BFC 12: The Island of Dr Moreau (spoilers)

I'm really excited for this. Its my fave Wells story

It's very nice indeed.

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Due out Tuesday 4th July

Regards

mark687

Our review indiemacuser.co.uk/2017/07/04/audio-review-the-island-of-dr-moreau/

Honestly this is my least favorite so far. I am finding it a chore to get through. I don't know if I would have enjoyed it more if I was familiar with the book but that certainly wasn't a problem for me with the previous Wells releases all of which I loved.

Interesting because The Shape of Things To Come was my definite favorite so far. 

Although I also really enjoyed Invisible Man and The First Men in the Moon . I am just having trouble getting into this one for some reason. 

Every release in this Wells series has impressed me and this was no exception. The range is so varied, from quirky lunar voyaging to classic and now-familiar tales of time travel and alien invasion to the breathtaking adaptation of the 'unadaptable' textbook of visions of the future - and two scientific horror stories, a man who became invisible - and this...

Wells' novel is the most horrific classic I've read, far beyond 'Dracula' or even 'Frankenstein' from which it draws some inspiration. It has 'adventure' elements - the shipwreck, the hunt, Moreau's death, the fire - but most of the horror comes from the brooding, introspective account of the thoughts of the unfortunate Edward Prendick, trapped in a living nightmare where the human and the beast are blurred again and again.

This begins as a moral blurring, when the shipwrecked Prendick and his fellow survivors turn their thoughts to cannibalism. Rescue takes him to that steaming tropical island where Moreau's grotesque 'humanised' animal creations give the blurring physical form. Finally, in his isolation, Prendick begins to blur mentally with the half-beasts, sharing their lives in the dark ravine. He is saved only by the reawakening of his human spirit in sudden revulsion against the half-beasts and by their descent back to their animal natures which make them naturally hostile - all except the faithful dog-man, still 'a man's best friend' despite Moreau's cruelties, a poignant touch in the horror of corruption.

Bringing the loathsome reek of Moreau's island kingdom to audio was never going to be easy, when so much of the book depends on the slow building of atmosphere and exploring moral dilemmas around life and creation, but this latest Big Finish Wells adaptation fully lived up to my expectations, Ken Bentley both dramatising and directing. The adventure elements are very well done as expected - that's a splendid audio shipwreck that opens the production - and I was also very pleased by the extent that Prendick's voice (and Wells') from his traveller's tale is used to describe his thoughts and experiences. This does mean the pace is slower than a pure adventure story, but that's only the surface of the novel and I thought the deeper, darker side came through very well indeed.

Ronald Pickup gives Moreau all the certainty, arrogance and calm scientific cruelty that I'd expected; a scientist who sees absolutely nothing wrong with his hideous vivisection experiments - except their lack of full success. His star performance is a highlight of the production, but Moreau is present in only a relatively small part of the story. This is mostly Prendick's tale and John Heffernan is excellent throughout his character's long mental journey through a living nightmare, well matched by Enzo Cilenti as Moreau's accessory Doctor Montgomery. The other actors who play the - less usual - inhabitants of the island voice their grotesque characters splendidly.

Big Finish productions always have very good sound design and music, and this time I thought they were both exceptional, Howard Carter's music creating an exotic, tropical atmosphere with hints of the style of classic adventure films. Steve Foxon's sound design is superb - that really is a great shipwreck at the start - and equally good at the details like footsteps on the raised wooden floor of Prendick's beach cabin, with the distant thunder of the Pacific surf. And in helping to give life to the voices of dreadful, pitiful creatures that should never have lived at all...

(As you will have gathered, I thought this was another outstanding release in the Wells series. I was lucky enough to enjoy listening to it outdoors on what was by English standards a hot, humid day under the high sun of midsummer, almost like being on some island in the tropics... Most impressed that Big Finish can now apparently provide climatic design for their releases too... )

I thought it was very well-done. It took its time to build tension. The terror was palpable in the first half. I think it lost a little momentum in the second half. It's definitely a thought provoking piece.