Sword of Orion review [Nicholas Briggs]

Sword of Orion might have been a pretty good story if it was released in the '60s. Unfortunately, by 2001 we'd seen this story a dozen times over. After the exciting freshness of Storm Warning it was important to show that Paul McGann was a modern Doctor for the modern listener, but Nicholas Briggs instead chose to remake an old fan story and show that McGann can follow the same tried-and-tested plotlines that the other Doctors have already done. It lacks ambition.

The Eighth Doctor goes up against the Cybermen in order to solidify McGann as a Doctor rather than because it was an interesting story. It's the same technique that Moffat would later do with Matt Smith (who fought the Daleks in his third episode) and Peter Capaldi (who fought the Daleks in his second episode). What do all these stories have in common? They're not that good, existing almost because the Doctor needs to go up against one of the big bads in order to be accepted.

The plot itself involves an abandoned space-station, the awakening of the Cybermen, antagonistic humans who think they can make a deal with them, blah blah blah... The guest cast are your usual Doctor Who stock characters: predictable, one-note and lacking any real colour. It's an unwelcome combination of The Tomb of the Cybermen and Earthshock. The story isn't offensively bad, but it's boring - arguably the worst thing Doctor Who can be. 

The previous story did a great job of introducing the Doctor and Charley with a script paired with convincing performances that made them both feel like breathing, warm-blooded characters. Sword of Orion does away with all of that personality and makes the pair entirely interchangeable with any other Doctor-companion duo. The dialogue and characterisation is completely generic and at a time that we should be getting to know this new Doctor, his dialogue shouldn't feel as though it could belong to any one of his predecessors. The adventure-thirsty Charley too has become more subdued and reactionary. They're hardly a pair that get you rooting for them in this story.

The Inquisitor's Judgement

Charley's first adventure in the TARDIS proves to be a disappointing affair, providing all the traditional elements of classic Who in a story that unfolds almost by rote. Storm Warning wasn't a perfect story but its characterisation was spot-on, its plot and setting new and exciting and it began the Eighth Doctor's adventures with a real sense of forwardness and invigoration. Sword of Orion, however, is by-the-numbers, tried-and-tested, been-there-done-that Who. It's an atrocious story and earns itself an F.

The Main Range - The Eighth Doctor

Storm Warning  |  Sword of Orion  |  The Stones of Venice

Exile review [Nicholas Briggs]

All the Doctor has to do to avoid being caught by the Time Lords is work in a supermarket and go to the pub. It's a cunning plan - certainly far less dangerous than fighting the dreaded Quarks and all those other alien fiends.

But just when everything seemed mundane and safe, alien transmissions, exploding poison gas, Princess Anne and wobbly trolleys burst onto the scene to ruin everything. It's a crisis! A fiendish alien plot! And the Doctor must use all the resources at her disposal to defeat it.

She'll probably need to have a large vodka first, though.

What If...?: Rather than being put on trial at the end of The War Games, the Doctor escaped justice and lives in hiding in a female incarnation after jumping from a pylon to regenerate.

Where and When: In another universe, after The War Games. London, 2000.

The Doctor's Case:

• A Good Quotation:
• "Oh, shit," says a Time Lord.
• "Trolleys. I hate trolleys. They're just Daleks without the interesting bits."
• "Are you really the same Doctor who defeated the dreaded Quarks time after time?" / "The Quarks were rubbish."
• The Time Lords shouldn't be funny. They're a grandiose race that work best when they're being mysterious and all-powerful, and are at least tolerable (most of the time) when they're being stuffy bureaucrats. However, they should never be made fun of or laughed at as they are at the beginning of Exile, as it's completely contrasted with what and who the Time Lords are and their position in the universe of Doctor Who. But it's hilarious and definitely belongs in this section and not the next. David Tennant puts in a great little performance as one of the squabbling Gallifreyans. This should never be done outside of the Unbound universe, though.
• The tongue-in-cheek digs at the Quarks are some of the funniest lines in the story.
• Arabella Weir is easy to listen to even if it isn't the best of scripts. She finally gets to be Doctory towards the end and she proves that she would have been a good one. Unfortunately, it seems very unlikely that we'll ever be seeing her as the Doctor again.

The Valeyard's Case:

• A Bad Quotation:
• "After five pints of lager, Cheese starts thinking his beer tastes like cheese. That’s why we call him Cheese."
• Nothing really happens for most of the story. We spend time with the Doctor living her life on Earth but she's unfortunately not too engaging and her friends are very thinly sketched. The story might have worked as a character piece but as a comedy with underwritten characters, it's vacuous.
• There's a lot of burping and vomiting and not all of the humour lands.

This Reminds Me...:

• The Doctor's going by the name "Susan Foreman", chosen, of course, from her granddaughter who first appeared in An Unearthly Child.
• The Doctor uses Venusian aikido, frequently used by the canon Third Doctor.
• The Doctor echoes the Fourth Doctor's line in Logopolis; "the moment has been prepared for."
• The previous Doctor and the Time Lords mention the Quarks a lot, who appeared in The Dominators.
• The Time Lords mention a Dalek invasion of Earth in 2164, referring to The Dalek Invasion of Earth.
• The Doctor gets scarecrowed, which is what causes the Second Doctor to regenerate in the comics.
• UNIT is all but mentioned by name.
• The Time Lords allude to the possibility of a trial not unlike The Trial of a Time Lord.

The Inquisitor's Judgement: Arabella Weir does a good job with what she's given and the Time Lord double act is a hugely memorable one, but, whilst the humour is often very funny, there's almost no plot. The vomiting and burping doesn't make for the best listen and a not inconsiderable amount of the humour doesn't land. Big Finish should bring back Arabella Weir but do away with her alcoholism. This story is very bad, and that earns it an E.

Unbound

Deadline  |  Exile  |  A Storm of Angels

The Heart of the Battle review [Nicholas Briggs]

The Daleks want peace with Gallifrey. Ollistra sent Seratrix to them to broker a peace, but why send the Doctor and a team of Time Lords after him?

When and Where: Keska, between The Thousand Worlds and Legion of the Lost.

The Warrior's Case:

• A Good Quotation:
• "Where can I find you, Doctor, when I need you again?" / "At the heart of the battle, where the blood of the innocents flows and only the monstrous survive."
• Trying to make peace with the Daleks sounds ridiculous, but Seratrix's belief that this could be a reality makes more sense when we learn that they've been given an empire of more than a thousand planets.
• We've been told that Ollistra is a master manipulatrix but it's not until this story that we see any evidence of this. She sent the peace-desiring Seratrix to the Daleks to die and tried to dispose of his fellow believers Bennus and Arverton by "randomly" selecting them to detonate the Time Destructor. When the Doctor saved them, she planned to get rid of all three by sending them after Seratrix, willing to sacrifice Veklin in the process.

The Cardinal's Case:

• We learn that the purpose of the Daleks' plan (the same as in The Dalek Invasion of Earth) is to fire planets at Gallifrey (the same as in The Apocalypse Element), resulting in a story that lacks in originality. Also, a thousand planets being fired at Gallifrey at 50x the speed of light is ludicrously over the top.

This Reminds Me...:

• The Daleks' plan is a combination of their plots in The Dalek Invasion of Earth and The Apocalypse Element.

The Inquisitor's Judgement: After a disappointing start, The Heart of the Battle ends the box set on a better note than it started. All plot threads introduced through this lacklustre box set are wrapped up and the Doctor and Ollistra are reset and ready for the next volume, with Rejoice gone. She was much better as an older woman than a young girl, but was still one of the most forgettable and bland Big Finish companions. Concluding a poor first series of The War Doctor, this is an okay story, and that earns it a C.

The War Doctor - Only the Monstrous

The Thousand Worlds  |  The Heart of the Battle  |  Legion of the Lost (Infernal Devices)

The Thousand Worlds review [Nicholas Briggs]

The Doctor is sent behind enemy lines to find a Time Lord strategist who holds vital Gallifreyan secrets. The Daleks are playing with drills again. When will they learn that this never ends well for them?

When and Where: This is set on Keska, between The Innocent and The Heart of the Battle. For Rejoice, it's been decades.

The Warrior's Case:

• Rejoice was a pleasant character in the previous story, even if her feelings for the Doctor were a little strange. Her reunion with the Doctor here is a highlight, with Hurt's delivery of the line "Hello... Rejoice" being heartwarming. 
• Beth Chalmers has a wonderful voice and does a good job as Veklin. It's a shame that it's difficult to separate her from Raine Creevy given how she uses the same voice and accent.

The Cardinal's Case:

• In the beginning of The Innocent, we had a Time Destructor used. Here, we don't have a weapon return but an entire evil plan - the drill one from The Dalek Invasion of Earth. Nods or returning weapons are welcome but the Daleks having the exact same plot means that this story isn't that original. It's The Dalek Invasion of Earth with more Time Lords and fewer twisted ankles. The titular Thousand Planets are reminiscent of The Stolen Earth/Journey's End, as well.
• What was the point in The Innocent? This story could just have easily have been the first of the box set, functioning perfectly as an introductory story and would arguably have been a better one. To be reintroduced to the War Doctor on a Gallifreyan machine behind enemy lines is far more unique a beginning than him having a traditional adventure.

I'll Explain Later:

• "Keep to the cloisters," Veklin says. Hopefully these aren't the same super deadly, seriously dangerous cloisters we see in Hell Bent.

This Reminds Me...:

• The Doctor has met his companions when they're older before, with Molly O'Sullivan for example.
• The Daleks' drilling plan was previously enacted in The Dalek Invasion of Earth and Lucie Miller/To the Death.

The Inquisitor's Judgement: Slightly better than the previous story, The Thousand Worlds is nothing too special. It's The Dalek Invasion of Earth with sprinklings of The Stolen Earth and The Traitor. The Daleks supposedly wanting peace is an interesting enough twist, but I'll eat my hat if they aren't lying. This story is bad, earning it a D.

The War Doctor - Only the Monstrous

The Innocent  |  The Thousand Worlds  |  The Heart of the Battle

The Innocent review [Nicholas Briggs]

The Doctor is dead, killed by the Time Destructor that wiped out the largest Dalek time fleet ever assembled. Except, of course he's not. He's alive and well (enough) and living on Keska.

When and where: The planet Keska. The War Doctor is old and tired, so this is later in his life. The whole War Doctor series is set some time between The Night of the Doctor and The Day of the Doctor. For Ollistra, this is after The Eighth Doctor: The Time War.

The Warrior's Case:

• A Good Quotation:
• "I KNOW THE DALEKS! I know them!"
• We're introduced to Cardinal Ollistra of the High Council, who's not given much to do but makes an impression regardless. She's a Time Lady who hates the Daleks, but there's more to it than that. She seems to think that she has a special relationship with the Daleks, believing that she knows and understands them better than most and utterly despises them. It's the same feeling that the Daleks feel for all other life-forms. To have a Time Lady hate the Daleks so personally makes Cass's question of who can tell the difference between the two races anymore that much more poignant. Ollistra would be a good Dalek.
• The Time Destructor, which so tragically killed Sara Kingdom in The Daleks' Master Plan, is a terrifying weapon and it was a great idea to bring it back for the Daleks to use in the Time War. I always like it when Big Finish use little bits of continuity in this way.
• Rejoice isn't a particularly memorable character but that name... It's a beautiful one.

The Cardinal's Case:

• The cold open introduces Ollistra and tells us about the destruction of the Dalek time fleet, but it seems strange for the teaser for the first audio of the first War Doctor box set to be that the Doctor is dead. Firstly, he obviously isn't. Secondly, we haven't had the opportunity to get to properly relate to or learn about the War Doctor aside from his last day before regeneration in The Day of the Doctor. It's a shocking moment for Ollistra, but not for the listener who hasn't yet heard a word from the character. If Ravenous 1 were to begin with this, it would work. We know the Eighth Doctor and we'd wonder what happened to him, what happened to Liv and if she's alive, and how did the Doctor get out of it. Here, it isn't a successful opener.
• This story is pretty much traditional Who with a little more character work with the Doctor. To use a story so rote and quiet to kick off the War Doctor series wasn't the best move. This is the Doctor who wasn't the Doctor, but he acts just as the First, Sixth or Twelfth Doctors do. He's not a blood-soaked warrior like we were promised. Surely we should have seen some of that first so that his opportunity to rest on Keska would be more interesting and more tempting to him.
• Rejoice having something of an attachment to the Doctor after nursing him for months makes sense, but it's taken a little too far. Perhaps it's her Keskan optimism but she's far too kind to and forgiving of the Doctor, most notably after the boat debacle.
• I never like it when they use the same photo of a character twice on one cover.

This Reminds Me...:

• Rejoice looks after the Doctor just like Rose did in The Christmas Invasion.
• I misheard "Arverton" as "Arbitan" (of The Keys of Marinus) and was wondering if Big Finish were really going to bring such an obscure character back for the Time War.
• Veklin is voiced by Beth Chalmers, AKA Raine Creevy, who first appeared in Crime of the Century.

The Inquisitor's Judgement: The Doctor lands on a planet, saves the day and leaves with a companion. Granted, the companion is sent home by Ollistra but otherwise this is a very traditional story that fails to be the explosive start to the War Doctor series that it needed to distinguish itself. John Hurt and Jacqueline Pearce are, as expected, amazing but the plot is thin and the characters not given the most interesting of material whilst wannabe-companion Rejoice - such a lovely name - fails to make an impression, just being kind of nice. This is a bad story, and that earns it a D.

The War Doctor - Only the Monstrous

The Innocent  |  The Thousand Worlds

Last of the Titans review [Nicholas Briggs]

The Doctor lands in a gigantic spacecraft and meets its captain, a cousin of the Neanderthals who once lived in Devon. But how did he get from the sunny south of England to the planet of Ormelia? And why did he leave?

Where and When: The planet Ormelia. The Doctor is travelling alone but the TARDIS still makes its TV sound effects rather than the film ones. He's in his white jacket on the cover, so perhaps he dropped off Ace at some point before 1963: The Assassination Games, although he seems to be travelling alone permanently rather than being on a break. Perhaps it's between Ace's departure just before Bernice Summerfield and the Criminal Code and his meeting Chris and Roz in Original Sin. We know from the cover of The Hesitation Deviation that he does wear his white coat during this period. It's impossible to tell.

The Doctor's Case:

• The Seventh Doctor has something of a problem with companions in that he seems to be defined by them. If he's with Mel, he's a clown. If he's with Ace, he's dark and brooding. If he's with Klein, he's tired and nearing the end of his life. To have him on his own means that we get to experience him as a singular character and not as part of a double-act, which he and Ace have come to be.
• Sylvester McCoy can sometimes be less than stellar when acting, such as when he had to be angry in Battlefield ("There! Will! Be! No! Battle! Here!") or in his overly theatrical delivery at the end of Survival ("If we fight like animals, we die like animals!"), but he does a great job as a narrator. He's very easy to listen to.
• Vilgreth is a sympathetic character, living all alone, but turns out to be a murdering sociopath. Despite this revelation, it's hard not to feel sorry for him. It was in his nature after all, being close kin to the Neanderthals.

I'll Explain Later:

• When does this take place?

This Reminds Me...:

• The TARDIS will again be plunged into fire in Journey's End, but with Donna inside.

The Inquisitor's Judgement: Short, sweet and with more substance than its runtime might suggest. It's good to see the Seventh Doctor alone (presumably after having Ace surgically removed from his side) and proving that he doesn't need a companion. The setting and story are immersive and engaging and the finale tragic. All in all, a good story deserving of a B.

Special Releases

Last of the Titans  |  The Ratings War