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The Doctor discovers that his TARDIS has been invaded -
by a lippy Northern lass named Lucie Miller! Why have the
Time Lords landed Lucie on him, and vice versa? The Doctor
attempts to return Lucie to her own time, but finds that a
temporal shield prevents him from landing. Instead, the pair
find themselves on the sunless colony world of Red Rocket
Rising, whose inhabitants face extinction as the result of
a meteor strike and consequent impact winter. But help is
at hand. The colony's SOS signal has been answered. Incredibly,
it seems that the Daleks are coming to the rescue...
This
is the first in a series of eight episodes featuring (appropriately
enough) the Eighth Doctor (Paul McGann), specially commissioned
by the digital radio station BBC 7. McGann's Doctor has appeared
on BBC 7 before, in adventures adapted from previous Big Finish
releases. However, this is the first time that episodes will
premiere on BBC 7, and there have been a few changes.
For
one thing, the episodes are longer. Their 50-minute duration
(one per CD on the commercial releases) brings them closer
to the 45-minute running time of the current television series.
The first and last stories are two-parters, while the rest
are standalone episodes. Personally, I would have issued the
two-parters as double CDs, but this release contains only
the first episode of Blood of the Daleks. Therefore,
listeners who missed the BBC 7 transmissions (and subsequent
"listen again" online service) will have to wait up to a month
to hear Part 2.
Each
instalment is supplemented by its own equivalent of the TV
show's behind-the-scenes companion, Doctor Who Confidential.
On CD, each episode is followed by about 15 minutes of interview
material with the cast and crew, an adapted and expanded version
of the interviews heard in the shorter Beyond the Vortex
segments that follow each instalment on BBC 7.
As well as a new format, the Time Lord also has a new travelling
companion: Lucie Miller, played by Two
Pints of Lager & a Packet of Crisps star Sheridan
Smith. This series is set after the Eighth Doctor's adventures
with Charlotte Pollard and C'rizz. We are not told what became
of Charley and C'rizz, nor are we ever likely to be, as long
as actors India Fisher and Conrad Westmaas are willing and
able to reprise their roles. Like Barbara, Ian, Tegan and
Donna before her, Lucie is an unwilling companion, and an
amusingly argumentative one at that. Unfortunately, her entrance
into the show, spontaneously materialising on board the TARDIS,
much to the Doctor's surprise, is very similar to that of
Donna in Doomsday
and The Runaway Bride. More refreshingly, she is from
the North of England, which is a first. (Given that these
adventures are set closer to the time of the Doctor's regeneration
into Christopher Eccleston's incarnation, perhaps he picked
up his Northern accent from her...)
Also in common with Army of Ghosts/Doomsday, the guest
cast includes one of Dirty Den's exes from EastEnders,
in this case Anita Dobson. But fear not: there isn't a trace
of Angie Watts in Dobson's character, Red Rocket Rising's
dedicated but desperate acting president, Eileen Klint. Meanwhile,
Kenneth Cranham is wonderfully gravelly and grave as the apparently
paranoid, but ultimately vindicated, conspiracy theorist Tom
Cardwell.
As
usual, the dependable Nicholas Briggs voices the deadly Daleks.
There are hints of Murray Gold's Dalek theme in Andy Hardwick's
music, and the current television series is further evoked
when the creatures' casings are compared to tanks. Writer
Steve Lyons depicts the Daleks at their most cunning, gaining
a foothold by pretending to be friendly, much as they did
in The
Power of the Daleks.
The
Doctor doesn't mince words when it comes to his hatred for
the creatures. He considers them incapable of pity, compassion,
growth or redemption. This may seem to contradict his encounter
with friendly Daleks in the Doctor Who Magazine comic
strip Children of the Revolution. However, this is
not a problem since most chronologies place the DWM
strips after the audios or in a separate continuity altogether.
The Doctor's attitude here might even be seen as sowing the
seeds for his character arc in Children of the Revolution.
All
in all, this is an exciting and intriguing start to the series.
Bloody marvellous!
Richard
McGinlay
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