The Sara Kingdom Audios

 

Well. There isn't a good place to put this in, as I've never done anything like this, but I guess I'm reviewing all of the Sara Kingdom companion audios I've done in preparation to get back into Dalek Universe. At the moment, there are three, and I can't see the need to bother making three pages for them, as my thoughts on them are rather interlinked, like a boxset. The Experiment begins...

Home Truths by Simon Guerrier

I initially questioned writing this review, as I've never covered Companion Chronicles on this website before. Early Adventures, yes. But never Companion Chronicles. And that's because I hadn't found any I had done so far to be worth reviewing. There were 4 of them on Spotify - Mother Russia of them the best, and I had heard The Scorchies, but that barely qualified as a chronicle - it was just a two-hander audio without any narration whatsoever. So for some reason it didn't qualify to me as a proper chronicle, even though It very much was. I just didn't think of it that way in my silly brain. And it was incredible, yes, go check out the Scorchies if you have the time, but I hadn't seen much of a point to the format. But listening to Home Truths, I soon discovered I had heard quite a few stories of the type, (well, without the narration, which is weird for me to mention as I did say that the Scorchies was like that earlier but be quiet, I'm on a roll and internal consistency is something you should never expect of me) snuggled into the Torchwood Main Range. These small-scale emotion driven stories can do so much with atmosphere, and Home Truths is one of the best small-scale stories like this I've heard, really thriving on the internal voice of Sara, and allowing us to see this short-lived character's dreams like we had never really gotten to before. Home Truths has just the most brilliant concepts to it, the most wonderful atmosphere, and this hellishly good framing device to tie it all together. Home Truths is perhaps one of the best Big Finish Productions in terms of character - we often joke about Big Finish taking the most irrelevant characters (Trinity Wells! Yvonne Hartman! Winston Churchill!) And giving them fullblown character makeovers, but Sara is living proof of how well it can work. So much more than a simple audiobook, the sound design and voice acting that Jean Marsh brings to the table in addition with a framing device used in a unique way... By the end of Home Truths, I was invested more than any Companion Chronicle I had ever heard before. Bravo, that's the way to do it. 10/10 

The Drowned World by Simon Guerrier 

The Drowned World is a lesser affair, but it still manages to be the fourth best companion chronicle I've heard, and next to Home Truths, The Scorchies, and the ASCENDENCY OF THE HUMAN FUCKING SPECIES THAT’S COMING UP NEXT that's a hell of an accomplishment. The Drowned World is an interesting companion chronicle, telling us more the story of House Sara and having an in-depth framing device that threatens to take over completely from the story that is supposedly the main one. As a matter of fact, by the end of the production, The Drowned World's "main" story had almost completely left me - but it's framing device lingered on with a hell of a lot of power. The story itself concerns House Sara from Home Truths being interviewed by Robert to see if she will be destroyed. Where it goes from there is stunning work from Jean Marsh - imbuing this slightly different version of Sara Kingdom with a slightly different performance in which she gets to be wonderfully devious figure, trying to figure out ways to get what she wants and stay alive. Robert himself as a man of morals is compelling as well in opposition to this version of the character, and the final moments are both an echo of the ending of the last one and exceedingly haunting and venomous. The framing device is absolutely incredible. But it's only half the story and when the other half is a forgettful plight on a titular "drowned world" as The Doctor, Sara and Steven try and save some miners from wicked water tendrils, and that this is the story that Robert chooses to use as symbolism for her heroism and also to call her back - is slightly lacking, since it's definitely a lesser story to what we've heard from this duo before. All the same, the work done here still manages to be absolutely stunning, and further evidence I should really get into these: 8/10 

The Guardian of the Solar System by Simon Geurrier

 holy fucking holy shitty fucking fucking shit fucking shit fucking shit shit fucking holy fucking shitting fucking shit fucking glorious fucking oh MY LORD HOLY MOTHER OF GOD IT’S THE MOTHERFUCKING SECOND COMING, BITCHES  10+ /10 

The Five Companions by Eddie Robson

Having gotten this one for free with my recent Main Range sub, I had the degree of not knowing what to expect, especially since I was unfamiliar with a fair few actors in it at the time I had heard it. And the end result is entertaining, if not extremely busy and also kind of awful for audio? It's a big bombastic action piece with the Doctor and Five Companions trying to stop both the Sontarans and Daleks in a Death Zone. Dinosaurs are also there. 

If you're wondering how Big Finish handles having five companions in a single hour, the answer is very well and also very badly. The usage of the companion is kind of forgotten, as a story with this large a cast and also no guest cast, it's odd having no characters - seeing the companions work together is fun, but they're making a trap, not investigating or being clever, the things we like to see these characters do. And they all supposedly get something to do, but some leave very little impression, Steven and Nyssa especially short turned. In addition the choices of companion are odd - four first doctor companions and one fifth doctor companion - I'd have swapped these characters out to get a greater variety of voices, as some of these characters being similar (Ian, Steven) doesn't necessarily make for a better ride. But this is the play that did make me interested in Sara Kingdom - she's given the best material, and gets to be wonderfully awesome in her fighting Daleks once more, and even Polly gets a fun moment knocking a Sontaran out on the vent! Nyssa struggles for screentime in comparison to the rest of these characters. Minus working for the Daleks at the start, I can't think of much she does memorably. So yeah - Five Companions in one hour, pretty bad idea. The best thing the story does do is it's witty lines, it makes for a bit of an excellent comedy on the moments it likes to be comedic - Ian even hides in a Dalek like One in the Space Museum! So it's funny, and that's a big point for it. But it does feel incredibly substancelss, and although I find it usually almost invisible to me after so many audios, there is a lot of, "OH WOW, DO YOU SEE THE THING? I GUESS I'LL DESCRIBE THE THING WE ARE DIRECTLY LOOKING AT! IT IS A DALEK!" And ordinarily that would be enough, but they never stop there. "IT IS ROLLING TOWARDS US! IT LOOKS VERY INTIMIDATING AND SCARY!" They go really far with that whole, let me describe what I'm looking at bit, especially in the start. And it's rare, but it actually took me out of it. On the whole, Fivd Companions isn't the most interesting (It had no ideas but having these characters interact. No concept whatsoever.) Or a very adventurous audio. It's a bit of a mess. But I got it for free. So I am rather pleased with myself. 6/10