Master (Seventh Doctor; Geoffrey Beevers as the Corpse Master; written by Joseph Lidster)
On the surface, this is a haunted house story and a murder mystery -- an amnesiac Master is living a seemingly peaceful life in an old manor house, but people in the house hear a whispering voice and behave strangely. And meanwhile, somebody's been killing prostitutes. (This serial's pretty violent, BTW.)
But that's all just surface detail. What this is really about is mood. It's about creating an oppressive sense of dread, of doom and inevitability. The haunted house and the murder mystery? That's just window dressing.
It's definitely not a fair mystery. I mean, it's not difficult to guess who's been killing prostitutes out of a cast of only five characters, one of whom is the Doctor, but the real reveal is that the Master has amnesia because the Doctor made a deal with Death; Death agreed to let the Master live a normal life for ten years, after which the Doctor would return to kill him. Needless to say, there is not enough information given in the narrative to lead the audience to deduce this conclusion.
The serial, and its reliance on the physical manifestation of Death as a character -- which the Doctor just takes as a given and doesn't question -- doesn't make a hell of a lot of sense, and I was ready to chalk it up to the Doctor, who's telling the story, as an unreliable narrator (he even says "Don't believe a word I say" in dialogue, for God's sake) -- but then something happens, in the framing sequence, that indicates that no, all that stuff really happened the way he's describing it, so...best chalk this one up as a fairy tale and not think too much about the logic of it. (And that's before we even get into the time travel/continuity aspect, which the serial does not: the Seventh Doctor should already know what's going to happen to the Corpse Master, and if he's really trying to change his fate, that should have serious ramifications for the Doctor's own timeline -- but none of that is addressed.)
But if you can get past all that, and focus on the mood? That sense of dread and inevitability? The serial does a great job with all that stuff. Ultimately I'd say there's a dreamy quality to this one; it doesn't make a lot of sense from a plotting or continuity (either internal or in the context of the wider Whoniverse) perspective, but I don't think it's meant to. It's meant to be a mood piece, and it succeeds.
Recommended.
Doctor Who
Re: Doctor Who
The Wormery (Sixth Doctor/Iris Wildthyme; Written by Stephen Cole and Paul Magrs)
This one uses the Casablanca/Cabaret/etc. premise of a WWII-era bar as a jumping-off point: everybody comes to Bianca's. That's where the Doctor has a chance encounter with his old friend Iris Wildthyme.
This is my first encounter with Iris, but from what I gather she's sort of the Rule 63 version of the Doctor (or was; now the Rule 63 version of the Doctor is the Doctor), a Time Lady who ran away from Gallifrey and now travels the universe in a TARDIS that looks like a double-decker bus. (And she's played by Katy Manning, who played Jo Grant on the TV series; the script makes a brief reference to that connection when the Doctor says that he and Iris spent some time traveling together after Miss Grant left. Which, okay, I'll try not to overthink the implications of Jo going off to get married and the Doctor immediately replacing her with someone who looks exactly like her.) She spends a good chunk of this serial drunk, because...well, the plot gets a little silly here, because the worms in the tequila are psychic alien parasites.
Not the most impressive Doctor Who monster, and my other criticism of the plot is that it resembles Bang Bang-a Boom a little too closely; both stories reach their climax around a singing competition, and involve subplots where the Doctor is hypnotized and falls in love with a woman who's up to no good.
All that aside, it's one of those stories where a strong atmosphere makes up for a weak plot, and there's also a satisfying twist in part 4 that I really should have seen coming because they foreshadow the hell out of it.
I liked this one; I feel like the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Baker and Manning both do great work. I wouldn't put it in my top tier of Big Finish serials, but it's perfectly serviceable, and it's an old one, so it's cheap, frequently on sale for half-price, and probably on Spotify too.
This one uses the Casablanca/Cabaret/etc. premise of a WWII-era bar as a jumping-off point: everybody comes to Bianca's. That's where the Doctor has a chance encounter with his old friend Iris Wildthyme.
This is my first encounter with Iris, but from what I gather she's sort of the Rule 63 version of the Doctor (or was; now the Rule 63 version of the Doctor is the Doctor), a Time Lady who ran away from Gallifrey and now travels the universe in a TARDIS that looks like a double-decker bus. (And she's played by Katy Manning, who played Jo Grant on the TV series; the script makes a brief reference to that connection when the Doctor says that he and Iris spent some time traveling together after Miss Grant left. Which, okay, I'll try not to overthink the implications of Jo going off to get married and the Doctor immediately replacing her with someone who looks exactly like her.) She spends a good chunk of this serial drunk, because...well, the plot gets a little silly here, because the worms in the tequila are psychic alien parasites.
Not the most impressive Doctor Who monster, and my other criticism of the plot is that it resembles Bang Bang-a Boom a little too closely; both stories reach their climax around a singing competition, and involve subplots where the Doctor is hypnotized and falls in love with a woman who's up to no good.
All that aside, it's one of those stories where a strong atmosphere makes up for a weak plot, and there's also a satisfying twist in part 4 that I really should have seen coming because they foreshadow the hell out of it.
I liked this one; I feel like the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Baker and Manning both do great work. I wouldn't put it in my top tier of Big Finish serials, but it's perfectly serviceable, and it's an old one, so it's cheap, frequently on sale for half-price, and probably on Spotify too.
Re: Doctor Who
Scherzo (Eighth Doctor/Charley; Written by Robert Shearman)
This one's not as strong as Shearman's other serials, but that's a high fucking bar to clear, and Scherzo is still a fascinating and compelling piece.
The Doctor and Charley have been trapped in another universe (this continues a previous storyline but you don't need to know the details; I just caught you up on everything you need to know) where it's not even clear what the laws of physics are. And, in a particularly inspired use of the medium, they can't see; they're in a world of sound without sight.
So we've got a setting that's legitimately weird in a way most Doctor Who planets aren't, a mystery of just what this world is and how it works, and a clever use of the audio medium. And on top of all that it's strikingly minimalistic; there's nobody in this one except McGann and Fisher (yes, they eventually encounter an alien adversary, but it speaks through their voices). And against this backdrop, it's fundamentally a piece about those two characters: the Doctor is pouting because he was trying to make a big heroic sacrifice, and Charley ruined it by joining him instead of letting him save her.
The whole thing kind of starts to sink under its own weight and the weight of Doctor Who narrative convention near the end; there are some reveals that aren't particularly satisfying and don't really make a whole lot of sense, and by the end the world seems a lot more conventional than it did during the first half. But despite some problems sticking the landing, it's still a really easy one to recommend; even Shearman's worst is still one of Big Finish's best.
(Okay I guess I can't quite definitively call it Shearman's worst since he wrote one more after this one and I haven't heard it. But I didn't like it quite as much as his first four. Still really good, though!)
This one's not as strong as Shearman's other serials, but that's a high fucking bar to clear, and Scherzo is still a fascinating and compelling piece.
The Doctor and Charley have been trapped in another universe (this continues a previous storyline but you don't need to know the details; I just caught you up on everything you need to know) where it's not even clear what the laws of physics are. And, in a particularly inspired use of the medium, they can't see; they're in a world of sound without sight.
So we've got a setting that's legitimately weird in a way most Doctor Who planets aren't, a mystery of just what this world is and how it works, and a clever use of the audio medium. And on top of all that it's strikingly minimalistic; there's nobody in this one except McGann and Fisher (yes, they eventually encounter an alien adversary, but it speaks through their voices). And against this backdrop, it's fundamentally a piece about those two characters: the Doctor is pouting because he was trying to make a big heroic sacrifice, and Charley ruined it by joining him instead of letting him save her.
The whole thing kind of starts to sink under its own weight and the weight of Doctor Who narrative convention near the end; there are some reveals that aren't particularly satisfying and don't really make a whole lot of sense, and by the end the world seems a lot more conventional than it did during the first half. But despite some problems sticking the landing, it's still a really easy one to recommend; even Shearman's worst is still one of Big Finish's best.
(Okay I guess I can't quite definitively call it Shearman's worst since he wrote one more after this one and I haven't heard it. But I didn't like it quite as much as his first four. Still really good, though!)
Re: Doctor Who
Davies is returning as showrunner.
Welp, there goes any hope of luring Eccleston back for the 60th anniversary.
Davies will return to the series when current showrunner Chris Chibnall steps down in 2022, before the show’s 60th anniversary in 2023. Current Doctor Jodie Whittaker will leave the programme after its next series and three special episodes, due for broadcast next year.
Welp, there goes any hope of luring Eccleston back for the 60th anniversary.
Re: Doctor Who
I guess I'm in the frame of mind where I enjoy the whole "let's just pile on everything" approach, because I enjoyed the season premier well enough even though I'm pretty sure it was a bunch of nonsense.
Re: Doctor Who
Audio mix was lousy, though. Had to turn on subtitles to understand what the fuck anyone was saying.
...wait a minute. Plot that just crams everything in there and is sure to collapse under its own weight by the season finale? Voices too far down in the mix to be audible? They really are preparing us for the return of Russell T Davies!
...wait a minute. Plot that just crams everything in there and is sure to collapse under its own weight by the season finale? Voices too far down in the mix to be audible? They really are preparing us for the return of Russell T Davies!
Re: Doctor Who
You know what, I'm enjoying the spectacle. On the whole I'm liking this a lot better than last season.
Though of course we're still only two episodes in and the ending is usually where things start to go off the rails.
Though of course we're still only two episodes in and the ending is usually where things start to go off the rails.
Re: Doctor Who
Still haven't gotten over establishing a fleet roster of exactly one ship per human on Earth then in the same breath having it physically surround the planet. I know there's a lot of us but it's hardly standing room only.
-
Mongrel
- Posts: 21336
- Joined: Mon Jan 20, 2014 6:28 pm
- Location: There's winners and there's losers // And I'm south of that line
Re: Doctor Who
mharr wrote:Still haven't gotten over establishing a fleet roster of exactly one ship per human on Earth then in the same breath having it physically surround the planet. I know there's a lot of us but it's hardly standing room only.
Fun fact: If every every human on earth had just a wee little patch to stand on, we would only cover all of Prince Edward Island.
Re: Doctor Who
I listened to the Scratchman audiobook. Extremely good stuff, Tom Baker did the reading and given that most of the text is first person narration from the 4th Doctor this works out extremely well. Definitely a favorite Doctor story from recent times, highly recommend
Re: Doctor Who
Man, is there any other monster in the history of Doctor Who that's seen the kind of diminishing returns the Weeping Angels have?
Re: Doctor Who
Not a bad conclusion, all things considered. I liked the conceit of the Doctor existing in three places simultaneously.
With Chibnall's tenure drawing to a close, I've been thinking a bit about the last two guys and what their long-term legacy seems to be. I think Davies did a better job creating recurring monsters (Ood, Judoon) and Moffat did a better job creating recurring supporting cast (Jack, River, the Paternoster Gang, Kate Stewart). Moffat created some really great monsters, but I think they were all pretty specific to the story he used them in; I don't know that any of them were good as recurring foes. The only ones we've really seen recur are the Weeping Angels and, well, we've seen how that's worked out.
With Chibnall's tenure drawing to a close, I've been thinking a bit about the last two guys and what their long-term legacy seems to be. I think Davies did a better job creating recurring monsters (Ood, Judoon) and Moffat did a better job creating recurring supporting cast (Jack, River, the Paternoster Gang, Kate Stewart). Moffat created some really great monsters, but I think they were all pretty specific to the story he used them in; I don't know that any of them were good as recurring foes. The only ones we've really seen recur are the Weeping Angels and, well, we've seen how that's worked out.
Re: Doctor Who
Dan Slott is writing Doctor Who comics.
Which he already did, except last time he called them Silver Surfer comics.
Which he already did, except last time he called them Silver Surfer comics.
Re: Doctor Who
The Harvest
Seventh Doctor, Ace, Hex (first appearance)
written by Dan Abnett
I wanted to like this one but it was just too many stock Doctor Who plots. New companion is an ordinary guy working at an organization that turns out to be involved in shady business. Said organization is a government facility that has secretly made a devil's bargain with a group of classic Doctor Who monsters (in this case the Cybermen). There's a plot involving the humans becoming more like said monsters, and the monsters becoming more like humans.
The last act has some compelling stuff where it seems that the Cybermen are actually sincere in just wanting to shed their shells and live as ordinary people and the Doctor is moved by this and decides to help them, but that lasts about five minutes before everything reverts back to normal as it turns out they only want to become humans because they've discovered human attributes like lying are an asset they can use in their usual world-conquering plans. It reminds me a lot of that Twelfth Doctor/Davros episode, in that it sets up something different and more morally complex but then it's like "nah" and reverts to formula.
Then there's a good, chilling do-not-fuck-with-the-Seventh-Doctor bit as the Doctor walks away from the dying Cyber-Commander as it pleads for help, professing that it is feeling pain and fear. It's pretty much Hal's death from 2001, but if you're gonna steal you may as well steal from the best.
Again, wanted to like this one but just couldn't get past how formulaic it was. It's fine, it's well-put-together, it had some good moments, but it didn't really wow me.
I recognized writer Dan Abnett's name; he writes comics. It seems like I've probably read some of them but I couldn't remember any offhand, so I checked his bibliography and...there's an Authority arc he co-wrote with Andy Lanning that I maybe read? I'm really not sure. And that's entirely consistent with The Harvest: it's competent but forgettable.
Seventh Doctor, Ace, Hex (first appearance)
written by Dan Abnett
I wanted to like this one but it was just too many stock Doctor Who plots. New companion is an ordinary guy working at an organization that turns out to be involved in shady business. Said organization is a government facility that has secretly made a devil's bargain with a group of classic Doctor Who monsters (in this case the Cybermen). There's a plot involving the humans becoming more like said monsters, and the monsters becoming more like humans.
The last act has some compelling stuff where it seems that the Cybermen are actually sincere in just wanting to shed their shells and live as ordinary people and the Doctor is moved by this and decides to help them, but that lasts about five minutes before everything reverts back to normal as it turns out they only want to become humans because they've discovered human attributes like lying are an asset they can use in their usual world-conquering plans. It reminds me a lot of that Twelfth Doctor/Davros episode, in that it sets up something different and more morally complex but then it's like "nah" and reverts to formula.
Then there's a good, chilling do-not-fuck-with-the-Seventh-Doctor bit as the Doctor walks away from the dying Cyber-Commander as it pleads for help, professing that it is feeling pain and fear. It's pretty much Hal's death from 2001, but if you're gonna steal you may as well steal from the best.
Again, wanted to like this one but just couldn't get past how formulaic it was. It's fine, it's well-put-together, it had some good moments, but it didn't really wow me.
I recognized writer Dan Abnett's name; he writes comics. It seems like I've probably read some of them but I couldn't remember any offhand, so I checked his bibliography and...there's an Authority arc he co-wrote with Andy Lanning that I maybe read? I'm really not sure. And that's entirely consistent with The Harvest: it's competent but forgettable.
Re: Doctor Who
I'm a few months behind; finally got around to watching the New Year's special.
And god damn it was almost impressive how little the writers cared about even the barest logical coherence or narrative consistency. It started off with a good premise, and then just straight did not give a fuck about anything making any sense.
Why do people begin the loop where they do? The Doctor, Yaz, Dan, and Sarah all loop back to where they started at the beginning of the episode but Nick doesn't; this is never addressed.
But worse than rules that are never explained or explored are rules that are clearly established and then immediately fucking abandoned. Sarah is concerned that if Nick is killed in the first minute of the loop, he'll be dead for good; then, the very next loop, Sarah is killed seconds after materializing but then just comes right back in the loop that follows.
It's an episode that's supposed to be closely concerned with a ticking clock in a very short timeframe, but it doesn't even try to make a minute onscreen correspond to a minute on the ticking clock, and everybody is supposed to be concerned about how little time they have but spend the bulk of the episode standing around monologuing.
Y'all have seen how many really terrible episodes of this series I've watched and kinda shrugged and given a pass to. You know how high my threshold is for half-assed ill-considered bullshit.
The script on this one was so perfunctory that I actually kinda feel insulted. Chibnall's always cared more about feelings than narrative cohesion, and I've been mostly fine with that. But this one really felt like the work of a guy who's quit his job and has one foot out the door.
Whitaker is a good Doctor and she deserves better material.
And god damn it was almost impressive how little the writers cared about even the barest logical coherence or narrative consistency. It started off with a good premise, and then just straight did not give a fuck about anything making any sense.
Why do people begin the loop where they do? The Doctor, Yaz, Dan, and Sarah all loop back to where they started at the beginning of the episode but Nick doesn't; this is never addressed.
But worse than rules that are never explained or explored are rules that are clearly established and then immediately fucking abandoned. Sarah is concerned that if Nick is killed in the first minute of the loop, he'll be dead for good; then, the very next loop, Sarah is killed seconds after materializing but then just comes right back in the loop that follows.
It's an episode that's supposed to be closely concerned with a ticking clock in a very short timeframe, but it doesn't even try to make a minute onscreen correspond to a minute on the ticking clock, and everybody is supposed to be concerned about how little time they have but spend the bulk of the episode standing around monologuing.
Y'all have seen how many really terrible episodes of this series I've watched and kinda shrugged and given a pass to. You know how high my threshold is for half-assed ill-considered bullshit.
The script on this one was so perfunctory that I actually kinda feel insulted. Chibnall's always cared more about feelings than narrative cohesion, and I've been mostly fine with that. But this one really felt like the work of a guy who's quit his job and has one foot out the door.
Whitaker is a good Doctor and she deserves better material.
-
beatbandito
- Posts: 4306
- Joined: Tue Jan 21, 2014 8:04 am
Re: Doctor Who
Thad wrote:I recognized writer Dan Abnett's name; he writes comics. It seems like I've probably read some of them but I couldn't remember any offhand, so I checked his bibliography and...there's an Authority arc he co-wrote with Andy Lanning that I maybe read? I'm really not sure. And that's entirely consistent with The Harvest: it's competent but forgettable.
Comicswise, I knew him as the guy that spearheaded the Marvel Cosmic revival they are still keeping on life support today. But I actually know him the writer single-handedly keeping GamesWorkshop turning profit.
From what I've read of his works, this assessment of the story could apply to all of them. Solid, doesn't tread new ground, gets really close to pulling off those emotional moments right.
Re: Doctor Who
Lottel wrote:Comicswise, I knew him as the guy that spearheaded the Marvel Cosmic revival they are still keeping on life support today.
Ah, those were the days.
Re: Doctor Who
beatbandito wrote:Only a little longer until Davies is back in control, yeah?
Yeah, Chibnall and Whitaker have two more specials coming this year and then Davies takes over after that, with a new Doctor who hasn't been announced yet. No word on when the next full series is, but one assumes we'll be getting at least something in '23 for the 60th anniversary.
Who is online
Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 14 guests