The Fourth Doctor Adventures: Angels and Demons

 

The Fourth Doctor Adventures: Angels and Demons

[Usual disclaimer: I am not an asshole. I am reviewing a product. I wish none involved in the making of this product harm in any way, nor should my opinion be taken as the entire fact and truth of the matter - I can only speak to the feelings of myself. I wish all who read this review a good day.]

Angels and Demons is the second volume of the strangest series that I can really think Big Finish has made in quite some time, due to it's sheer disinterest in it's original material. For quite some time, the Fourth Doctor Adventures have been predicated on the logic of nostalgia - that they should be based around the idea of evoking 1970s material. This has been present since the genesis of the range with The Fourth Doctor Adventures Series One and The Fourth Doctor Lost Stories boxset, way back in 2012 - being promoted with these ads.

Eleven years later, how much has really changed?? Fandom these days exists in a remarkably cynical fashion, as many people bemoaning the imminent return of David Tennant on social media will tell you. People want something new, but they also want it to be Saturday Teatime in 1977 or 2006. Nostalgia seems to have gotten more and more powerful as of late, with films like the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, Scream's triumphant return or more recently, the return of Top Gun, Indiana Jones, or Michael Keaton in DC's The Flash. The successful projects of these tend to do something new and remarkable, worth noting upon. In short, nostalgia is on the mind more than ever. The Fourth Doctor Adventures usually do nostalgia based tales, but sometimes they do something new and bold. It genuinely can be either. 

The Fourth Doctor Adventures Series Twelve has operated in a weird manner where it isn't quite doing something new and bold and isn't exactly teatime in 1977 either. These approaches both sort of work - but it's not really either. It all comes down to the brilliant character of Margaret and her intensive misuse throughout the two sets. When Margaret gets something to do, the stories leap to the next level - Baker, Jameson and Hughes soar to the challenge - and so we have a series of halves. Half of the six stories in the season are good. Half of the six stories of the season are bad. It's difficult to determine what overall tone they should have gone with. Luckily, Angels and Demons is by far the stronger half - even if sections of it can leave a bitter taste in the mouth.

The Wizard of Time by Roy Gill

The Wizard of Time is the first good un' of the series, although it's also an odd one out in that it sort of occupies a different framework from any of the other episodes. Taking place vaguely within the format of a companion chronicle framing device with narration, we learn about the life of Jacob Harner, an ordinary man who upon meeting the Fourth Doctor as a young boy, took a vastly different career in life, dramatizing his life's work as children's books. It is a Doctor-lite story, and it's even more companion lite than Doctor-lite, mainly focusing on the guest stars, which results in Leela and Margaret to have frick all to do, although Leela does at one point memorably use the term "unalive." The fairytale thing that the story is based around is sort of a way to sort of fuse the writing of the famous Doctor Who target novelizations with the plot of the Eleventh Hour. Like that episode, Jacob is played by multiple actors across the story's runtime. I think I would prefer Jacob's stories to be given more focus - perhaps the whole story could have worked within that lens, of Tom Baker playing a Wizard of Time and not Doctor Who, and the story definitely misses a trick in not having a final scene where Leela/Margaret and Dr Who are introspective about what happened in the story's events. Still, it's remarkably harmless and entertaining for Doctor Who standards. It's a good story, but it's really hurt by those that surround it. A Doctor and Companion-lite series would be a lot more fitting for a TARDIS team that has really gelled, and Margaret and Leela, while showing stunning potential, need a bit more time in the tin. 

The Friendly Invasion by Chris Chapman

The Friendly Invasion is almost The Android Invasion, but thanks to taking place on earth, it's a bit more Invasion of the Body Snatchers with added period. Fans of Chris Chapman's usually stellar Big Finish work may be disappointed - he does not adjust to the two part format with the aplomb he usually delivers his four part stories. The Friendly Invasion is rushed, and more than a bit frustrating. It's a historical piece, which is Chapman's strong suit, and he relishes developing the guest stars a good deal. Technically it should be a Margaret character-piece, but similarly to Antillia The Lost, Margaret's scenes feel bolted-on, even though she has much more to do. During the middle of an important plot sequence, Margaret pauses the plot to traumadump her backstory in a way that reminded me of Ryan's Dad in the Tsuranga Conundrum. This is really nothing inspiring - we have had many stories about interference with history before, and usually when that happens, it's an excuse to have a delightful villain such as The Monk or the Master. Here, the villains are truly what sinks the piece, generic humans with glowing eyes. You still shouldn't skip this one, it becomes very important for emotional impact later on, despite it not being impressive in of-itself.

Stone Cold by Roland Moore

Stone Cold has no original ideas when it comes to using The Weeping Angels, and doesn't really care to do so - it is far more concerned with executing the ideas we are familiar with flawlessly. The sound-design, acting, guest stars and cliffhangers are all really good at creating the Hinchcliffe gothic that we so love from the program - Stone Cold taking particular influence from The Robots of Death and The Horror of Fang Rock. One could view Stone Cold as slightly derivative, but it is actually the strongest piece in the series thus far. All the regulars are well-developed, as are the guest stars, everything is given the perfect amount of time to breathe, and the character work scenes do not feel tacked on to the plot itself. Stone Cold is almost weirdly simplistic, but it's also Doctor #4 at the top of his game, and exactly where he belongs... trapped and desperate on a cruiseliner with a bunch of people who really don't like how odd he is. The character bit at the ending genuinely made me tear up a tiny bit, this should NOT be this damn good. 

The Ghost of Margaret by Tim Foley

Tim Foley is getting a bit of a John Dorney reputation at this point, where he sweeps in at the last moment in the set, and just when you think it's going to be fairly mediocre, he drops another banger on you. I was almost concerned starting this one - the entire season has been a series of flukes, and I worried that Foley, like others, would struggle with the TARDIS team dynamic, but The Ghost of Margaret is a character-driven delight that almost softens the wound that we won't be getting any more Margaret in the future. Big Finish companions either stay on longer than they should, or they leave before we really get to know them, and Margaret is completely the latter. I would love to see her appear in a further boxset sometime, or maybe be shuffled off to Davison or McCoy, although the way The Ghost of Margaret ends, this is exceedingly unlikely. A story has to work remarkably hard to sell me on a romance (I am not much of a soppy person when it comes to them) but The Ghost of Margaret really, really delivers in that regard, creating a bond between Margaret and Ray that is earnest and sweet, nothing more than two characters who depend on each other. While the villains are a bit second-rate, The Ghost of Margaret ends things off for this trio very satisfactorily, although it feels odd to leave Margaret, as in Stone Cold and this one especially, she was really beginning to hit her stride.