London, 2015. The Doctor is looking for a lost space probe. Lucie is feeling just plain lost, on a world she no longer quite belongs to. Perhaps there’s someone who can help. A chance encounter with an old sparring partner leads Lucie to the Eightfold Truth, a bunch of crystal-bearing cranks who reckon a rebel sun is on its way to purge the Earth. As if! But what if they’re right...? As humankind counts down the last days of its existence, the Doctor races to unmask the Eightfold Truth - and uncovers an old and deadly enemy...

Writer Eddie Robson follows up his earlier Eighth Doctor / Lucie adventures Human Resources and Grand Theft Cosmos by once again bringing back the Headhunter (Katarina Olsson) and Karen (though this time Karen is played by Kerry Godliman rather than Louise Fullerton).

I don’t think I’m giving too much away if I reveal that the Eight Legs from Jon Pertwee’s 1974 swansong Planet of the Spiders also reappear. You can see the hairy spider legs creeping into frame on the front cover - which, incidentally, robs the writer’s cliffhangers of some of their power. By bringing the Eight Legs to Earth in the near future, Robson plays upon some pertinent ideological issues, ranging from the mostly harmless to the downright dangerous: from the alleged healing power of crystals to sinister cults.

Once again, the Doctor and Lucie spend the episode separated, a circumstance partly prompted by the persistently clashing schedules of Paul McGann and Sheridan Smith, who (as revealed in interviews at the end of this CD and the next one, Worldwide Web) actually recorded their respective scenes several weeks apart. While Lucie infiltrates the Eightfold Truth, the Doctor associates with a couple of stand-in companions, scientist Avishka Sangakkara (Sanjeev Bhaskar, The Kumars at No. 42) and journalist Kelly Westwood (Sophie Winkleman, Peep Show’s Big Suze). The impressive cast list also includes Stephen Moore (Marvin in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy) as cult leader Clark Goodman, though he is rather underused.

Believe it or not, my mark out of ten for The Eight Truths is...

8

Richard McGinlay