Big Finish - Daleks Among Us

The second Big Finish audio on the playlist for my long bike ride was Daleks Among Us by Alan Barnes and directed by Ken Bentley.

The conclusion to the latest Klein trilogy sees the Seventh Doctor, Will Arrowsmith and Dr Klein herself arrive on the planet Azimuth in search of that elusive Persuasion machine. As ever things are not what they seem and while Elizabeth learns the shocking truth about her past the Doctor encounters and old enemy.

Well this is just fabulous. Everyone here is on top form and I was very impressed to learn that Alan Barnes was the author. I have had problems with some of his previous scripts but it seems that Daleks bring out the best in him. And these Daleks are fairly nasty and violent and not just the giant screeching toys that they can sometimes appear as in Doctor Who. In fact there is a real sense of menace in this story with none of the humour to be found in Starlight Robbery.

I like this idea of the Seventh Doctor sensing his time is limited and trying to wrap up loose ends, all the while keeping an eye on Elizabeth Klein in case she somehow reverts to type. There is some more of that Elder Gods stuff which bores me but that is more than made up for with a clash of wills with a dark enemy. I didn't look at any cast lists in advance so I didn't know what was coming and Big Finish pulled off a big surprise. I won't spoil it here but it was as much fun as when they managed a similar trick in Unit: Dominion.

While all this is going on Dr Klein "borrows" the Tardis to travel back to 1945 Germany and discover some of the shocking truth about her origins that the Doctor has been keeping from her. Once again Tracey Childs does a marvellous job. I did like the way her German accent deepened when she was in her home country. I don't know if it would sound convincing to German listeners but it impressed me.

All in all a terrific story and my favourite of the trilogy. 4.5 out of 5 Persuasion machines. One of the best Big Finish stories around.

Big Finish - Starlight Robbery

Starlight Robbery written by Matt Fitton and directed by Ken Bentley.

Here is the second part in the current Seventh Doctor trilogy. Elizabeth Klein and Will Arrowsmith are sent undercover to an illicit, galactic arms fair run by the Urodelian crook, Garundel who we last heard in Black and White. The Doctor has set his two companions on the trail of the Persuasion machine and its creator Kurt Schalk.

Sylvester McCoy is a busy chap and this seems like one of the Doctor-lite episodes from new Who. So Klein and Arrowsmith do most of the leg work here and they are ably assisted by a host of bad guys attending the arms auction. In particular Dan Starkey who plays Strax on TV gives us three different Sontarans. His performance is one of the high points of this audio drama. It's nice to hear the Sontarans as a credible military power instead of just figures of fun. I am less keen on Garundel as a character but his role as a galactic con man works in this story so I'll give him a pass.

As ever it is Tracey Childs as Klein who really shines as the best thing in the whole episode. I've mused before about why her character works so well with the Seventh Doctor. We shouldn't like her but we do. The few moments she gets with the Doctor are great stuff. She can see through the master manipulator and recognises when she is being used as a tool, "just another sonic screwdriver" as she memorably puts it.

The story didn't grab me particularly, but the Sontarans and Klein were worth the price of admission alone. 4 out of Sontaran spheres for Starlight Robbery.

Big Finish - Persuasion

Number 175 in the Big Finish main range is Persuasion by Jonathan Barnes, directed by Ken Bentley.

Klein is back! Her story is getting a little complicated at this point. Let's just say she is the most interesting UNIT scientific advisor after the Doctor, and her love hate relationship with his seventh incarnation continues. And this time she has a young and enthusiastic but very inexperienced assistant along with her. Will Arrowsmith knows a lot about the mysterious Umbrella man and what UNIT refer to as "blue box incidents" but this is his first actual encounter.

The story concerns another set of powerful elder gods who the Seventh Doctor wants to deal with before his time his done. He senses that his next regeneration is approaching and is worried that his replacement may not be as resolute as he is. This sense that Sylvester McCoy's Doctor is ageing and trying to tie up loose ends before he finishes is very interesting and I wonder if Big Finish will continue with this. Also rather intriguing is the idea of the very powerful Persuasion machine which acts as the MacGuffin for this story. The machine's ability to persuade populations of whatever idea the controller programmes into it is obviously of interest to politicians of all ideologies. I presume this will also come back in the next two parts of this Klein trilogy.

I confess the elder gods stuff that cropped up in Protect and Survive and Gods and Monsters rather bores me. Here the characters of the Shepherd and Shepherdess speak in iambic pentameter which presumably was rather challenging for Jonathan Barnes to write, and it sounds impressive, but their storyline does nothing for me. Fortunately there is Klein and the idea of the Persuasion machine to keep me interested. Tracey Childs is right up there with Maggie Stables as a great Big Finish supporting actor and perfect foil for the Doctor. I was less convinced by Christian Edwards as Will Arrowsmith but maybe his character will grow on me.

Some interesting stuff in this one but let down by uninteresting bad guys. A middle of the road 3 out of 5 straw hats from me.

Big Finish - Unit: Dominion

This was the third of Big Finish's special release box sets from the end of 2012:
Unit: Dominion by Nicholas Briggs and Jason Arnopp, and directed by Nicholas Briggs (he's a busy chap).

I'm going to use the synopsis directly from the Big Finish website here. The universe stands on the brink of a dimensional crisis – and the Doctor and Raine are pulled into the very epicentre of it. Meanwhile on Earth, UNIT scientific advisor Dr Elizabeth Klein and an incarnation of the Doctor she's never encountered before are tested to the limit by a series of bizarre, alien invasions. At the heart of it all is a terrible secret, almost as old as the Time Lords themselves. Reality is beginning to unravel and two Doctors, Klein, Raine and all of UNIT must use all their strength and guile to prevent the whole of creation being torn apart.For a lot of the time we have two stories going on here. 

We all know that Sylvester McCoy has been in New Zealand for a long time making The Hobbit, and has only been available for brief periods of recording with Big Finish. So he is off stuck in another dimension with Beth Chalmer's Raine Creevy for the first half of this drama. This leaves us focusing on Dr Klein and another future version of the Doctor played with flamboyant relish by Alex Macqueen. There's also a Unit sergeant called Pete Wilson who gives us the ordinary person's point of view and also provides a human interest angle as his wife is about to give birth and his duties keep him away for her.

There's all sorts of strange creatures and trans-dimensional incursions as Unit struggle to save the Earth and there's also a big reveal which was a great surprise (for me anyway). But you know what was the best thing about this? Elizabeth Klein. What is it about Klein's character that makes her so interesting and enjoyable to listen to? She has so far appeared in five Big Finish stories including this one. She's combative and forthright in her views and rather abrasive. She started out as a Nazi scientist, although this version of her is unaware of her past due to the Seventh Doctor's meddling. Despite (or, perhaps, because of) all this she is absolutely fascinating. The actress Tracey Childs is best known for being in a rather dire 1980s soap opera but her vocal performances here are just marvellous. Big Finish has had to create some memorable recurring characters of their own but I believe my favourite so far is Klein.

Having said that she is given a close run for her money by Alex Macqueen's new version of the Doctor with his "Hello, you" catchphrase. His petulant and snobbish dealings with Unit reminded me of Jon Pertwee's rather arrogant third Doctor. It's all done with great panache and although the trans-dimensional story can get a little confusing at times the great characters and performances more than compensate.

I enjoyed the music by Martin Johnson and would also pick out Alex Mallinson for his cover art, and for doing a pretty convincing American accent in one of the smaller parts. My only criticism of the sound design was that there was too much radio sound effect when characters are speaking on walkie-talkies. I think we got the point that they were speaking over the radio and the effects could have been toned down a little so we could hear the dialogue easier. However minor quibbles aside this was a terrific box set from Big Finish and I am glad I finally gave in and bought it before the price went up.

This matched the heights of Dark Eyes and gets 4.5 out of 5 giant floating heads Excellent stuff.

Big Finish - The Architects of History

This is Big Finish release 132 - The Architects of History by Steve Lyons, and directed by John Ainsworth. And it's a bit of a cracker.

Tracey Childs steals the show as Klein, and Klein has stolen the Doctor's Tardis, using it to create an alternate history in line with the one she came from. Her Galactic Reich is a force for good and has created a golden age of peace and prosperity. Obviously the monsters are not going to allow that and here the shark-like Selachians arrive in force and are suitably loud and shouty. Hopefully they are also green which is the correct colour for Doctor Who Monsters.

The alternate timeline allows for some more clever tricks with Doctor Who's history and, in particular, gives the Seventh Doctor a new companion called Rachel Cooper played by Lenora Crichlow from Being Human. As ever there is a great clash of wills between the Doctor and Klein. It is so good that the battle between the Selachians and the future Nazis is almost an irrelevance.

This is a terrific trio of Big Finish stories which is really worth checking out. This great concluding episode is getting 4.5 out of 5 Shark spacesuits. Next up will be The Butcher of Brisbane.

I should add that I only discovered Klein and this great trilogy through my friend Brian from the British Invaders podcast. Cheers, mate!

Big Finish - Survival of the Fittest

Big Finish 131 - Survival of the Fittest by Jonathan Clements, John Ainsworth and Lee Mansfield. Directed by John Ainsworth, with Sylvester McCoy as the Doctor and Tracey Childs as Klein.

Having established Klein as a German scientist from a time line where (or when?) the Nazis won the war, this story attempts to fill in her back story. And, in particular, how she came to be in Colditz castle in 1944. This is the most interesting part of this Big Finish audio drama and involves some neat manipulations of known Doctor Who history in an alternate world. A special guest star turns up using a German version of a name that will be instantly recognisable to fans.

With my increasing enjoyment of the character arc of the questionable Klein I would have been quite happy if this section of the story had gone on longer. However it is only a prologue to the main events which feature the Doctor and Klein landing on a planet and finding themselves in the middle of a fight for survival between human colonists and the insect like Vrill. There's some clever stuff about the Vrill who use scent markers to communicate so that their messages float in the air after they have moved on. The battle for supremacy allows for some interesting discussions about Klein's political background. The Seventh Doctor is at his manipulative best and there is a great cliff-hanger ending. But all the while I was waiting to get back to Klein's story.

It is a perfectly fine Doctor Who adventure but not quite what I was waiting for. Maybe The Architects of History (which is a great title for a Who story) will complete the picture for me.

3 out of 5 misplaced Tardis keys for Survival of the Fittest but I am really enjoying this unexpected Klein trilogy. Now on to the Architects if History.

Big Finish - A Thousand Tiny Wings

Big Finish release 130 was A Thousand Tiny Wings by Andy Lane. Directed by Lisa Bowerman and starring Sylvester McCoy as the Doctor and Tracey Childs as Klein.

It is 1953, Kenya and the Mau Mau uprising has trapped a group of women in a remote house. There is a mystery illness and a strange creature in the woods. And into all this comes the Seventh Doctor for a confrontation with Elizabeth Klein who he first met in Colditz.

I bought this as part of a special offer for the three stories in the Klein trilogy and it was very enjoyable. If you have read my previous reviews you will know that I love a confrontation between the Doctor and a strong willed opponent with a different philosophy. These battles of wills seem to be what I like most about Doctor Who. Obviously I enjoy a good monster story from time to time but listening to the Doctor clash minds with an opposing point of view makes for terrific audio drama.

Klein is a fascinating character, a scientist from another time stream where Germany won the second world war. She is very different from the conventional stereotype of a Nazi scientist, Klein is a believer but not in a straight forward way. She is complex and humane and quick to point out the flaws in the Doctor's own arguments against her. It takes a terrific performance from Tracey Childs to bring her to life and to make her a hero in a strange way.

Right now I am trying to decide which is my favourite of the Big Finish Doctors but if you asked me to pick which of the supporting characters I would like to see brought into the TV show I would pick Klein. Of course it is not all just a clash of wills. There is a mystery and a monster and it is all played out in a neat variant of the classic "Base in Peril" story. The monster itself is a clever commentary on the role of the English occupiers and the struggles of the Kenyans for independence.

All in all this was a great starter to the Klein trilogy. I have found some of my recent listens to be either too short or too long but this was like that third bowl of porridge, just right. It gets 4 out of 5 straw boaters. Next up will be Survival of the Fittest.

Big Finish - Colditz

This is the first of three Big Finish titles I bought in their recent £5 sale. Colditz by Steve Lyons, written by Gary Russell, with Sylvester McCoy as The Doctor, Sophie Aldred as Ace, Tracey Childs as Klein and David Tennant as Kurtz.

Growing up in the 1970s it is impossible to hear the name Colditz without thinking of the long running BBC series with Bernard Hepton, Robert Wagner, David McCallum and Anthony Valentine amongst others. Listening to this Big Finish production I could see the austere castle and its courtyard which apparently was filmed at Stirling castle in Scotland. The Doctor and Ace turn up in the wrong place at the wrong time and are soon prisoners. While Ace tries to join an escape attempt, the Doctor is interrogated and then handed over to the mysterious Klein who seems to know some of the secrets of his Tardis.

Maybe it was the deliberate harking back to the TV series and the real history it was based on but this was a terrific story. McCoy's Doctor seems to have met his match to some extent in the character of Klein but that doesn't stop his trademark manipulations of his enemies. Meanwhile the boisterous Ace is almost too much for the reserved British prisoners. This story was released in October 2001 when David Tennant was just a jobbing actor so it his fun to hear his recognisable voice doing a German accent.

I enjoyed this so much that it passed almost too quickly. Once thing that I did miss was the 'DVD extras' that BF now put on their CDs. It's always nice to hear writer, director and actors discussing the production at the end of the second CD, but these early releases don't have that bonus track which is a shame.

Despite that this story gets a good 4 out of 5 Balsa wood gliders. Next up is Master.