The Diary of River Song Series Seven

 

The Diary of River Song Series Seven

In many ways, this feels like a set made for me - I really don't care too much for overblown continuity, and I love a good sci-fi detective story. River Song is a brilliant character that I really enjoy. On paper, this is probably one of my favorite pitches for a set, River out here doing random detective work. More sets should have abstract pitches like this. The following set attempted doing the same thing with robots, but I'm afraid that's not the same thing. Big abstract genres are really good ideas for Big Finish to play with in sets, theming them around something. I'd totally take a comedy or a horror River set. This being said, Diary of River Song series 7 is almost the odd one out in the series, and that puts it into a very very interesting position...

Colony of Strangers by James Goss

Colony of Strangers is interesting in how much of a non-event it is. Most other River sets draw you in with a sharp and quality opening signaling more to come. Series One opens - the very first episode drawing you in with River for the first time on audio and a bunch of plot threads that will be followed up on. Series Two opens with River meeting the Seventh Doctor. Series Three and Four open with some bangers, and series Five and Six open with River meeting major characters of the Doctor Who Universe. Series Seven opens with an intentionally subdued statement. There's a body on a beach, and River just non-chalantly walks up, and declares her intention to investigate. It's jarring in how normal it feels. River 7 simply doesn't hook you at first, but if you stick around, you'll find a deftly plotted and very good sci-fi murder mystery, a very interesting and clever bit of fiction that gives you all the clues and lets you stick them together if you're smart enough to. There's some wonderfully morose energy in Colony. It is essentially River does Broadchurch or Shetland in terms of tone, although perhaps it also draws from other bleak Nordic mysteries. Regardless, things are dark, modern, and moody in atmosphere even if not much actually horribly dark happens. Colony has this identity, this almost bordering on pastiche thing of what it's going to do, and it executes it. It's a James Goss script, and while it's not a James Goss Torchwood script, it's still the same brilliant writer behind the helm. The characters are fairly interesting, River is an excellent lead, but it's also nowhere near the bombast that the series usually goes for. I like it a lot, and as a mission statement for the set it's a good opener of saying that we're just doing normal detective stories without any fuss, thank you. It's not perfect, and I don't think that it's incredible or anything, but it's a very nice subtle piece of work that says that we're going to do some different shit this time around: 8/10

Abbey of Heretics by Lizbeth Myles

It's perhaps slightly cynical of me to think that this story was exclusively made so the cover artists could have a nice and easy time using the cover with the composite of River from Doom Coalition 3, but admittedly, the thought did strike my mind. The story doesn't necessarily dispute it either - this is a very uneventful one. This is only Lizbeth Myles second ever contribution to the Whoniverse after a Sixth Doctor anthology story, so I feel safe in saying that this slightly subpar story is merely because of the fact that she was getting her footing. This is after all, before she wrote plenty of excellent masterpieces like Grey Man of The Mountain, The Blood Woods, The Outlaws, The Black Knight, and I'm sure many others to come. It's a very solid list that one, of a woman who is slowly becoming one of my favorite writers, so yeah, Abbey of Heretics does rather stand out. It's also kind of not really very good as a mystery. Which isn't to throw things about. Mysteries are probably one of the hardest genres to write. They also must have a certain formula, an order of things, and messing around with that order can sort of lead to aimlessness. For the first half of Abbey, we're investigating a pretty generic Doctor Who threat, that of a sickness slowly overtaking the monastery. It's not a very urgent threat, considering how River initially seems solely focused on decoding a book that the Abbey's library has in it's possession that the Abbess views as Heretical. It's a very long time before we begin investigating the previous Abbess's death that brought this all into motion. If you can't tell, Abbey of Heretics isn't, well, uninteresting, but it is slow. I think it needed a tinge more humor or an urgent threat like a monster of some sort to bring it all together. I still think a bad River episode is usually better than most bad Doctor Who stories, as I love River so much, I almost don't care to rate this one down a lot, but I must be honest and say it's probably a 5/10, not to say that River fans like myself won't still find a lot to enjoy regardless of the ultimate quality.

Barrister to the Stars by James Kettle

James Kettle immediately proves himself. This was his first ever Doctor Who related script, and it's one of his best. It's a legal drama that's mainly concerned with doing a fish out of water story of River literally kidnapping a random defense lawyer to represent her in a space case where she is accused of killing a dictator that conquered several star systems. She's allowed to pick whatever criminal justice system she wants for her trial, and she's picked him to represent her exclusively because British law is so slow. From there, they investigate several exceedingly colorful and wonderful characters, and to be fair, all of this is in the first twenty minutes or so, it's not spoilers, it's just an example of how utterly magical this one is. The character work in this one is stunning. I love every single character involved in this case, and River almost gets to step back, and smugly be a supporting character, only interjecting whenever the story needs a fabulous extra oomph. She's used the perfect amount, and Mr. Hodgkiss is the ultimate fun lawyer man. Better Call Saul my ass, this dude is an AMAZING character. The ambiguity in the ending is stellar, I love everything about this story and I have literally no notes. Sometimes being a reviewer is a very easy job: 10/10

Carnival of Angels by Roy Gill

Previously having three standalone no Doctor Who references stories evidently gave Roy Gill the license to go fricking overboard and be like, okay, sequel to Animal Instinct, prequel to The Angels Take Manhattan, Melody Malone story, weird Weeping Angels lore!! Essentially it's a cool noir story, where River is investigating a time displaced man seeing his own murder. From there, the story moves on to a carnival, where there's a sort of ominous carnival ride that is sending people to "Heaven" and Hell but not letting them return. It's a good hook, and one that works for the Angels, although the more complicated plot requires that they have a mouthpiece in the form of Miss Quirke, a woman working for them. This isn't as well utilized as it is in stories like Side of the Angels or Time of The Angels. The Mouthpiece character for the Weeping Angels works best if they're dead, and don't have their own agency. In addition, Miss Quirke has the weirdest fricking accent, which normally wouldn't be a critique, but this is audio. The Angels themselves are well used. They're characters that you think wouldn't work on audio every time that you see their faces on the cover of a story, but they're almost continually delightful. There's an interesting choice on the part of Roy Gill to characterize the Angels into a sort of hierarchy. There's a line about River recognizing that these Angels are weaker, talking in vague, beautifully not telling us much but very ominous terms, and how this makes them dangerous. It's very good world building, and while I hate usually having more Angel information that ruins their mystique, this in fact sort of muddies the waters even more. I like not knowing everything about these guys. The return of Luke, a character from Diary of River Song series 5, is very welcome. He's a character that helps make the story work, serving as River's stereotypical Noir Film Secretary character, while also just, kind of being delightful. He's also very good bisexual representation, which isn't something you see often. His love interest on the other hand is kind of unnecessary. But I like Luke, and hope that he returns throughout the sets, he's definitely one of the series' best supporting characters. The main issue with Carnival of Angels is that it's a bit too long. I'd say that this story needed either a longer first half and a shorter second, or a shorter runtime in general. The resolution to the noir plotline happens sadly a bit too soon. Still, it's another quality story, if nowhere near the previous episode's ballpark: 7/10