Ninth Doctor Adventures: Lost Warriors

 

The Ninth Doctor Adventures: Lost Warriors

Writing a blurb about Lost Warriors as a whole is rather ridiculous. Whereas Respond to All Calls had the, shall we say, tenuous, theme of three different distress calls, Lost Warriors has frick all. As far as I can tell, there's pretty much nothing connecting these three stories minus them all being, technically historicals, although all of them take such a different perspective on "historical," I'm not sure that works either. So nothing. No, whereas set one had the Ninth Doctor in a cohesive whole story as a hook, and set two had the Ninth Doctor in three random stories with a very basic connective theme as a hook, set three has the Ninth Doctor in three random stories and the Cybermen are in one of them haha that's the like, connective tissue! Nothing! But that doesn't matter. I mean, technically speaking I really do think they should have stuck with "Volume Two" and "Volume Three" because that's what you're getting here. You're getting the Ninth Doctor. It's unbelievably similar to Volume Two as a matter of fact - if you liked that absolute triumph of a release, you'll like this release, and probably just as much, and if not as much, then close. Because while, I would say, on the most basic merits, this one is slightly weaker, it's really not by much. It's what you'd expect, really. It's Doctor Who. You won't be mad at this series if you like the 8DAs, the 10DAs, the 4DAs, any one hour play series. Because ultimately, it's yet another set that knows what it's doing, even if it doesn't have a clear mission statement. In the end the lack of connection or theme on the whole doesn't matter. Because these three stories are just a wonderful ride. 

The Hunting Season by James Kettle

Unreasonably good, The Hunting Season is pretty much exactly what I want from the Ninth Doctor. Despite the lack of any companions, it's an exciting, new and fun kind of story, and it really plays with structure in the audio drama format quite well. There's something so unabashedly epic about this random one episode story that in the grand scheme of things is perhaps unimportant. But it feels important, and the literary illusion of The Doctor being an old Western Hero in this story that isn't western at all is utterly fascinating - Annette Badland's narration of a story that has nothing (and everything) to do with the plot gives the tale an enormous amount of flair and style. I really think this is the standard the Ninth Doctor Adventures should be held to. While we haven't had a perfect episode yet, this story is probably the closest we've gotten so far. It's exactly what Doctor Who is - it's scary, it's quirky, it's funny, and goddamn it, the reviewer in me has kind of left my body right here. There really aren't that many problems, it's a simplistic tale that doesn't really get overambitious, which really works to it's benefit - when the stakes of the world are in the question you know the planet Earth will survive, but when it's a small country house and the few people in it that are in danger, you don't really know what's going to happen. Simplicity is something that can be rewarding. This story really reminded me of a few of the Eighth Doctor and Lucie plays, because well, the truth is, you could put this whole thing up on a BBC Radio Channel and anyone who tuned in would have everything they needed to know to get into Doctor Who. It's wonderful when you have a play not only welcoming to newcomers, but entertaining to all crowds - an easy 9/10 and the best episode of the series so far.

The Curse of Lady Macbeth by Lizzie Hopley

It's very difficult for me to dislike a 9DA - I will note I do have that bias, because even though I was never a humongous fan of series one on television, I do find this series immensely agreeable. As a reviewer, it is my duty to be honest, and so I do have to say that The Curse of Lady Macbeth does push that. It's a story about Macbeth that has absolutely nothing to do with Macbeth. That's the most fascinating thing to me about it - not fascinating in the story concept, but fascinating to me in that I do wonder how Lizzie Hopley thought that was a good idea? When your title characters of Lord/Lady Macbeth are pretty much interchangeable with random scottish lords and ladies from the time period, and the monster is some kind of hatred creature, that does make me question as to what direction you're coming from. Of course, a story about the real historical figures of Macbeth and Lady Macbeth is a good idea, but honestly, the story would be much better if it was actually related to that. The story doesn't really talk about how they're different from the play - Eccleston very enthusiastically says "the real lady Macbeth" at the start and then has a line about how he hopes she's different from her literary counterpart, but this is an avenue worth much more exploring. How did this story get distorted in such a manner? And secondly, it's much less fun to do a story about historical Macbeth and some dumb hate aliens that you really tend to get frequently in Doctor Who than it is to do actually cool Shakespearean Macbeth where you could play with gothic horror, weird blurring of fiction and nonfiction and actually turn out something unique. It would technically brush up a tiny bit on the Shakespeare Code, to be sure, but fictional Macbeth just has this texture to him, this really fascinating dark imagery of bloody daggers and the out out damn spot stuff, and this historical version of Macbeth just isn't interesting enough in comparison. The story is functional, yes, and Eccleston is very good, but I question the direction it comes from, because ultimately, this would be a lot better if they could have a little more fun with it - if the historical aspects of the story are the same if he's any Scottish Lord than he's Macbeth, than why use Macbeth? You should go all in in either direction. A stellar cast - (Eccleston and McIntosh need a Nine and Vastra story desperately) can't save this production from just being another one hour Doctor Who play that's in one ear and out the other. 6/10 

Monster in Metropolis by John Dorney 

What initially seems like a slightly worse redo of The Silver Turk but with the Ninth Doctor actually is quite a bit more. Monster in Metropolis is a story very much suited to Nine, and it's very very intelligent in what it's saying. I haven't seen Metropolis, but I can't imagine how moving this play must be with that context. That's probably the singular word I'd use to describe Monster in Metropolis, moving. It's a tale with such wondrous melancholy to it, a real texture. I like that the story deliberately avoids anything related to the large scale feeling of the Cyberman - it is not an action piece, which is all the better for an audio story. I appreciate that it opts for the smaller scale, even if it makes this feel like one of the most un-Cyberman Cybermen stories ever written. Eccleston is as usual, perfect. A lesser actor would have it be imminently clear that he has no companion in these audios - sometimes Doctors struggle when separated from their companions in the audio format. Much of the Doctor Who story structure can be written around that role. Yet I really appreciate Big Finish's three boxsets of the lone Eccleston (alright, two, Nova did exist in set one) and it's simplistic adaptability. It took me a long time to actively realize that there's not really a character that fills the companion role in this episode. Eccleston carries it essentially entirely by himself. This is especially impressive to me when you compare how simple the other characters in the tale are. While Dorney wrote an excellent script to jump off of, I feel that a readthrough of it would be lifeless. The story is Eccleston, and indeed, Briggs portrayal of a very scared human coming to terms with an awful scenario in a beautiful fashion. To jump to a completely different subject, A few of my friends have critiqued this episode's editing, posting clips online of sudden cuts between scenes. I did not notice this. I've heard the so called badly editing scenes separately, and they are bad, but when listening to the story itself, either they are completely absent from my copy (which I actually do somewhat suspect) or I didn't notice them the second time I heard them, which quite frankly, I find doubtful. As a matter of fact, I applaud this episode's sound design - I really enjoyed the opening and closing of the episode with the sound of a ticker-tape film reel. This story does have simple magical moments like that from time to time - it's not brilliant throughout, it's very much brilliant in bursts and average throughout, but I mean, you aren't going to tell me that the scene where Nine and the Cyberman sit down to watch Metropolis isn't utterly beautiful. Briggs and Eccleston are excellent performers - I think we sometimes forget how fucking gorgeous an actor Briggs is - even ignoring the voice modulation and stuff, he's astonishing - not just the funny robot voices man. I'm not going to pretend that Monster in Metropolis is the first perfect 9DA or anything - I think that there are a bunch more in the series that exceed it. Fright Motif and Hunting Season especially actually do spring to mind. But it does have a purpose to it that many stories don't, and ultimately, I left the story feeling essentially not much else but respect for it. Which, quite frankly, upon exiting a Doctor Who tale is a really rare thing. 9/10