someone who's doing some things
What’s not to like right? It is my favourite genre of fiction by a long way indeed.
Ok, not exactly new Doctor Who, and, in fact, arguably not Doctor Who as these are of course “Companion Chronicles”. However, they are the remaining Mary Tamm stories that I haven’t heard, so I’m looking forward to listening to them a great deal.
Another great fourth doctor story with Mary Tamm, and with the excellent inclusion of David Warner. This is the second story in Big Finish’s second season for Tom Baker, and this story is really the kick off for the main story arc in the series. It’s a great story arc too, and David Warner is at the centre of it. It’s far more like a serious Doctor Who story as opposed to the Auntie Matter, which was quite frivolous and yet wonderful to listen to.
The Sands of Life is quite a traditional story in many ways. The doctor meets a life form he’s not met before which is threatening all life on earth but only due to a mistake caused by Cuthbert (played by David Warner). I won’t say anymore about the story in case you do listen to it. I’d recommend it, it’s an excellent story and it continues with “War with the Laan”, but more of that another day.
So I’ve moved on to the next set of 4th Doctor stories from the Hornet’s Nest, the Demon Quest story. Again it’s a five part story, each part being around an hour long and it has the same core characters as hornet’s nest as it is in effect a continuation from the end of the hornet’s nest.
But five hours is a good long time to develop a whole story. Of course each episode is a self contained story in its own right, but the whole thing hangs together very nicely too. It’s a nice arc and that’s what I really like about these three stories or arcs from Paul Magrs. It’s a shame in a way that there won’t be any more of these, or at least it’s my expectation that there won’t be more of them as Tom Baker has moved on to working with Big Finish now. Not that that isn’t a great thing in itself as the work he’s done there is excellent. But like any fan I always want more!
What else would you expect?
A number of people recommended Babylon 5 to me and it was always one of those very long series that I never got into when it was originally on air. Either I missed it or was doing something else and by the time I was ready to get into it the first series was over. So, many years later I’ve finally started watching it. So far I’m only onto series two. It isn’t bad so far. I’m not really into the wider story arc or at least it hasn’t taken a real hold so far, but I can see that it has promise.
I can’t say that it’s on the same scale as something like Battlestar Galactica, but that’s probably not a fair comparison really as BSG is much newer and had the benefit of a complete re-imagining.
So I’m going to stick with it and watch the whole arc, and as I do I’ll post a few more thoughts on it as I go through.
Well I watched it, and it wasn’t nearly as bad as I was expecting it to be. In fact there were bits I actually quite liked about it. However, my one question overall is about why there’s a new doctor inserted into the chronology, and what does that mean for the overall chronology of doctor who. I suppose it means that overall every doctor after Paul McGann moves up a number, making the new doctor (who I very much approve of) number 13. Isn’t that a problem?
If I remember correctly, in the Keeper of Traken the Master was on his 13th regeneration and couldn’t regenerate after that, although of course he did regenerate but it was at someone else’s expense, Tremas’ expense actually (and of course Tremas is an anagram of Master).
So will the latest doctor be the 13th regeneration? If so, what happens after him? Obviously I’m guessing that the writers will just find a mechanism to get around it. Hopefully not like the master though, I don’t think it’d be very popular for the doctor to subsume another person.
Of course the best thing about it was the return of Gallifrey, or at least its restoration. I always thought that the whole thing with the time lords at the end of Tennant’s doctor was awful and massive mistake not in keeping with how the time lords had been described before. At least now all of that nonsense has been undone.
Anyway, so a not bad effort overall. With a 50th celebration it’s always going to be hard to pull off and this one wasn’t bad at all.
I’ve had this audiobook for about 4 or even 5 years now and I still love it. I can remember the first time I listened to it and just how much I enjoyed it. The thing is, I still do. It’s a great Doctor Who story, part of a nice arc too. The whole story arc runs to about five hours, which is just right as far as I’m concerned.
It’s such a good vehicle for Tom Baker’s doctor. It allows him just the right amount of space to be himself and move the story along too.
I decided to listen to all three story arcs from the pen of Paul Magrs. This is the first, the Hornet’s nest, then there’s Demon Quest, then Serpent Crest. I wish that there were more of these, but now that Tom Baker has started to do stories for Big Finish I’m not sure that there will be space for any more of these. Still, never mind. Whenever I listen to them I enjoy them and find something new in the story.
So it arrived. The Big Finish 50th anniversary adventure, and I’ve been listening to it today. In fact I’ve listened to about half of it so far. Often I don’t enjoy multi-doctor stories. I find that they can be a little confused. However, so far, this story is quite good. I’m enjoying it and the interactions between the doctors, especially the 4th and 8th especially.
So I’m looking forward to part two and also the ample CD extras.
A great story to close the season and great performances from everyone. But it’s sad to think that it’s the very last episode for Mary.
I am Ashley Elsdon 