The Eighth Doctor: Time War 1

The Eighth Doctor Time War 1

 The few Time War sets I have done so far have ranged from exquisite (The War Master sets) to so undeniably terrible I don’t even want to bother finishing it, let alone reviewing it. (Only the Monstrous.) and to be honest, that’s because they fall in one of two patterns. To actually depict the Time War on screen (okay, audio) is perhaps one of the toughest challenges Big Finish have risen to - I mean, it’s the event that was built up for so many years of the revival show. It’s almost more an idea than a story concept, with all of it’s eldritch horror and whatnot, so as a result, the Time War is an idea more suited to vague dialogue and prose than actually being in it. That’s one school of thought. The other school of thought is BLAM BLAM SHOOTY DALEKS BLAM. Luckily for the most part Time War 1 situates itself on the right side of the fence and doesn’t just do a big shooty Dalek thing, because well, I don’t think that’s what people want the time war to be. It’s so much more fun as the incomprehensible. At times throughout Time War 1 I was thinking that perhaps I was wrong and the Time War is an idea that should be fleshed out- and in others I was perhaps indeed quite disappointed.

The Starship of Theseus by John Dorney

Well, Starship of Theseus is a John Dorney script, and so predictably I’m going to give it a massive tongue-bath, but really the concepts that Theseus plays with about with Doctor Who in general make it a really fun deconstructionist piece, and absolutely beautifully pretentious - and yet then it is bogged down a bit by having to do the whole “oh wait this is a boxset thing.” Yeah, if the Starship of Theseus was a 2 hour play completely standalone play (or at least mostly) ala the early monthly range’s tendency to be experimental, I think perhaps I would look on it even more favorably. It has some really interesting things to say not only about the Time War but the show itself though. The Ship of Theseus, (as you probably know from Wandavision) is an artifact in a museum that is gradually replaced. By the end, when none of the old ship remains, is it the same ship? Reinvention has always been such a core aspect of Doctor Who, even before we got regeneration, the cast was a revolving door minus William Hartnell and initial characters that seemed to be among the show’s most important (say, Susan, for instance) were deftly swapped out not even two full seasons in. As such, This story plays cleverly with that revolving door concept in such a brilliant way, and it’s not only really good time war fun shenanigans but it serves a meta textual purpose and analysis about the vehicle that is Doctor Who. Starship of Theseus is in the end about how really, when we watch the Third Doctor and The Eleventh  Doctor’s eras back to back, are we even watching the same show, and I think that’s brilliant. Then it has to do some crappy setup at the end, and has to shove Bliss into it (in THE most awkwardly written companion introduction of all time, accept no substitutes) and the survivors and do all of the legwork so Echoes of War can get going, while really, I would almost prefer for this fascinating story about Emma/Sheena/Louise to be the only plot thread rather than the Daleks showing up when we have 15 minutes left. As it is, Starship of Theseus is a brilliant story, absolutely wonderful from every standard, and yet I can’t help but feel this could have been the best Doctor Who story, of all time, period, - and it’s really not. 9/10

Echoes of War by Matt Fitton

The closest comparison I’d give to Echoes of War is John Dorney’s The Red Lady from Doom Coalition combined with Into the Dalek. Which is a hell of a starting pitch. Like the Red Lady, Echoes of War is an audio drama that is astonishingly “visually” pretty, with eloquent gorgeous language being used to evoke a really cool landscape and these concepts really pull the play together, and of course, there’s also A single individual Dalek being used to examine the species as a whole (why hello there Robert Shearman your fingerprints are all over this boxset) and on the whole, from pretty much every direction you look at it, Echoes of War just *works.* A crashed spaceship from the previous story leaves the Doctor and extras on a planet where the forests are growing and dying in a matter of seconds as a part of the aftermath (or beforemath) of a battle in the time war. It's just smart in it's setup as it takes the approach to the time war that many other sets like, say, The War Master does, with the Time War working as a concept that's just on the fringes of the story, giving the story a unique level of atmosphere and scope that is rarely found in a Doctor Who story that isn't just like "and then the entire universe was in danger." There's really a creative way that the story utilizes the cast to maximize tension. The Doctor isn't in the story at just the right spots for "Dal" to really get under the audience's skin - the Daleks are always most effective when alone. Bliss is in this story, unlike the previous story, and I hope you get endeared to her here, as she is absolutely 100% irrelevant to the following two stories, which would play out exactly the same way without her. It's very evident Bliss just wasn't planned to be a companion in this series, and it's doubly evident that the writers don't really want to have to bother with her at the moment. All the same, despite this, I do like Bliss, she may be bland but Rakhee Thakrar really feels like she's super into it. I can't think of much a flaw in these first two episodes, but sadly things go downhill fast. 10/10

The Conscript by Matt Fitton

[Sigh.] Okay. So. At the Very Least, The Conscript tries. But from the getgo, it's very starting point is really flawed, and however eloquent it tries to be, it's starting off from the wrong point. The plot of the Conscript is that the Doctor is sent to... a Gallifreyan Boot-Camp, where a bunch of Time Lords - you know, character's that should be the masters of time, fighting a war on multiple dimensional planes and in multiple time periods, where at any moment your very existence could be retconned away by another battle, where every single spot in the universe is in danger from Meanwhiles and Neverweres - and well, they're preparing for war at a classic american movie bootcamp with a stereotypical sergeant shrieking "DROP TO THE GROUND AND GIVE ME TWENTY!" So that's completely rubbish. Our side cast of Bliss, Quarren and Rupa are completely sidelined minus brief interviews with Ollistra (God bless Ollistra, the saving grace of this silly thing) and well, minus Paul McGann getting a few good words in, it's really just a War Movie. And that's not what this ridiculously pretentious and high concept war should be. As it is, it's written fine. Written really well, actually. I give this a ludicrously high score for what it is. But it's central idea is still cracked to the core. There are some cool things with the Time Lord Soldiers preparing to fight in multiple time periods with some Vortex Manipulators, but come on. Look at the scene in the War Games where the Time Lords are basically gods and then look at this. Actually the sheer whiplash would kill you, so maybe don't? 7/10 

One Life by John Dorney 

INCHES AWAY from being yet another John Dorney masterpiece, One Life kind of gives up at the finish line. It's got all the pieces - a really really strong emotional center with Quarren and Rupa, some Time War Space Stuff that actually meshes together the tactical war aspect and interdimensional time war bit fairly well (A ship's past and future selves allowing itself to infinitely duplicate itself on the battlefield is exactly the level of crazyness I wanted from this set.) Ollistra is stunningly strong here too, miles away in terms of dimension from her first appearance in Only The Monstrous - and the flashback scenes in this story are so beautifully quiet, ordinary and painful that once again, they remind me of the quiet relationship character drama from Rob Shearman's Everyone's So So Special. But at some point, and I'm not sure where it is, because it's just so close - One Life just falls apart. This could be an Absent Friends tier emotional breakdown story and as it is, it is better than average and that is it, and to be honest, that is damning with faint praise. One Life is so close. I can't say that enough - for the first forty minutes I'm really fricking into it, and thinking that that emotional catharsis from all this wonderful buildup and drama is coming, and then it doesn't. I would give my hypothetical kidney for another draft of this thing: 8/10 

So as it is, Time War 1 is fine. Which is more than I expected - it's certainly on par with the first boxsets of other ranges - about on par with Doom Coalition's first outing, Diary of River Songs', and miles better than Ravenous's. But just like One Life, I do feel like it really could have been more. It could have been great. Someday these writers will really get the Time War - hell, Matt Fitton's two stories are so contradictory in both quality and everything about them I might think that he's Two-Face from Batman. But Just a bit more polish really would be quite evident in making this thing truly shine. And maybe throw the very idea of The Conscript in the rubbish bin. 

Yay, these are back: