Missy Series Two

 

Missy Series Two

After my opinion on Missy Series One being mixed on the whole compared to her phenomenal appearances in River and Ravenous?  I was cautiously optimistic with the following installment in the series, Missy Two, and I am happy to day, yep, it’s the same, with all the highlights and pitfalls of the previous set. Wait, oh no. Yes, Missy One had two excellent episodes, but it also had several pitfalls it fell into - and it proved that you can only really trust the most exemplary writers with Missy, as a balance with her character is something even the strongest writers have a challenge with, and unlike the War Master, who can slink into the background, Missy is loud and boisterous, making her a difficult protagonist. Coming Volume Two, I think the writers began to understand this, and proceeded to try and give the stories a protagonist other than Missy, which definitely works in the best episodes of the set, but this creates a secondary problem of the quality of that protagonist and why we should care about them next to Missy. Perhaps I should begin with the episodes, as to better illustrate my point. 

The Lumiat by Lisa McMullin

The set opens with by far the best episode, to the degree it isn’t even much a competition. The Lumiat not only has massive effect on canon, but is absolutely hysterical and a wonderful character study, to the degree that although most people focus on the canon altering insanity that Obviously drags attention a bit (how did the BBC let them do that) I really prefer the Lumiat for how it serves as an episode in it’s own right. It’s difficult to review a comedy episode without giving away all the jokes or just being like, “wow fam that’s funny” but the Lumiat has a lot more depth than that on the still fascinating idea of how the Master could still be good, and what the Master’s Valeyard figure would be like. Remarkably strong ideas and performances throughout, if the entire set was at this level, I wouldn’t have an issue at all. 10/10

Brimstone and Terror by Roy Gill

After Roy Gill’s first weak attempt to characterize Missy in the previous boxset, I was incredibly nervous about bringing back the garbage kid characters. I don’t have a problem with these kids acting like many people do, I have a problem with the fact that they are boring slates, and whereas A Spoonful of Mayhem got away with this somewhat by having Missy a more benevolent and fun presence in that story, having these kids as our main protagonists is strictly rubbish. Strax shows up too, but he can’t salvage this either. While a Strax/Missy runabout in the vein of Divorced Beheaded Regenerated would have been a blast, here I almost question the need for him. Plus weirdly Dan Starkey plays half the cast in addition to Strax/Strax’s Disguise character. It’s just such an odd, barely functional tale that only nearly gets a 50%. 5/10

Treason and Plot by Gemma Arrowsmith

As this story actually has a good protagonist and concept, it is good, and a good example of what this series should be going for. The problem with Missy as a series is that half the episodes are bad and half are good, which can make one have a sour feeling on the product as a whole. Luckily Treason and Plot uses both Michelle Gomez’s remarkable aptitude for audio drama and a clever concept for an incredibly entertaining if not “filler” audio. Although unambiguous, Treason is immensely entertaining, doing what the Lumiat also did and properly giving her the opportunity to be evil in her role- and giving the Protagonist role to an unlikely underdog time agent, who I did not expect to become so utterly invested in over the course of the story. If this was a War Master or Torchwood, the story would end bleak for this agent daring to cross the Master, hut I like that it doesn’t. It makes the story all the more comfy, and it doesn’t lessen any of Missy’s edge- a fine historical audio that actually feels rather Doctor Who than spinoff, but not to it’s detriment, Treason is pretty much stellar, if unambitious.  9/10

Too Many Masters by John Dorney

It pains me to give John Dorney any flack whatsoever- like I’m not even joking, there is a legitimate twang in my stomach, but Too Many Masters is not his best work. After turning in some of Missy’s best work in set one, he makes the cardinal mistake of doing pretty much the exact same thing as that audio, leaving it sort of Divorced Beheaded Regenerated Lite- with Ogrons too, but honestly I don’t think anyone has a real love or need to explore Ogron society, however entertaining they might be as fill in the blank baddies. The stakes feel low as a result - The Monk and Missy vs some Ogrons, really? How could they POSSIBLY lose?? At least in Divorced, the baddies, while generic, were imposing enough for the tale to work. Although Missy and The Hound Monk’s chemistry continues to be stellar, it’s another one of the Naff episodes- and in terms of what John Dorney was trying to do here, I know the brilliant fellow can do better. The upsides of the story are fun, the Monk playing with the old idea in the 80s that they were the Master (because god forbid the show ever have more than two time lords or the status quo gods scream in agony) which is very funny and once again, these two can never be NOT entertaining, there’s just the issue of this story has been done before, and in a series with only 8 episodes under it’s belt and a lot of misfires, that’s not exactly leaving me hopeful for the future - although the idea that the next set will have Hound Monk as a regular is mouth watering... 5 or something I really don’t know/10