123-a. The Company of Friends: Benny's Story.

1 episode. Approx. 35 minutes. Written by: Lance Parkin. Directed by: Nicholas Briggs.  Produced by: David Richardson.


THE PLOT

Many years after the end of her association with the Doctor, archaeologist Bernice Summerfield is participating in a dig inside the coal mines of a dead planet. It's a freelance job for which she is being very well-paid, in exchange for "not asking any questions." She is shocked when she quickly finds the object of her employer’s efforts: a TARDIS key. She is even more startled when her employer uses that key to summon the TARDIS in question – the TARDIS belonging to the Doctor!

Soon, Benny finds herself running with the Doctor from deadly security robots, through frozen coal mines and across time zones into a jungle filled with treacherous cliffs and ravenous green lions. With "her" Doctor - the 7th Doctor - she could have at least been secure in the knowledge that the Doctor had some masterplan. But this new Doctor has no more idea than she does what is going on, and no kind of plan at all!


CHARACTERS

The Doctor: Paul McGann seems to be having a terrific time, infusing his performance with a lot of energy and enthusiasm. As in The TV Movie, he can shift from wild enthusiasm to deadly serious very quickly.  He handles the Doctor's genuine anger at the climax quite well (far better, I'd say, than his immediate predecessor could have done). This story sees him travelling alone, and he reacts with delight at running into an old friend, eager at the thought of travelling with her again.

Bernice Summerfield: Lisa Bowerman has played Bernice for a long time now, both in a handful of Who audios and in her own long-running audio range.  She is likely at the point at which she could play Benny in her sleep. It's to her credit that she does not in any way phone in her performance. The story is very much told from her point-of-view, and as such it is up to her to carry the story. She does so with energy and good humor, and she plays so well opposite McGann that I find myself wanting to hear a full-length release with these two.


THOUGHTS

In the past few years, it has become standard for Big Finish to produce one "anthology" release per year, varying these among their Doctors. 2009 was the 8th Doctor's turn for such a release: The Company of Friends, in which the gimmick was to pair 8th Doctor Paul McGann with companions from the various 8th Doctor ranges: Virgin NA's, BBC EDA's, and the Doctor Who Magazine comic strip. Benny's Story, the first of the four stories, sees the 8th Doctor reunited with the New Adventures' Professor Bernice "Benny" Summerfield.

When I first listened to it, I found this the weakest of the four stories, and I suspect that opinion will hold. That's not to say Benny's Story is bad. It's an amusing trifle, with a great deal of pace and energy and spirited performances by the two leads. But it is very much a trifle, a quick runaround.

The villain is weak, and the scenes in which she tries to take over the TARDIS simply occupy too much of the story's brief running time. I wanted to hear more of the Doctor and Benny, and a lot less of the supremely uninteresting Countess Venhella (Su Douglas), whose only good scene comes when the Doctor confronts her at the end. The plot being just a thin clothesline for interaction between McGann and Bowerman is fine - but if that's the case, then surely we should get as much 8th Doc/Benny as possible?

It's amusing, and worth a listen. But it's too lightweight to be fully satisfying as a story, and too overplotted to be fully satisfying as a character comedy. An OK bit of filler, but nothing more than that.


Rating: 5/10.

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48. Davros.

2 episodes. Approx. 150 minutes. Written by: Lance Parkin. Directed by: Gary Russell. Produced by: Gary Russell.


THE PLOT

Arnold Baynes (Bernard Horsfall), head of TransAllied, Inc. (TAI), has come into possession of a new asset: Davros (Terry Molloy), the long-reviled scientist responsible for the creation of the Daleks. Baynes believes that Davros' genius will give his company the spark it needs to expand outside our galaxy. His wife, historian and Dalek apologist Lorraine Baynes (Wendy Padbury), thirsts to interview Davros for a "definitive biography." Neither realizes just how dangerous their newest employee truly is.

The Doctor is at TAI on completely unrelated business. He is determined to look into the corporation in a smart, careful fashion. Then he sees Davros, and all thoughts of caution evaporate. He stalks into the company, demanding to know what Baynes thinks he's doing. Within minutes, he finds himself agreeing to work with Davros on TAI's projects - to keep himself in a position to thwart any plot Davros might hatch.

But the brilliant Kaled scientist is already several steps ahead of him...


CHARACTERS

The Doctor: You can hear the relish in Colin Baker's voice as he dives into this high-quality script. Writer Lance Parkin makes sure to emphasize the Doctor's compassion, his value for life. He agrees to continue working with Davros to cure the galaxy's famine problem, simply because he cannot turn his back on such a situation. You can hear the sincerity in his voice as he warns Baynes that Davros will destroy him. When Davros is subjecting innocents to high doses of radiation, the Doctor waits to stop him until after he acts to save those lives. And yet this is still the prickly Sixth Doctor, who can't resist baiting Davros with childish behavior or with remarks about the chair-bound scientist being a "stand-up comedian."

Davros: As good as Colin Baker is, this story truly belongs to Terry Molloy's Davros. Though we're never fooled into thinking that he has changed, the first half of the serial does seduce us into empathizing with him, if only a little. In flashbacks, we hear the "human" Davros, before the explosion that crippled him. He seems to be a very normal man. In another flashback, we hear his horror just after the explosion as he views his savagely burned face. Meanwhile, in the story's present, he is contemplative. He insists to the Doctor that he believes he can change, and he may even be sincere in his desire to change.

Then the second half reminds us of his evil. The flashbacks become darker, and we see that he was a monster long before his exterior was burned and scarred to make his nature visible. We get as much of a look into his psyche as a Doctor Who adventure story can allow, and what we see is pathetic. Davros is a "spoiled child" who cannot stand the idea of competition, who only feels powerful when he uses his genius to destroy. "There can never be too much destruction!" he declares. As we hear him giggling even while listening to the dying moans of his latest victims, we realize that he means it.


THOUGHTS

Davros is a genuinely great audio story, one of the best of Big Finish Production's entire Doctor Who range. It's a long story, taking up the entire length of the two cd's it occupies. A full 150 minutes. But it's compelling. It would be a disservice to say that the story goes by in an eyeblink while listening. Time actually stops while listening to this story, a story which envelopes the listener in its world and its narrative.

Lance Parkin was one of the best writers of the Doctor Who book range, which makes it surprising that he's only written a couple of stories for Big Finish. He's done superb work here. Given the assignment to write a story for Davros without the Daleks, he draws on the background given the character in his televised stories and fills in the blanks. Flashbacks show us the war-torn Skaro that was the only home Davros ever knew, the harsh conditions of which molded him into the man he became.

Credit must be given to Jim Mortimore's sound design. A story which mixes past and present must always take particular care to differentiate the two. That's even true of visual works, let alone on audio. The production team use the Dalek "strobe" to identify the flashbacks. Every time Davros recalls his time on Skaro, that sound plays constantly in the background. That and a faint echo lend a feeling of unreality to the scenes in the past, while transitions between the flashbacks and the present are extremely well-judged.

Though superb, Davros is not flawless. There's a subplot involving Willis (Eddie de Oliveira), an investigative journalist following up on information about TAI. Willis is a weak character, effortlessly outclassed by the heavyweight cast surrounding him. He exists to provide an excuse for the Doctor's presence at TAI when Davros arrives. Better if the Doctor had just been there by chance; I can't really picture him being concerned with the petty day-to-day skullduggery of corporations.

Despite the misjudged Willis subplot, Davros is one of Big Finish's masterpieces. Wonderfully acted, particularly by Colin Baker and Terry Molloy, and boasting a compelling script, this is one of a handful of audio Who stories I'd comfortably refer to as "a classic."


Rating: 10/10.

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26. Primeval.

4 episodes. Approx. 108 minutes. Written by: Lance Parkin. Directed by: Gary Russell. Produced by: Gary Russell, Jason Haigh-Ellery.


THE PLOT

Nyssa is gravely ill, and the Doctor can find no cause for her sudden sickness. With all of Time and Space at his disposal, he has brought her to the one place where she can find healing: her home planet Traken, roughly 3,000 years before its destruction.

He has brought Nyssa to Shayla (Susan Penhaligon), the foremost healer in all of the planet's history. What he doesn't realize is that these are also Traken's primeval times, a time of superstition when the consuls all but worshipped the artificial sun known as "The Source," whose energy keeps out all evil influences. The ruling Consuls, Janneus (Rita Davies) and Hyrca (Mark Woolgar), see the Doctor as a pernicious influence and insist that he and Nyssa must leave immediately. When Shayla protests that this will mean Nyssa's death, the consuls declare this a small price to pay for the good of their ideal society.

An appalled Shayla gives the Doctor another lead to follow: Kwundaar (Stephen Greif), a malevolent being who leads an army that worships him as a god. Kwundaar's fleet constantly circles Traken, kept at bay by the power of The Source. He is tremendously powerful and tremendously dangerous - but he will be able to save Nyssa. There is a price, however, and if the Doctor pays it then it will mean the total destruction of Traken!


CHARACTERS

The Doctor: Rejects the Trakenites' black-and-white view of good and evil. "I've traveled quite widely, met the most terrible people with the most appalling beliefs. I consider them evil. But I'm sure if you were to ask them, they'd tell you that I'm the monster, not them. Evil is relative." He sees Kwunddar's followers as more misguided than anything. He respects Kwundaar's captain, Narthes (Billy Miller), for his desire to provide a better life for his children, and he clearly pities the devout young Lt. Anona (Romy Tennant), whose harsh life has made her entirely too receptive to Kwundaar's deadly philosophy. None of this stops him from wanting to defeat Kwundaar, but it makes his interactions with the "dark god's" followers much more interesting than might have been the case.

Nyssa: Even when deathly ill, she remains protective of the Doctor. She stands up for him to the Consuls, denouncing their superstitious fears and scornfully saying that they should be ashamed of themselves. She also shows resourcefulness when confronted by Anona near the end. Very Doctor-like, she manages to defeat Anona despite being unarmed and having no advantage other than her quick wits.

Kwundaar: Primeval has generally strong guest characters and performances, but Stephen Greif's Kwundaar is the clear standout. He's a villain, but he's not just a villain. As his backstory is revealed, we see that his hatred of the Traken people is far from unmotivated, and there's something almost tragic about his sad reflection that "Everyone betrays me." Like a lot of Big Finish alien villains, his voice has been electronically treated. Unlike many cases, the treatment works perfectly. It's light enough that Greif's own silky, seductive delivery comes through the effect. He shifts from soft to harsh and back again, and the effects don't get in the way. And as he speaks, we hear the howls of the Damned echoes within the treatment given his voice - shrieks of torment that, by the story's end, seem to reflect the pain not of Kwundaar's victims, but of Kwundaar himself. An excellent villain, well-performed and well-presented.


THOUGHTS

Primeval returns us to Traken, giving us a look at its distant past while centering the narrative on the Doctor and Nyssa. Lance Parkin's script cleverly links this young Traken to the world seen on television. In this way, it is able to act as both sequel and prequel to The Keeper of Traken, more fully developing the planet's history and society while showing the birth of the "Keeper" system.

That makes it interesting from a continuity perspective, but Primeval is much more than fan service. Parkin has written an intelligent script, one that examines questions of good and evil in a way that's less superficial than the average Doctor Who runaround. And it does so while still managing to a good, fast-paced yarn.

Faith is a major thematic centerpoint. Kwundaar's followers and the Traken consuls are paralleled at many points, both groups blind in their faith. Narthes describes his service to Kwundaar: "I worship him, follow his commandments. He grants me all I ask for, intervenes on my behalf. There's not many that can say that about their god." In return for Kwundaar's intervention, his followers in their blind faith perpetrate destruction on a massive scale.

But the faith of the Traken consuls is equally toxic, as they pronounce the perfection of their own society and elevate their artificial sun into a deity in deed, if not in word: "The Source guides us. The Source is perpetual, infallible. We bathe in its light, while the lesser races must skulk in the shadows... The whole universe envies us!" There are more similarities than differences between the two pronouncements, and we see the consuls willing to execute innocents and ignore the deaths of non-Trakenites as irrelevant all in the name of their self-pronounced "perfection."

Nyssa's faith in the Doctor is the contrast. She continually voices her faith in his goodness and is certain that he will save her, then that he will save Traken. But she is very willing to question him, and is quick to point out the way in which he falls straight into Kwundaar's trap. Her faith is genuine, but it isn't blind, and so comes across as far healthier than the single-minded worship of either Kwundaar's people or the Traken consuls.

Lest this come across as wordy and actionless, it should be said that the story involves a fleet of ships, with Nyssa and the Doctor under constant threat from either the Traken consuls, Kwundaar's followers, or both. By the end of Episode One, we've heard one supporting character's disintegration. By the end of Episode Two, there has been a desperate escape, one that we learn is actually part of a trap the Doctor is falling directly into. The final episode could accurately be described as an action piece. It's just it isn't dumb action, and when the characters talk, their words are well worth hearing as much for the pleasure of the dialogue as for advancement of the plot.

Fast-paced, deceptively thoughtful, and populated by interesting and well-performed guest characters, Primeval is one of the highlights of Big Finish's first three years. It's one that I regard as a personal favorite, and I have no hesitation in recommending it highly.


Overall Rating: 9/10.

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