The Ninth Doctor Adventures: Into The Stars

 

The Ninth Doctor Adventures: Into The Stars

He's been "Back to Earth," and now he's going "Into The Stars!" If there was any consistency the following set would be all historical stories, but let's not complain now, alrighty?? Into the Stars is the most Ninth Doctor set of all time. It follows all the rules. Three stories, very very awkwardly and generically themed, the middle one of which is the least good of the three. Include one episode that is weirdly phenomenal (most likely written by Tim Foley) and blows all of the other ones in the set out of the water to keep you latched onto the series. Give the Ninth Doctor no introspection related to his character and have the only character arcs in the set relegated to the guest stars. Possibly throw a random monster in there, but only for one episode, and just so people who care about that buy the thing. It's a formula, and if you don't like how that formula sounds, or are annoyed after five other sets that mostly follow that formula, Into The Stars isn't for you. At this point, I think when you buy these sets - you know what you're in for. 

Salvation Nine by Timothy X Atack 

Salvation Nine is absolutely gorgeously brilliant on paper. The Doctor meets a group of Sontaran renegades who have given up a life of war and evolved over many years into a peace loving and entirely different species. This is exactly the sort of thing you should pitch for the Ninth Doctor, it lines up with his character perfectly, in that the Ninth Doctor is at a point in his life where he is being confronted with his own prejudices. The story is also funny, but not funny in a grotesque sort of way that ruins the fun of the Sontarans and any intimidation value they may have. Salvation Nine is good. 

That's it, really, it's only "good." It never skyrockets into great territory, and I think that has to do mostly with the fact that the guest character's arcs are fairly simple in nature. I love Josie Lawrence as Gaznak, who somehow manages to outmatch Dan Starkey's usual immaculate turn as the Sontaran species. But I just really don't have much to say about Salvation Nine. It's good, it's just not a story that's going to change anyone's life. I think this may have to do with the fact that it's much more concerned with being fun than it is about being something deep and intrinsically character based. It is fun! It is so fun, don't get me wrong - it's just I could tell where it was going to go from the second that the baby Niners were introduced. Sometimes indeed you do need fun Doctor Who stories but my favorite tales from this range are ones that possess a bit more substance. 

Last of the Zetacene by James Kettle

I was immensely excited to see Last of the Zetacene was written by James Kettle, because James Kettle is a rad little guy who wrote the best story in Stranded, one of the best stories in River Song, and the best story in the Ninth Doctor Adventures Series One. Perhaps going in, my standards were too high, but Unfortunately, Last of the Zetacene may be one of the least memorable Ninth Doctor stories yet. In Last of the Zetacene, The Doctor and Random Girl of the Week discover that Evil Maureen O Brien has kidnapped a space whale. They go into a high stakes Poker game against a bunch of silly space characters including a memorable alien blob named The Rotter and somebody named Succeeding of all things. Maureen O Brien playing an evil character is fun, even if it is quite odd that they brought her in and she isn't playing Vicki. Being so used to her recognizable voice as dear old Vicki might mean that Selo takes some getting used to, but ultimately, she's one of the better parts of it.

The problem with Last of the Zetacene is that James Kettle kind of perfected this sort of thing in Barrister to the Stars, which worked well as it had a good fish out of water central character, and a cool mystery plot, and really had no problems whatsoever. That story is an all time classic. This just feels like a weird fusion of The End of The World and The Beast Below, having the pathos of neither. With a bunch of alien characters, you really need a modern day earth character to serve as an audience surrogate. The story sort of attempts to do this, but it tries to have the best of both worlds and sort of fails at both. Golly, this sounds negative, but...

 The main companion lady of the episode, Nel, is really, really bland for a companion character, even for an episode of the week like this series so often has. She's from the future, but at no point does she really feel like she's from the future?? She talks like she's from modern day, but she's comfortable with aliens because it's the future. It doesn't work. She's very immediately well adjusted to working in a game of chance against evil high class businessman people. She doesn't feel like a real person, essentially, and that is pretty much where the story goes wrong. Especially considering we need to feel the tension in this space poker game when she's basically Flip Jackson or Lucie Miller, that sort of archetype in terms of personality. A happy london companion lady doesn't work when she's supposed to be from the future and space and whatnot - you can't have your cake and eat it too.

 Nor did the stakes of Last of the Zetacene feel particularly high when it's all about saving the nearly extinct space pig. That's a good motivation, but the story needs to focus more on that aforementioned motivation to make us care about the nearly extinct space pig. The Beast Below is actually quite good at this. Last of the Zetacene doesn't focus on what the story should essentially be about. That's the thing, the story isn't very focused. Oh, well. It's the middle story of the set, and these are next to always rubbish. I'm not actually mad or anything, I just know that Christopher Eccleston, James Kettle and Maureen O'Brien can do better.

Break The Ice by Tim Foley

Break the Ice is the requisite Tim Foley writes a banger episode. I really could sort of end it with that - you'll probably, if you're reading this review be quite aware of what Tim Foley does with this range, and he does it very well. 

Break the Ice is the kind of banger Russell T Davies style script you'd get once in a while - I think a good example would be Midnight or Waters of Mars. It's The Ninth Doctor going up against an inexplicably horrific force, and the story manifests this EXCEEDINGLY well, despite the story literally being about Jack Frost of all things. Break The Ice is just incredible though. It's The Ninth Doctor up against an eldritch horror from the time war onboard a slowly sinking space station. It's got a great companion standin who has a really nice anxiety attack scene?? I know that's an odd thing to praise but it's really nice. 

Anyway Break The Ice is another triumph for the range, just when you were thinking this set is kinda tripe. It's still not the best set in the universe, and both Back to Earth and Hidden Depths are likely better purchases, but Break the Ice makes Into The Stars just barely worthwhile. It's a marvelous story.