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Post by Deleted on Jan 2, 2021 9:00:13 GMT
personally and I know am in a minority probably but I do enjoy the Brewster stories and would welcome a return of the cheeky chap. The first story is a total jumble of ideas and really takes a few listens to visualise or it did for me and what a performance from a very batty Beth Chalmers(was this her first BF?) I gather from reading a few things that the writers didn’t actually meet and discuss Brewster which is a great pity as there was mileage in what he had been up to with The Tardis (then he was taken up adopted by Colins Doctor)
A Perfect World was basically a love story for the lad and the dangers of a perfect world hahaha one we will never see. Its by no means a brilliant set but definitely worth investing the time in.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 2, 2021 10:22:41 GMT
The fact this release doesn't seem to have had a thread up until now speaks volumes - it is, for me, one of the unheralded classics from the monthly range. I love it that there are so many releases that we actually get stories which are rarely talked about, if that makes sense: it just shows how spoiled we are, as fans, to have this much product. But yes, I loved this and wish it had been a four-parter. There was something about those three-part releases (with 'bonus' episode!) that felt incomplete to me. The Death Traders was another story with such brilliant ideas, only to have them rushed to fit in with the three-part format, especially as the additional single episode was often so throwaway.
A great, surreal, barren story from Marc Platt, who excels at these eccentric worlds and characters, so much so that his work often comes across as a kind of fairy-tale. A case in point is Beth Chalmers' character, who is both bizarre and funny at the same time. I loved the minimalist sound design too - it really sold the isolation of the location to me.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 2, 2021 10:31:53 GMT
The fact this release doesn't seem to have had a thread up until now speaks volumes - it is, for me, one of the unheralded classics from the monthly range. I love it that there are so many releases that we actually get stories which are rarely talked about, if that makes sense: it just shows how spoiled we are, as fans, to have this much product. But yes, I loved this and wish it had been a four-parter. There was something about those three-part releases (with 'bonus' episode!) that felt incomplete to me. The Death Traders was another story with such brilliant ideas, only to have them rushed to fit in with the three-part format, especially as the additional single episode was often so throwaway.
A great, surreal, barren story from Marc Platt, who excels at these eccentric worlds and characters, so much so that his work often comes across as a kind of fairy-tale. A case in point is Beth Chalmers' character, who is both bizarre and funny at the same time. I loved the minimalist sound design too - it really sold the isolation of the location to me.
Yes truly we are spoiled.A wealth of ideas it’s always good to revisit stuff and away from any original hype that invariably surrounds stuff and influences us.Beth pretty much shines in this definitely am not sure making it a four parter would have altered it very much but could just serve up more bizzarreness when we get To Perfect World and the plumbers I was almost glad of a more normal setting and more of the dusty Baker Street residence always welcome.I think that’s the thing about the TV show and BF ,BF know you do not need to go with universe shattering/main character changing arcs there is life in just telling a good self contained(for most part story)
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Post by slithe on Jan 2, 2021 12:03:22 GMT
I liked Brewster and wonder what would have happened had he met the 7th Doctor (as was initially the plan if I recall). It's a quiet, but solid, little story that doesn't do much and isn't particularly memorable.
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Post by slithe on Jan 2, 2021 12:03:38 GMT
Davison comes across well here and does let the 'mask' of the patient/kinder Fifth Doctor slip a bit. I still think Brewster is better with the Sixth Doctor - the Crimes of Thomas Brewster is silly fun and is one of my favourites.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 2, 2021 16:30:08 GMT
I liked Brewster and wonder what would have happened had he met the 7th Doctor (as was initially the plan if I recall). It's a quiet, but solid, little story that doesn't do much and isn't particularly memorable. It was good he got a mention in the Stranded1 set he is gone but not forgotten by 8
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Post by grinch on Jan 3, 2021 12:36:36 GMT
Time Reef is a very imaginative and extremely bizarre story (even for Marc Platt) with some nice and simply fantastical ideas in it. One could argue that’s perhaps why it isn’t more highly regarded. It’s so odd in places with it’s strange characters and usual setting that I could quite easily see that putting some people off.
A Perfect World is a nice one and done. And it serves as a fitting farewell story (for now...) for Thomas Brewster.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 3, 2021 12:41:09 GMT
Time Reef is a very imaginative and extremely bizarre story (even for Marc Platt) with some nice and simply fantastical ideas in it. One could argue that’s perhaps why it isn’t more highly regarded. It’s so odd in places with it’s strange characters and usual setting that I could quite easily see that putting some people off. A Perfect World is a nice one and done. And it serves as a fitting farewell story (for now...) for Thomas Brewster. It has the same kind of weirdness that The Magic Mousetrap has perhaps that’s why I enjoy it
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Post by grinch on Jan 3, 2021 12:45:10 GMT
Time Reef is a very imaginative and extremely bizarre story (even for Marc Platt) with some nice and simply fantastical ideas in it. One could argue that’s perhaps why it isn’t more highly regarded. It’s so odd in places with it’s strange characters and usual setting that I could quite easily see that putting some people off. A Perfect World is a nice one and done. And it serves as a fitting farewell story (for now...) for Thomas Brewster. It has the same kind of weirdness that The Magic Mousetrap has perhaps that’s why I enjoy it I think The Magic Mousetrap tends to get more of a pass because when it comes to the nature of the threat involved in that one, strange stories and settings are almost expected. Don’t get me wrong though, I love that one as well.
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Post by Tim Bradley on Jan 17, 2021 10:43:33 GMT
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Post by elkawho on Jan 17, 2021 15:31:00 GMT
I like weird, but I don't like this one. Sorry folks, this one is a definite miss in my opinion. I started out really liking Brewster and intrigued by what they could do with the character, but by this release I hated every decision they made with him. I'm glad some of you enjoy it.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 17, 2021 15:56:06 GMT
I started out really liking Brewster and intrigued by what they could do with the character, but by this release I hated every decision they made with him. I started from the opposite position, I never liked Brewster... but by this release I thought someone at BF was playing a cruel joke on us. I always hoped that the character of Thomas Brewster would improve, but for me he never did.
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Post by Ela on Jan 18, 2021 22:25:00 GMT
The fact this release doesn't seem to have had a thread up until now speaks volumes - it is, for me, one of the unheralded classics from the monthly range.
The fact that it doesn't have a thread speaks to the fact that it was released long before this forum existed. That's true for many of the older releases that don't have threads here. It was probably discussed at length on the old official BF forum.
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Post by Ela on Jan 18, 2021 22:25:22 GMT
I like weird, but I don't like this one. Sorry folks, this one is a definite miss in my opinion. I started out really liking Brewster and intrigued by what they could do with the character, but by this release I hated every decision they made with him. I'm glad some of you enjoy it. Oh, and yeah, this wasn't a favorite for me, either.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 18, 2021 23:19:17 GMT
The fact this release doesn't seem to have had a thread up until now speaks volumes - it is, for me, one of the unheralded classics from the monthly range.
The fact that it doesn't have a thread speaks to the fact that it was released long before this forum existed. That's true for many of the older releases that don't have threads here. It was probably discussed at length on the old official BF forum. You mean ... there was a time before this forum existed? I've blotted such times out of my mind!
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Post by Ela on Jan 18, 2021 23:56:36 GMT
The fact that it doesn't have a thread speaks to the fact that it was released long before this forum existed. That's true for many of the older releases that don't have threads here. It was probably discussed at length on the old official BF forum. You mean ... there was a time before this forum existed? I've blotted such times out of my mind!
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Post by Kestrel on Oct 15, 2022 3:02:43 GMT
Time ReefHm... this is one of those stories that just sort of feels... discordant. Or perhaps a better descriptor might be... tonally inconsistent. Sometimes it's dramatic, sometimes silly, sometimes very campy, and none of the tones cohere very well together. It's like there are three wildly different drafts of the same story spliced together. I dunno. Maybe that doesn't make sense, but that's the feeling I left this story with. Anyway. As mixed as my overall feelings on Time Reef are, I must say that the opening scene was pretty perfect. I think the term is "stinger?" It does such a great job at hooking the audience and feeling them in with compelling mystery. Especially that final line: Quote of the story: "Poor boy. A curse on these rocks and this damned reed. Curse the rock and curse the damned Doctor who brought us here and abandoned us all to our fate."And then we immediately cut to the Doctor bumbling about, lost in his own TARDIS. Absolutely pitch-perfect. Though the impact of that stinger is somewhat lessened with the reveal that this Doctor wasn't the Doctor but rather Brewster in masquerade. So far the Brewster arc, such as it is, really isn't doing much for me. And I think that's largely down to the character himself, rather than the actual stories. I just... don't understand him as a person. Why does he do the things that he does? What does he want? What is he trying to accomplish? I feel like there's no real depth to him beyond the bare premise of being a "cosmic Artful Dodger." Which, yeah, is a cool premise -- but that's supposed to be the starting point for characters, not the end. Some assorted aspects of the story that didn't quite work for me: - These early time travelers (who initially I thought/hoped would be a bit of a riff on Odysseus or Jason) being, basically, space-time Vikings is a neat concept... but why would the Doctor look up to pillagers, looters and murders? Seems a tad out of character.
- So the captain is both prophesied to die a heroic death and cursed with immortality. What a neat detail (and one that heartens back to those Greek epics). Shame it's only ever brought up the one time and I mediate,y forgotten, being totally irrelevant to both the plot and characters. Shouldn't this have lead to the captain meeting some appropriately ironic fate at the conclusion of the story?
- Lastly, I'm generally fond of deliberate anachronism (as is this franchise, as I'm sure were all well aware) but the idea of these sailors using super-advanced technology in the approximate form of ancient, or at least colonial era sailing vessels just... does not work well for me in the absence of any visual component.
And that's just about everything I have to say about Time Reef: I found it a middling (at best) and largely inconsequential affair. Fortunately there's more to this MR release than just Time Reef, and not for the first time (or even the second time) the single-episode story included almost as a bonus winds up stealing the show. ———————————————————————————————————————————————— A Perfect World
In a word, A Perfect World is just fun. Really fun. A nice, simple premise with an amusing twist, relatable characters, and excellent pacing with no fat to trim. These "short story" full-cast dramas tend to produce some some great stories and a real highlight of the Monthly Range. It's a shame the move to the XDA format has essentially removed them from the Big Finish Arsenal, so to speak. I suspect that their mileage may vary quite a bit for most listeners, but personally I quite enjoyed the "cosmic plumbers" popping out of nowhere to both set the plot in motion and, u,timately, conclude things. It's a great way to gloss over the unimportant details of how and why the world has changed, while at the same time injecting a bit of Douglass Adams-y absurdity into the story, which is something I will always appreciate. Quote of the story: "No. Staying with us would've been the biggest mistake of his life. He made the right decision. And, you know, I think he'll probably do very well."
That ending. That last line. That exquisite delivery from Davison. We've come full-corcle, with this release both opening and ending perfectly. And in the latter case, it's this one line that really elevates this story to a whole new level -- demonstrating with the keenness of a knife just how deep the 5th Doctor's melancholy goes. Here is a Doctor so consumed by guilt that his whole view of the world -- of his life on the TARDIS -- is fundamentally warped. We've discussed on other threads how the 5th Doctor's TARDIS team is something of a found family, and here we can see (without, I think, needing to read too much into things) that the 5th Doctor sees himself, and his companions, as orphans. Traveling not to explore the universe, but for want of having anywhere else to go. The eternal voyagers, ever-seeking the home they'll never find. (And, tragically, failing to recognize the home they have.) Its also hard not to detect a touch of envy in the Doctor's final lines: here we can, arguably for the first time (chronologically) hear a hint of the Doctor's longing for the "dream of a normal life" that would be such a poignant aspect of the 10th Doctor's character arc. This winds up sort of grounding A Perfect World within the continuity of Doctor Who, anchoring itself both to the fallout from Adric's death in the past as well as future story arcs. An i press Ive accomplishment for so short a tale.
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