in such a way. To be honest I found myself liking this story very much. It was read brilliantly by Katy Manning who has a voice that like William Russell’s I could read for hours. It is also one of those stories that are quite snappy and also easy to follow. In the end the farmer and the rhubarb shaped alien come to a deal and a nice little business deal is started. A fun story that continues the positive progression of stories. The fourth story is The Old Rogue by John Grindrod and sees the Doctor and Romana visit a man that is working in a café. It’s sort of a prison but it’s a normal everyday café. This story is read brilliantly and whilst I didn’t find it as straight forward as the previous stories it was still another highly enjoyable adventure. For me the funniest thing that the thought that K9 was outside of the café and was attacking the youths outside and setting fire to their football.

The fifth story is quite an interesting one an and uses a famous landmark in Lions of Trafalgar by Jason Arnopp and its good because it’s a familiar landmark and sits it right in the middle of a sci-fi story. It’s actually quite a good story with quite a good basis for a story but what I found surprising about this story was Peter Davison. I sometimes find his reading to be a bit uninspiring. Unless the story is very good it means that I often find the story harder to follow.

But the sixth story written by Cindy Garland is my favourite Short Trip story out of all four volumes. In To Cut a Blade of Grass there is a mystery about what connects the Doctor and an old man being visited by his daughter. It seems that nothing major is going to happen and then what we learn is that the Doctor has been taking the old man into the future to see what his daughter will become. I thought it was beautifully told and I could easily heard this as a 30 minute story. It was superbly read by Colin Baker and obviously is my favourite story of this volume. The penultimate adventure is The Shadow Trader by Charles William. Now the opening scene describes what the shadow was and it was all a bit of a mystery to me. It wasn’t until later on that I understood what it was and the rest of the story made sense. It was a nice story.

The final story was Quntum Heresy by Avril Naude. It sees a woman who is working in a bland position who is visited by the Doctor over and over again. The Doctor is stuck in a time-loop and is getting older with every visit. I thought that this was a fine story that didn’t seem like much to begin with but soon became interesting and this was a great way to end this release. I think that this was the best of the Eighth Doctor adventures.

Overall this volume was a relatively good one. There were more good/better stories than terrible ones but I do think that overall the four volumes have been quite an interesting experiment. I never read the books and think that having such inconsistent durations for stories (ranging from 10 minutes to 25) does have its advantages but more often than not its disadvantages. If there are to be more volumes in the future (as of now there is now official word) then I would hope that they reduce the number of Doctors and have longer stories (I know their suppose to be short but I think 4 x 20 minute adventures would be better).

The Demons of Red Lodge and Other Stories (2010)

For the last few years, there has been a single release that has consisted of four single stories. This year it was the turn of the Fifth Doctor to get this treatment. What is quite special is that one of the writers won a competition set up by Big Finish and was won by the curiously named Rick Briggs. I suppose anyone who submitted a story for the competition and didn’t win might be slightly envious of Rick for this opportunity and are eager to see what he produced that won him this spot.

The Demons of Red Lodge is the first story written by Jason Arnopp and sees the Doctor and Nyssa wake up to find out that they don’t remember where they are and after investigating the surroundings they find that the speara (not sure about spelling) are planning an invasion and are trying to convert the inhabitants and the first stage is to basically knock them out and then the second stage is to take full control of their personalities. The Speara are trying to convert the Doctor and Nyssa but think that their human and when they try to copy the Doctor’s two hearts affect the plans of the Speara.

I really liked this story. It’s a I thought that there was enough threat from Speara and it was great how the Doctor and Nyssa seemed genually scared at the beginning of this story. With a few tweeks this could easily make a hour long or even four part drama. Jason Arnopp has written a good opening story and it’s a good starter for this release.

The second story is the one written by Rick Briggs called The Entropy Composition. It sees the Doctor and Nyssa arrive in 1968 in a prog rock musician called Geoff Cooper who wrote a song called White Waves, Soft Haze that was never released. He is accompanied by Erisi and there are clues early on when the animals disappear. Erisi is a Entropy Siren and the music is basically eroding all the music on the archivist planet and is creating chaos. There is a lovely scene where the Doctor and Nyssa are trying to convince Mrs Malloy who they are and Nyssa trying to pretend she’s a swinging 1960’s girl but not understanding what the term groupie means.

I found this a harder story to understand than the previous one. It took a few listens to fully understand it and that shouldn’t really be the case in a 25 minute story. Don’t get me wrong I do think that it’s an interesting story but when you have such a short amount of time to tell a story then it should be far simpler than it was. I did like the characters that Briggs has written. I thought that Mrs Malloy was a lovely character and her exit was quite a shock and Naloom was also very entertaining as the archivist.

The third story was called Doing Time written by William Gallagher and sees the Doctor in a prison on the planet Folly. The opening dialogue was a mirror of the opening scene of the BBC Sitcom ‘Porridge’. The Doctor collects a future echo that tells him a planet is going to explode but arrives a year too early. He is put in prison by a very nasty Governor who has desires of becoming President. The whole story is very entertaining story that sees the Doctor create an interplanetary version of the Cricket Ashes.

It’s a good story with some good characters and in particular Susan Kyd as Governor Chaplin. She was very entertaining throughout and was probably the best guest character of the entire release. Gallagher has written a fun and often amusing story.

The final story of this release is called Special Features written by John Dorney and is a 25th Anniversary DVD commentary to a 1970’s horror film called Doctor Demonic’s Tales of Terror. This is an original way of telling a Doctor Who story. It’s quite a brave attempt because commentaries are improvised and require the viewer to be actually seeing the images as opposed to just listening to the action. There is a lot of talk between the contributors about a curse and the bad luck that befell some of the cast. I thought it was a really good story because this takes place over the course of 20 or so minutes and in one long scene. The story manages to pack a lot in despite the short running time but this is thanks to the writer.

All the cast do a great job and along with Dorney’s writing this is my favourite story of the entire release. John Dorney has been one of the shining stars in 2010 with Solitaire springing to mind and he does another good outing with this story. He’s managed to make this episode seem like it was done like a normal commentary.

So the final regular release of 2010 is a good one. They were all good in their own way and despite the Rick Briggs story, they were all very straightforward and enjoyable. On the subject of Rick Briggs I think that he should be allowed to write a full four part story like Steven Hall did this year with A Death in the Family because I think that he could do a good job. The Demons of Red Lodge and Other Stories should be listened to by anyone who likes short stories and who likes creepy stories.