The Twilight Kingdom (2004)

The next instalement of the Eighth Doctor adventures in the divergent universe. In this story the Doctor, Charley and C’Rizz arrive in a jungle which is overrun by soldiers. I really liked this story the first time that I listened to it. This is a first story from Will Shindler and he has written a story that has to wrap up the Divergent Universe until it gets resumed in the next series.

The plot does have a big plot point which would be false to call it a plot twist seen as if you look at the front cover you will know what the caves are actual living beings. It was probably a bit of an own goal for Big Finish to do that on the cover. It was great to have the Kro’ka back. His absence in The Natural History of Fear was noticed and so to have him back even briefly was great. Stephen Perring was a brilliant piece of casting,

The acting is of the highest quality that there has been during this series. From the main actors to the supporting artists everyone provides a superb performance. Paul McGann is slightly different from recent adventures. The Doctor has now been without his TARDIS for a few adventures and quite ingeniously McGann portrays as the Doctor as someone who is starting to miss the TARDIS which is a part of his character. Off the supporting cast I found Alan Rothwell to be very good as Janto who is a scientist who has been isolated. C’Rizz and Charley do their companion thing brilliantly and are typically split up and do their best to help move the story along. India Fisher and Conrad Westmaas are gelling well.

This story continues the good run of adventures. Apart from Invaders from Mars which I thought was dreadful I think that we have now had a good run of stories which have all varied in terms of what they offer but still manage to hit the spot in enjoyment. This is the last story of the series so this story had to help move the overall story arc along a bit and if I had to make a criticism then it would be like the previous story and it didn’t really move the story along bar a little bit at the end. It should have been more. That said it’s still a damn good stand alone story.

Scaredy Cat (2005)

Scaredy Cat is the second story since the Eighth Doctor left the Divergent Universe. This story is quite an eerie story with some creepy moments in it. This story is the second to come from Will Shindler who wrote The Twilight Kingdom (2004) which I was a big fan of. The story sees the Doctor, Charley and C’Rizz arrive on the planet Endarra. The first thing that struck me was how short it was compared to most stories. The story runs at around 1 hour and 20 minutes which is around 20 minutes shorter than normal. That’s nearly a full episode they could have fitted in which leads me to wonder if they could not have found something to fill this gap.

Despite the short amount of time this story is forced to move at a fast pace. The idea that that a planet and a child could become one is something that I found quite interesting. The story does take quite a while to get started but by episode two. The story between the Doctor and C’Rizz seemed to step up a gear with a relationship that isnt your normal Doctor/Companion one.

The story is an interesting one, besides that it gives McGann’s Doctor a new lease of life and this reflects in his performance. But it is in many ways Conrad Westmaas’ story as C’Rizz is given a lot of time. Westmaas is very good and uses his time brilliantly, I loved the different side of his character. He seems to have developed an attitude almost bitchy since he left the divergent universe. India Fisher seems to suffer from the lack of air time, she hardly has anything to do throughout which is a shame because she is a really good character.

Unfortunately this story will stick in my memory due to the shortness. This story does have some good points but the most important is that it’s the fresh start that the Eighth Doctor stories need. After too long in the Divergent Universe we can final get back to a more traditional DW story.