Adventures Through Two

Good points:

For a story that is so centrally about war, writer John Pritchard has a magnificently unusual angle, setting it two years after the end of the first world war in the days leading up to the burial of the Unknown Soldier.  A less inventive writer  would understandably have had  the TARDIS land in the middle of a war-zone and used that as a springboard for a discussion on morality and mortality. Yet rather than planting them on a battlefield, Pritchard (who surprisingly doesn't have a lot of Who writing credits, with this audio being his first outing with the Second Doctor) lands the team on a  dark and dimly illuminated train-line and its attached signal box.

The setting is reminiscent of Dicken's The Signalman, and with the narration shared between Jamie and Polly, Jamie takes upon the bulk of explaining the surroundings. Clearly set early in his TARDIS career, Jamie's bewilderment and ignorance of technological advancements since his time lends a fantasy to his descriptions, the red signal light like a demon's eye and the 'breathing' of the stationary train like a sleeping giant, really lifting the audio from what could have been dull scene-setting.

While the main plot deals with a spooky and unsettling ghost story of sorts, with the theme at its heart revolving around the experience of loss and grief that follows war, there is a strong sense, particularly for the first half, that the story is quietly about Ben and Jamie and their own experiences of war. In Big Finish at least, there's been subtle references to Ben (and Polly's) childhood growing up in the shadow of WWII, and when the 'ghosts' appear to Ben manifested as the ghoulishly burnt dead from his father's own memories of conflict, there's the subtextual implication delivered pitch-perfect by Eliot Chapman of Ben's unspoken dread that, should another war happen in his lifetime, his role in the Navy means he'll suffer the same violent fate. On the other side of the coin, Jamie's visions aren't of panic and fear, but of a form of survivor's guilt, fleshed out with the accusing voices of the dead he left behind rotting on Culloden. Polly's off-hand comment that Jamie 'doesn't talk about the war' that implies more than it says. These moments lend a weight to both their characters, and after a quiet scene where Ben explains WWI and the symbolic significance to Jamie, a heavy discussion of war which is broken by Ben's teasing, there's a satisfying sense that even if they'd never say it aloud, they  understand each other better, finding themselves not too different after all.

The Doctor doesn't have a lot to do in this audio, giving poor Frazer Hines a likely welcome break from his double-act, but there's a sweet exchange between him and the Signalman where the Doctor enthuses about trains and signalman etiquette like the nerd he is, a gentle break from the heavier topics.

Anneke Wills  holds up the other end of the plot's focus, playing the empathetic Polly, sitting with and comforting a grieving woman on the tracks, convinced her lost fiancee is the unknown solider. She's always fantastic so I'm struggling to add anything else to her gentle and respectful performance.

Not so sure:

I'm not certain what to think about the eventual reveal that the TARDIS, damaged earlier from a collision with a train, is the cause of the ghostly figures, amplifying the grief of a nation focused on a single train into a manifestation of the memories associated with war and giving them substance. It's a thought out reason, and there are hints throughout the audio on a second listen that the TARDIS is an unknown quantity whose capacities aren't fully understood, operating on its own alien consciousness that even the Doctor can't always predict. The ease with which the Doctor arrives at, and the rest of them accept this explanation however, seemed a little rushed.

Until the final reveal of Michael's identity, I was unconvinced at his late-in-the-day introduction, given he seemed usefully impervious to the ghost's mental hold. It doesn't help that Wills, Chapman and Hines all take turns in delivering his lines, which means it was hard to get a clear idea of the character. His final role as part of what is quite a fairytale conclusion, with a 'power of love solves all', resolution was tearily sentimental without being overboard, and there wouldn't have been a better way to end an already dark story without a bit of brightness.

Other notes:

Jamie and the Doctor have another one of this story's emotional character moments at the story's end. It's a rather subdued conclusion, and oddly sad, with Jamie asking the Doctor whether the world is at peace following the world war he's just heard about, and the Doctor admitting that it is for the moment, but that this won't last for long, saying that 'only the dead have seen the end of war'. It's an honest but gloomy reflection from a time traveller who has seen so much conflict, and it  leaves the listener thinking even if it doesn't paint the most optimistic of pictures.

Good points:

Structure is one of those things that's usually notable only when it isn't very good – when a story crams too much in, rushes the final act, or just doesn't flow very well. The Black Hole refreshingly, is noticeable for its well-balanced, excellently paced format, hinging perfectly on a corker of a mid-point cliffhanger.

On the cliffhanger itself... Woooh boy. The script does a good job convincing the listener that the main peril has been for the moment fought off at forty minutes in; there's been drama, uneasy truces, technobabble galore and a dash of peril for good measure, and – given that the second episode ends with the Doctor and Jamie going off to star in The Two Doctors leaving Victoria on the space station, it felt like the episode would be about whatever happened when they inevitably failed to get back to the right time and encountered whatever caused the black hole. I was right, but satisfyingly in a way I didn't expect. And then SURPRISE BITCHES. It's the Monk here to ruin your temporal party!

Rufus Hound has a steady, understated turn as the dogged and ultimately noble Constable Pavo before flinging off calm and collected to ham it up as the gleeful and triumphant figure of the Monk. The transformation is completely left-field  and delightful to listen to. I've never watched The Time Meddler, so my only Monk knowledge comes from his role in the Eighth Doctor audios. The Monk is great here, an equal intelligence to the Doctor's, and Hound and Hines bounce off one another with a tangible ease.

Speaking of voice acting, David Warner is magnificent as usual, and Janet Dibley plays the competent, determined commander Flail. On a second listen, you can really appreciate her shift into the mid-story reveal of the real Constable Pavo.

Not so sure points:

There's a few moments that don't gel as much with the reason of the audio and as a result ring slightly hollow. One is the late game introduction of the Seeth, and because of the focus on the Monk, as villains they kind of some across a bit one dimensional.

Another more noticeable absence is the emotional follow-up from Victoria's momentary erasure from existence, the trauma which causes her to be written out of episode three doesn't get the closure it requires. Guerrier admits the story would have focused more on the ramifications of this if it was a Companion Chronicle, providing an inside view of how the shift in format requires a different approach. But as it stands as an EA,  the moment isn't addressed with as much gravity as it required.

Speaking of Victoria, it seems obvious to mention that as an actor, Deborah Watling sounds little like she did in 1968. This is audible to a degree with every older companion but in comparison with say Wendy Padbury or Katy Manning, it's really obvious with  Watling, and initially takes a bit of getting used to.

Other notes:

Disclaimer: I adore the whole Season 6B premise, and its potential for the Doctor as an unwilling CIA operative together with an older Jamie in the years before his regeneration into Three. Having said that, Guerrier has taken pains to write a pre-War Games Time Lord story into which The Two Doctors (and presumably Helicon Prime) fits, only failing to explain why the Doctor and Jamie look twenty years older between serials, which isn't really his fault. The result is a solid alternate interpretation, even if it robs me of  my 6B headcanons. Ah well. Can't have everything.

Knowing what's to come in the future often helps to inform the tone of chronologically earlier adventures, and in this story there is a sublimely understated moment in episode one when the Doctor realises that the sort of technology that conjured up the black hole must mean that his own people are involved, and he panics. Not just flustered, not just 'oh-dearing' and stressing, as in actually bolts back to the TARDIS and readies to fly away. It's a brilliant moment, contrasting the Doctor's uncharacteristic desire to leave immediately and get as far away as possible, with Jamie and Victoria's unwavering belief that he'd never leave people in danger, and their subsequent confusion as to what could have frightened him so much that he'd consider abandoning the people on the station to whatever their fate is. As a moment, it not only cements the Doctor's values of saving others over his own self-preservation, but also it ups the stakes, and really hammers home how desperate the Doctor had to be in The War Games to ask for help.

Good points:

The humour is excellently balanced here. In Big Finish's back catalogue, there are definitely more tragedies than comedies, which just makes the ones we do get (like Bang-Bang-a-Boom) all the more of a treat. The story (and its fantastic narrator) commits to its comic-book camp humour without going overboard, and there's something of Paul Magrs' haughtily self-confident Novelisor Huxley (Ringpullworld, and Final and Replace, played by Alex Lowe) in the figure of Iolas Blue, an awkward genius who practises his evil laugh to check it's perfect, attempts to strike a intimidating Evil (TM) pose, and ultimately isn't quite cut out for his chosen vocation.

… which makes it all the more impressive when it turns out he really is. Duncan Wiseby is magnificent at the subtle shift of the story. After a few minutes of listening to Iolas fuss and get into strops and feel ever so pleased at his own cleverness, we're all convinced he's not much of a threat, entertaining but harmless. Except in an excellent shift, where he demonstrates his power of being able to predict the cause of anything (and thus know exactly what little thing to change to make anything happen 'accidentally') by ridding of a former school bully via asteroid strike. All while carelessly dismissing the knock-on effects and ramifications his actions have caused (wars started, countless lives lost, people snuffed out of existence) that understandably horrifies the Doctor and sells Iolas as a genuine menace. After this, the Doctor and co's efforts to escape become increasingly desperate, the games Iolas is playing no longer funny, and the environment getting more claustrophobic as the countdown to the Doctor's death gets closer.

Seriously, Iolas Blue (and the snarky, put-out voice of the supercomputer) are such fun, well-draw characters, it makes me sad that there isn't any room to bring them back as recurring menaces (even knowing it wouldn't work).

Not so good points:

Not really 'not so good' as more a reasonable element that gets less attention because of the run-time and POV choice – Jamie and Zoe are really relegated to background colour and don't get much to do here. With the point of view placed in the hands of the story's antagonist, the end result is more a Doctor Who story that features the Doctor, rather than having him as the main driving force of the action.

The Final Sanction, if it had been proposed in the DW writer's room, would never have been made into an episode. Barring its unflinching violence and horrors-of-war tone straight out of Platoon, it's far more suited to the grimdark teatime of the nineties than the light-hearted danger and optimism in the future of the late 1960s. The Doctor, armed with his optimism, can-do ingenuity, his tireless outrage at the injustices of the universe, finds himself pitted against the worst excesses of humanity, a situation made unwinnable by both fate and by the ignorance of those who do not learn from history. It's not the first time this has been presented as a challenge. Only this time, it's fair to say he resoundingly loses.

For all my thematic issues with it, which I'll address in detail in a moment, it was an engaging read, a car-crash played out over two hundred odd pages. It has some of the old weaknesses of Lyon's earlier The Murder Game (aside from Mulholland and Michaels, the secondary characters only ever briefly flicker with a semblance of dimensionality) but what it does have is a clear story and an ambition, a worthy attempt to introduce the second Doctor and co. to a bleak, war-ravaged world and see how they do.  This sort of unremitting grimness and lack of hope is not unprecedented in Who - both Genesis of the Daleks and The Caves of Androzani excel as episodes because of their dark setting and ambiguous morality. The problem is... well, it doesn't work, and the Doctor's character suffers because of it.

You expect certain things from the Doctor, regardless of the setting. Never losing faith that goodness will out, having a trick up his sleeve, playing on his enemies' weakness without resorting to violence, saving the day. And here, all his usual tactics fall short without even getting off the ground. The light-hearted, comedic element of his character has no place in war, so that goes almost immediately. His ingenuity at finding the right solution is hindered because there is no right solution. Either the Doctor allows events to continue and stands by as genocide occurs, or he doesn't and changes a Fixed Point in time. This in itself is an interesting premise, but because the Doctor is powerless and can't affect either outcome, he's relegated to a mostly ineffective voice of conscience, warning against the horrors about to unfold and being ignored in the story's slow march towards the inevitable.

To its credit, this novel is one of the few where it has felt like the TARDIS team is genuinely out of their depth. Like the Doctor's , Jamie's own experience in Culloden doesn't prepare him for the unforgiving, weaponised war he participates in, and his inexperience with his alien environment and equipment put him at a disadvantage, leading him to spend much of the novel getting the stuffing knocked out of him. Zoe comes off even worse – given no opportunity to demonstrate her major strengths of logical thinking, technological aptitude and her eidetic memory, she spends two thirds of the novel being bullied from one prison cell to another. While her later taking charge and mounting a (failed) escape attempt is a welcome release, she is under-used. Out of them all, only Jamie really gets to attempt to change anything concrete about this world, and even then, all of them consistently fail, every tiny accomplishment cut short with failure and followed by worse.

This lack of any hope is one of the major issues of the work. The novel's theme is a treatise on the senseless, honour-less, and soulless nature of war. Good message, I'd never deny that, only that's all it comes across as. Everyone is humourless and dour, and the absence of any alleviation means trudging through a miserable landscape of miserable people, with no chance of salvation. Even more noticeable, for all its attempts to make the Selechians a once-peaceful race ruined by oppression and now trapped in a cycle of warfare fails because we never see that side of them. There is no 'good' Selachian' to offer an alternative to a gung-ho, tediously ultra-violent enemy who spend the novel murdering and torturing without remorse. The end conclusion, with the Doctor telling a traumatised Zoe that he'd 'rather believe in hope' than predestination, rings false for a story so routinely devoid of redemption, leaving Zoe wondering what the point was when they couldn't make a difference, and the reader, what lesson they're meant to take from that.

It's a dreamy story this, perhaps fitting its place as an early-morning recollection of Mrs Polly Jackson who, as she readies to move out of a well-loved family home into a great unknown elsewhere, finds a memento of her time with the Doctor in one of the packed-up boxes.

Falling isn't a complicated story by any means, and debatably its weakness (or narrative charm, depending on your view) lies in its rather sedate open-endedness. Its very clear theme is of ending, of allowing things to have their time and facing their fruition when it comes, and Barnes wisely settles this story as an immediate precursor to The Tenth Planet, with more than one observation on the Doctor's growing frailty and his refusal to accept the limitations his old body is placing on him. The angel-like being they encounter – almost-humanoid, with shockingly emerald wings and eyes, crashed and surrounded by plumes of red smoke, a stunningly striking image drawn by Wills' narration – seems to gently challenge the Doctor on his unwillingness to let go of his body and undergo his 'transformation', and  the Doctor responds with a typical mix of chastened acknowledgement and bristling calls for the creature to keep out of the Doctor's affairs.

Anneke Wills, as ever, does a magnificent job of narrating all four characters with a distinct voice and personality. Particularly Ben and Polly; Falling is to their relationship what The Rocket Men was to Ian and Barbara's – an understated acknowledgement of things unspoken, a tender consideration of both parties' newly budding emotions. For both stories, there is the impression that the time for speaking about it, of saying what needs said is 'not now', not only implying that such developments can only be visible off-screen (and as such not interfere with the 'canon' of their characters), but also perhaps that both relationships need time to flourish and work themselves out away from the hustle and bustle of TARDIS life.

Other vivid set pieces stand out here – including a moment where the Doctor is required to recount a Gallifreyan nursery rhyme,  an eerie but captivating reminder of the Doctor's alienness – but the final one is the most striking and open in terms of interpretation: an older Ben and Polly, married many long years  and standing surrounded by the boxes containing the memories of their life together, looking up and seeing a cascade of brilliantly green feathers. Its meaning is vague and honestly lost on me, although its kept me thinking, which I suppose is a hallmark of a good interpretative ending (if those are your style).

Good points:

I'll confess, I sighed a little when I saw it was set in 1942. In terms of historical stories generally, those set during the first and second world war are not my cup of tea, and yet I was pleasantly surprised. My favourite historicals are those that leave me coming away knowing more about the world than I did than before; before The Highlanders, I'd never heard of Culloden or the Jacobite Rebellion, before the Glorious Revolution, I'd never heard anything about James II. With The Forsaken, Justin Richards sets himself up in a period he's researched for his original Never War series and places the TARDIS team in a transitory moment in military history; the British withdrawal from, and the subsequent Japanese invasion of, Singapore. I appreciated the newer ground being tread, so thank you Mr Richards.

Ben is excellent. For most fans of Ben and Polly's run, they're almost audio companions due to the limited surviving footage of them, experienced only through the recorded sound of lost episodes. Given this, I forgot repeatedly that this wasn't the Ben I knew from surviving audio. In the post-story behind the scenes extras, Bowerman notes that not only has Eliot Chapman done his homework, but he clearly cares about getting the character 'right', and it really shows. Chapman flourishes in this story – with more to do than the last EA – and brings a sparkling, easy chemistry that only improves on the fire-forged Anneke Wills / Frazer Hines pairing.

Justin Richards gets the Second Doctor era. He brings the same aplomb to the Season 4 team as he does to the Doctor, Jamie and Victoria in Dreams of Empire. Even better, everyone is given a chance to work their role in the group (Jamie's practical 'get the beastie before it gets us' mentality, Ben's more cautious but equally offensive instinct, and Polly,  who is magnificent here as the one companion out of the three who is thinks things through and comes to conclusions), and it never feels like any one companion gets pushed aside.

The story is a tightly structured base-under-siege affair, but little feels unnecessary. The sound effects of the sweltering jungle and the cavernous, empty hotel are great at creating the sensation of claustrophobia and creepiness, and Lisa Bowerman (who is always fantastic at directing action) captures the frenetic pace of the cat-and-mouse chases.  

Not so sure:

The big 'pull' of the story revolves around Ben meeting his father. They're both at the same age, so it would understandably be a chance for Ben to understand his old man better, especially given that (as of The Yes Men), Ben's father is dead by 1966. Which makes it such a shame that none of this history and weight to their relationship comes across in the story. Doctor Who has a steadfast tradition of having stories where companions' personal relationships with the past come into play, and the emotional notes are usually ones of acceptance of a loved ones flaws, and a greater appreciation of them as people in their own right without the tinted glasses of childhood – like Curse of Fenric or Father's Day, and even  The Resistance subverts our expectations because we anticipate this. Aside from a few scenes of  idle getting-to-know-you chit-chat, Ben's father could be replaced with a random Cockney Ben takes a shine to, and little would have changed, and the story loses out because of it.

Other idle musings:

Polly is not having people molly-coddle her, and gives Ben an ear-full to the fact. And almost the Doctor (until it turns out he's got his reasons for keeping her out of the main action). Feisty Polly is feisty. One of the best bits is when the fear-inducing Forsaken tries to make her frightened and her first reaction is to be pissed off. You go girl.

Jamie is remarkably unconvinced that Polly saw the Grim Reaper for a man who deliriously saw someone silvery in The Moonbase and declared it to be the Phantom Piper. The Forsaken is so melodramatic, down to the evil mwha-ha-ha. Wouldn't be Who without a bit of overacting.

Good points:

There are some interesting ideas littered about the audio: the Doctor being able to put together some sort of gizmo to travel at speed seemingly from a tin kettle and bits and pieces he's just found in his pockets (I always appreciate a McGyver solution), and the Morlock-esque creatures originally bred for war who have learned to experience and embrace emotion. It's not new ground by any means, but it's a sentiment well worded by the Doctor that the creatures should be allowed the opportunity to develop rightly or wrongly for themselves rather than being interfered with or destroyed.

Not so sure points:

You've got HG Wells in your story! Not only one of the fathers of modern science fiction but who has also been in an televised adventure already (Timelash). Hugh Ross does his best voicing an older, more world-weary version of the man, but he's got little to work with and little to do, and as a result is more of a bystander to the story than a real foil for the Doctor to bounce off.

I don't mind it when other actors loosely impersonate the Doctor. Most of the Companion Chronicles worked on this premise, and it brings a flavour of a personal interpretation tempered by a familiarity with the character (Hines is often lauded, quite rightly, as performing a fantastic version of his Doctor, and the same can be said for William Russell or  Peter Purves or Katy Manning). Hugh Ross... doesn't manage this. His version is  a posher, more elderly Two that doesn't gel well, and its distracting enough to detract from what's happening.

Good bits:

Originally a short story in written form as part of the Big Finish short trips, it makes an excellent audio. The sound of the sea and gulls in particular make it just a bit more vivid.

It's a quiet story in its own way, for the most part spending its time indulging with the clear affection of three friends hanging out at the beach, taking turns to  throw each other into the surf, chuck sand and chase each other with rock-pool crabs. It's delightfully domestic, and when compared to the attempted beach holiday in The Dominators and the Doctor running happily into the surf in The Enemy of the World, it's not a far cry from something we've seen snatches of on screen.

The scene set is so gentle in fact, that it makes sudden drama so much more heartbreaking for the unsettling shift in tone. Nicholas Briggs does a great job of the Doctor, on a hunt for ice cream, stopping to chat to a little boy in a kindly old uncle sort of way, and then switches  to a low numbness when – because of something the Doctor says – the boy is hit by a car. Briggs' narration here here is restrained and unsettlingly calm, which makes the whole moment so much more effecting.

Not so sure bits:

The Doctor, having witnessed this accident, apparently goes to 'great lengths' to return to the same day, but cancel out his own actions so he doesn't get involved and the little boy doesn't get hurt. This is never explained, not even a cursory hand-wavy effort, and its lack is incredibly distracting, and draws you somewhat out of the story.

The framing story of the little boy at bath-time, whilst being very sweet, feels slightly superfluous and adds nothing to the rest of the story.

Idle musings:

I love any hint of unseen adventures, and the Doctor, trying to pilot the ship to a particular day in 1969, apparently takes months cavorting across space righting wrongs before they get back. Jamie is suitably unimpressed.

Plot: The Doctor, Ben, Polly, and Jamie land on an Earth colony he previously visited off-screen (and saved from invasion) as his first incarnation. While the Doctor and Polly try and discover the political mystery of the apparent assassination of Prime Designate Meg Carvossa,  Jamie and Ben get embroiled in a uprising from the servile robotic underclass.

Good bits:

It's always been a great shame that Michael Craze was never able to bring Ben Jackson to the audio arena that has rescued so many other maligned or forgotten characters with improved scripts and a greater opportunity to perform to the actor's strengths; indeed, he's one of the small cadre of companion actors like Ian Marter and Jackie Lane who haven't played their characters for Big Finish. Newcomer Elliot Chapman – while he doesn't have a lot to do in this story – takes up the mantle of the character excellently, and plays off well with Anneke Wills and Frazer Hines. I look forward to hearing more of his performance in later Early Adventures.

It's an interesting idea to have the Doctor return to an old haunt only to realise more problems have sprung up in his absence (like New Earth in Series 2 and 3, or as a more obvious example 20 and 21st century London, which seems in permanent crisis mode). This one takes the promising idea of a Doctor returning to see a former would-be companion, and both the script and Hines' performance as Two do well to highlight, first his determination to bring her killers to justice, and later his palpable disappointment when it's revealed that she's not the same person he left behind.

While for the most part the audio landscape is forgettable, there are some great 'moments' like the simulated mind-scape of Culloden Moor, and the surreal comical cliffhanger of part three. Stephen Critchlow has fun with the high-pitched eternally polite robots, and the sub-plot of Ben and Jamie's accidentally ending up masterminding a revolution is the memorable storyline that provides much of the story's interest and comic relief.

Character-wise, the differences of approach for each companion give a depth to their roles. Ben is more than happy to experience the luxury offered by robotic servants, while Jamie is uncomfortable, yet both – having sided with the robots – have a them vs. us mentality that draws them into conflict with the Doctor. Polly is the lady of ideas here, and it's often her quick thinking that makes the plot progress.

Not so sure bits:

I've read somewhere that Simon Guerrier didn't know when writing that Elliot Chapman had been cast as Ben Jackson, and so my criticism that Ben is barely in the story, and indeed, gets an episode's holiday in part three, is tempered somewhat. I do hope in the future Guerrier is able to bring some of his excellent First Doctor era character work that made The War to End All Wars, and the Oliver Harper and Sara Kingdom trilogies so outstanding, and give Ben a chance to shine.

For a Simon Guerrier work though, it's... kind of placid. The story muddles on at a regular enough place, but the central mystery of Who Killed Meg Carvossa isn't engaging. David Richardson as producer describes the story as a thriller in the style of Enemy of the World, but unfortunately it's just not very thrilling, and Jane Slavin (Meg Carvossa) and Lizzie McInnerny (her political rival) don't come across as distinct and engaging characters in their own right, making it hard to empathise with either. The story has some great ideas – the underground robot city who mimic human attitudes because it's all they've experienced, the oddly sterile, automated city, the eventual reveal as to why the city is so quiet and the colony politics at play.  The problem is both A and B plots feel intellectual in conception but struggle to feel real in performance, meaning it's difficult to root strongly for either side.

Overall: 

This story sold me on Ben and Polly as a TARDIS team. Given their lack of surviving complete serials, and the relative dirth of media that deals with their adventures with Two prior to The Highlanders, it usually feels like they come part and parcel with Jamie, like Victoria and Zoe do in later seasons. And while the Ben-Polly-Jamie team is great fun, with the two coming across as older, wiser siblings to the inexperienced Jamie, fans of larger TARDIS teams know that the more companions a story is juggling, the more some characters can get relegated to the background, and Ben (and sometimes Polly) seems to bear the brunt of this for the Second Doctor era. By setting this story in their shared childhood of post-Blitz London, this short trip really looks in detail at their past, and their friendship (and hinted to be more) considering their different social backgrounds. Ben's personality in particular shines here, with Anneke Wills doing a great job of his joking banter and light-hearted joshing, which switches immediately into unquestioning support when faced with the opportunity to help write an old wrong in the form of Polly's lost bear.

The standout strengths of the audio are, firstly, the incredibly evocative settings; the bomb site of a ruined house, the hustle and bustle of a department store, the office of Lost and Found. If you're more inclined towards straightforward action and plot, this might have you drumming your fingers as the team wander from one sound landscape to another, but it allows the other standout of the audio, Anneke Wills to excel in creating an emotional story of childhood loss and acceptance through maturity. She's fantastic at knowing exactly where to work an emotional moment and when to let it speak for itself.

The story has the narrative subtlety of a Silver Age comic, which is both to its detriment and credit. On the downside, the overall story of the Doctor and Zoe rescuing Jamie, who has been kidnapped by the grotesque Corpulus the Magnificent, overlord of the mechanised war world of Combatia, in order to be recruited to gladiatorial fighting, is simplistic. Rescue is enacted, the generic villain – ugly, greedy, shouty, the usual –  is defeated, the good guys win, the end. Any character not the main trio isn't really fleshed out. This is especially noticeable with Gichin Funakoshi, who the story takes pains to introduce as Jamie's only human cell mate and later co-instigator of the revolution.  Aside from his weaponless and pacifistic approach to combat, clearly mirroring the later tactics of the Second Doctor, he has little impact on the story, and it was only after I listened to the audio and did some research that I learned he was a real historical figure, attributed as being the founder of modern Karate. Given his approach to violence, and his personal importance, the story misses a trick by not doing more with him.

Little Doctors marks several changes from early Short Trips. The first outing of the Second Doctor outside of the collected volumes means the audio comes refitted with a slightly bumped up run-time of over half an hour, and Frazer Hines taking over narrational duties from David Troughton. Weeks without Hines as narrator have been an excellent reminder of why he's such fun to listen to. Troughton is excellent, don't get me wrong, steady, comforting and with a measured cadence that leads you through a story and gently evokes the Second Doctor era (I can well imagine his reading of Baxter's Wheel of Ice is magnificent). Hines in comparison, is effusive, and you can hear him enjoying himself with the dialogue and characters, which lifts the audio, and alone makes it worth the cost of entry.

Writer Philip Lawrence captures the  TARDIS team of Two, Zoe and Jamie well, and the drama is better when it's taking its time setting up the environment and allowing the characters to experience the surroundings for us. The futuristic high-tech city of Olympus is a marvel of efficiency, to Zoe's delight, and Jamie's unfamiliarity with mod-cons such as glass lifts (he's scared of them) and protein bars (he pretends to like them) is played for laughs, as is his gentle, to-and-fro relationship with the Doctor. The ideas in the story are big – the technology to create anything by programmable matter, a computer mind running a human colony which – while a little efficient and with strong hints of authoritarianism – just wants to protect its charges – and the world is built up with a careful care which means that, that come part two, watching it coming down like a crumbled sandcastle is disappointing.

The problem with the audio is that it clearly wants to get to the main meat of the plot – the Doctor, after using a neural interface to communicate with the computer mind, accidentally programming the computer to create multiple tiny versions of himself (the little doctors of the title) – , and doesn't take the time to make sure this fits. The concept becomes rushed, and the story barrels from one scene to another. And while some Big Finish audios have excelled at making  bizaaro comical ideas such as the tiny doctors believable (like Ringpullworld, Doctor Who and the Pirates, or The Scorchies), this is not one of them. Personally, the little Doctors (intended to be a computer's understanding and recreation of the second doctor's mind) are a poor representation that adds little to the drama. They're volatile, and childish, and destructive, little gremlins with the face of the Doctor, and that rendition doesn't quite have either the farcical slapstick value the writer was maybe hoping for. The final version of the story wants to say something that unifies and justifies the plot (is it that efficiency and living a life without colour is wrong? Is it that computers and sometimes people are too literal-minded, and that's not a good thing? Is it trying to teach Zoe to appreciate the joy of the universe without analysing it?) but never finds it, leaving some good character moments and world-building trapped inside a rushed plot that never quite finds its bearings.