Human Resources review [Eddie Robson]

Lucie is working her first day at Hulbert Logistics. The Daleks, the Tomorrow Twins, Phobos... They were all dreams. So was the long-haired Doctor in his bright blue box, who just so happens to be on his way to save her.

When and Where: For the Doctor and Lucie, this is just after No More Lies and at some point before Dead London. For the Cybermen, this is at some point after The Tenth Planet and before The Tomb of the Cybermen.

The Doctor's Case:

• A Good Quotation:
• "Any more rope-gags?"
• "Take a letter, Miss Miller." / "I'll take four letters and make a word out of them if you're not careful."
• "What are you doing?" / "Shredding." / "Shredding what?" / "Whatever I can find." / "Why?" / "I'm hoping it might annoy somebody."
• A key part of a number of Moffat-written episodes is the cold open. There was River's exciting departure of the Byzantium in The Time of Angels, the movement of Van Gogh's painting through time in The Pandorica Opens and the chase scenes in Day of the Moon. Here we have another good teaser, with Lucie having been taken to, of all places, the office job that she got before she was swept up by the Time Lords, and the Doctor is given a time ring to save her. Like Heaven being an office in Dark Water, Lucie having been kidnapped for an office job at Hulbert Logistics is an intriguingly strange premise. 
• Hulbert Logistics brings in humans of a non-military background and has them wage war on planets by translating their tasks into a form that they can understand whilst ignoring that which doesn't fit into the narrative. Their latest mission: wiping out the Cybermen on Lonsis. This is a great idea that almost sounds like something out of Terry Pratchett. Doctor Who is very good at combining the ordinary with the extraordinary, and that's excellently done here. The keen-eyed, however, might notice the office-robot on the cover. I didn't.
• The Cybermen here don't speak like the Cybus models in Rise of the Cybermen/The Age of Steel, nor like the Cybermen of The Tenth Planet. They're somewhere in-between, with the effect of the modern ones but the strange enunciation of the classic. Their screams are an amazingly horrible thing to listen to.
• The surprise arrival of the Cybermen at the end of Part 1 is brilliant, bookending this series with two of the Doctor's greatest enemies: the Daleks and the Cybermen. This is also the earliest in their timeline that we've seen for quite a while, excluding their origin in Spare Parts.

The Valeyard's Case:

• Although the office scenes are funny and bizarre, Part 1 does take a while to get going as a result.
• Lucie being placed in the TARDIS by mistake is a little underwhelming a reveal.

Witness Protection: Hulbert found Lucie to be a promising new addition to his company but she was taken by the Time Lords and dropped into the TARDIS before she could arrive at the office. Hulbert sent the Headhunter after her because he was afraid that a competitor had nabbed her and that they would be able to learn the secrets of his mental manipulation from her. In actuality, the Time Lords had taken her because the CIA had altered her life using a quantum crystaliser to keep her from becoming a right-wing dictator and they didn't want her exposed to the quantum crystaliser aboard one of the Hulbert offices, as it could destroy her. Lucie was, however, the wrong woman.

I'll Explain Later:

• If the Time Lords have access to technology such as the quantum crystaliser, why is this the only time it's used? It would have been handy in the Last Great Time War.

This Reminds Me...:

• The Cybermen have never heard of Telos. They came to Lonsis from Mondas after its destruction in The Tenth Planet and, after their defeat in this story, will escape to Telos where they entomb themselves and are later sealed in by the Second Doctor. The planet is bombarded by humans at the end of the Cyber-Wars. At some point, they will "give help" to the people of Red Rocket Rising, as seen in the end of Blood of the Daleks.
• The Doctor previously worked in an office in World Enough and Time.

The Inquisitor's Judgement: The series finale isn't as much of a blockbuster as its first story, taking a little too long to get started and perhaps not being quite as high-concept, but it's a satisfying end to the first series of the Eighth Doctor Adventures. As a good story, it earns a B.

Eighth Doctor Adventures

No More Lies  |  Human Resources  |  Dead London

Phobos review [Eddie Robson]

The Doctor and Lucie land on one of Mars's moon, Phobos, which is home to an unfinished ski resort that attracts adrenaline-seekers. But there are things lurking in the snow. Things that Kai Tobias warns everyone about. Things that have killed.

When and Where: The year is 2589 and the location is an incomplete resort on Phobos, one of the moons of Mars. This story takes place after Immortal Beloved and before No More Lies.

The Doctor's Case:

• A Good Quotation:
• "You're telling me this is natural?" / "Everything here is. That's why we come. You can't get a properly authentic experience on Earth anymore."
• "If it's not a really rude question, what is he?"
• "I've seen entire species destroyed, civilisations left in ruins. I've witnessed solar systems vanish in the twinkling of an eye. I've seen things that would freeze your blood, so don't threaten me. Don't ever threaten me."
• It's the future and the Earth has been urbanised and built upon so much by humans that you have to go to a Martian moon to get an authentic experience of adrenaline-seeking. It's this sort of fascinating idea that Doctor Who can explore but doesn't too often, like with the mood pills in Gridlock.
• There are some hints of Paradise Towers in this story. The adrenaline-seekers are drennies and the setting, rather than a forgotten residential block, is an unfinished resort inhabited by squatters.
• The funniest moment of this story is easily when the Doctor confronts Kai, saying, "Kai, I'm in a bad mood and if you say 'what are you talking about?' during this conversation then I will break something." Later on in the conversation, Kai inevitably feigns ignorance and we hear an object smash on the floor.
• After Cribbins and McNeice, this week's big star is Timothy West, who gives a great performance as the well-meaning killer Kai Tobias. 

The Valeyard's Case:

• A Bad Quotation:
• "I feel the need for speed."
• "I don't know what you're capable of anymore."
• The cool kid drennies are sometimes the victims of embarrassing attempts to make them sound hip. One half of the gay couple uses the word "cool" a few times too many, and delivers the line "I feel the need for speed".
• The Doctor and Lucie spend another audio almost entirely apart from one another. Having them apart and following different plot strands make for more varied storytelling but doesn't a great pairing make. Ninth and Rose were together for most of series 1, allowing us to get to know the two, enjoy the chemistry and explore their relationship. This is what was done with the Eighth Doctor and Charley, which made them a popular and successful duo. The Doctor and Charley, of course, had longer adventures but Ninth's and Rose's were just as long as the Eighth Doctor Adventures and managed it.

Witness Protection: The Headhunter shows up at the end again, swearing that she'll get Lucie next time.

This Reminds Me...:

• A creature that feeds off of fear also appeared in the Seventh Doctor story The Fearmonger, although with a very different M.O.
• Nerys Hughes also played Rhys's mother Brenda Williams in Torchwood.
• The Doctor says that he has known savages with better manners than Lucie, perhaps referring to Leela.
• You can tell that the Eighth Doctor Adventures was written during the Russell T. Davies era, with a rare appearance of a gay character and an alien-human relationship, just like in Gridlock.
• The Doctor defeats the entity in a similar way that the Eleventh Doctor tried to defeat the villain of The Rings of Akhaten. Before Clara saved the day with her leaf, of course.

The Inquisitor's Judgement: Phobos is very much a New Who story and a good one at that. The Eighth Doctor, who hasn't yet been explored very much in the Eighth Doctor Adventures, shows signs of darkness and weariness whilst we've learnt little more about Lucie's character or backstory. The twists are satisfying and the idea about adrenaline sweetening fear for the entity's survival is an original one. There isn't very much new or exciting about this story but it's good, and that earns it a B.

Eighth Doctor Adventures

Immortal Beloved  |  Phobos  |  No More Lies

All Hands on Deck review [Eddie Robson]

"A long time ago, you decided I was going to stay here. I didn't get a choice. I've had a good life on Earth but I'm making the decision this time." - Susan

Who are we with?: The Time Lady Susan Campbell.

Where are we?: The 2210s. For Susan this takes place some time after To the Death. For the Doctor, it's at some point between the end of the Doom Coalition series and The Starship of Theseus.

The Good:

• It's always a pleasure to return to Susan post-The Dalek Invasion of Earth, and even more so to see how she is after the death of her son at the end of the Eighth Doctor Adventures. There's very little continuity aside from Susan's hostility towards the Doctor but we do learn a bit about her life since then and there are a few sad notes, such as when we hear of how Susan didn't need so big a house anymore.
• The last few scenes with the Tesseracts and Susan being picked up by the Time Lords to join the Time War are very enjoyable and it's very satisfying to now know why the Doctor in the modern series assumes that she's dead. At long last this question has been answered.
• The final scene is an inversion of the First Doctor's farewell to Susan in The Dalek Invasion of Earth. Susan has gone forward in all her beliefs and grown to become a strong character, leaving the Doctor behind as he once did to her.
• Susan is once again an excellent character in this story, beautifully written and wonderfully performed. Big Finish has given the character a whole new lease of life and developed her from the somewhat pathetic teenage girl of the '60s.

The Bad:

• Why wasn't this a full cast audio drama? The goodbye would be that much more poignant with Paul McGann opposite Ford.
• Shouldn't Susan be angrier at the Doctor leaving her to deal with Alex's death alone? That would have been an interesting nugget of their relationship to explore, but instead Alex isn't so much as mentioned. Perhaps it was to avoid alienating those who haven't listened to Lucie Miller/To the Death, but all the same it's a missed opportunity and one that's now unlikely to be returned to.
• The Doctor's distractions come across almost as filler until we get to the meatier ending. There is, of course, a good narrative reason for them but wouldn't it be more fun if the Doctor was staying with Susan ostensibly to help her cope post-Alex whilst actually being there to throw away any Tesseracts that arrive?

A Good Quotation: "Don't be afraid for me. It's the right time. That's why they came for me now. They know I've done all I can here. You go and do what you need to and I'll do what I need to. And one day we'll see each other again. One day." - Susan

This Reminds Me...:

• We first saw a Tesseract in The War Games, in which the Second Doctor uses one to contact the Time Lords.
• Susan tricks the Doctor in a reversal of what he later does to Rose (The Parting of the Ways) and Clara (The Time of the Doctor). Perhaps Susan's where he learnt it from.

I'll Explain Later: 

• Why doesn't Ian and Barbara's plaque have a date of death? 
• If Susan isn't her real name, why does the Doctor call her that in The Beginning?

Verdict: An okay story with a superb performance by Carole Ann Ford and a heart-breaking ending. It seems that this is the end of our visits to an older Susan, which is a huge shame, but perhaps we'll catch her in the Time War at some point. She did say they would meet again one day, after all. C.

Short Trips

A Heart on Both Sides  |  All Hands on Deck  |  The Ingenious Gentleman Aldric of Alzarius