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Post by Star Platinum on Jun 14, 2022 6:53:21 GMT
What are your thoughts on this particular story?
With the majority of the timeonic fusion device plot resolved in the previous story, this one acts as much more of a character piece.
Torvald gets a large portion of the spotlight this release as his story moves along. Louise Jameson once again puts in a great performance as Lela, she’s got some great material with this stories revelations. Personally, I think the standout in this story India Fisher, her performance as Sissy Pollard was very well done. She evokes Charley, but brings a utterly contemptible version of the character. There are a few well placed condemnations of her views in this story.
Lastly the last of the Timeonic fusion devicesbplot threads are wrapped up nicely as the writers begin to set the stage for the next series.
Once again, Gallifrey makes nods to Neverland and Zagreus, but there’s also a Wormery nod in there for good measure.
Over all a great story, and my personal favourite of the first series.
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Post by Kestrel on Jun 15, 2022 14:21:04 GMT
Yeah, it's definitely a strong end to the first series that wraps everything up nicely. I especially liked just how willing it was to embrace the chaotic, timey-wimeyness of the setting. The whole convoluted timelines sending the Timonic Fusion a device this way and that were perhaps a little too confusing, but I really appreciate the attempt. I feel like, in the fog of my unreliable recollection at least, the future sets generally failed at exploring the potential of time travel to the same extent.
Like the next arc, the Imperiatrix thing IIRC, wound up being a fairly straightforward political drama, and the following arc was more about parallel universes than time loops or paradoxes. This set also introduces the idea of parallel "temporal powers" which also, sadly, are not adequately explored in the following sets.
I didn't really catch the reference to Wormery, though, but TBH that's not one of the MRs I remember particularly well. Was that the one where Romana was tortured?
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Post by Digi on Jun 19, 2022 13:42:05 GMT
It's a good story. I enjoy the conceit of the entire thing being on a train....the story is nothing at all like Murder on the Orient Express of course, but it puts me in mind of that mysterious storytelling where all the players are in a confined space, and the mystery just has to unspool.
If I have to split hairs on anything about this one, it's that they chose to integrate the concurrent Eighth Doctor/Charley storyline. Now, personally I originally came into this range because it spun out of the Eighth Doctor stories so I benefited from it. But it seems like it may not have been the wisest of choices to conclude the first series of your spinoff show by leaning so heavily on another range entirely.
That said: it's done well. The entire Sissy story here is very well told, and the tragedy of how it ends is dark in a way I can't even conceive of Big Finish attempting in this day and age. This is exactly the sort of stuff I was talking about in recent days when I was talking about a different set of 'rules' for the Gary Russell era than they have to follow now, and in the case of this particular story, grateful that they had the freedom to go to very challenging places.
On another angle entirely, I really think this script does an excellent job of utilizing its entire cast. There can be some stories where a character gets a little sidelined, or maybe there are three main characters and the guests are just there to give the big three an excuse to deliver exposition, but that's just not the case here. This one is a script where every single character in it has things to do, and every single one of those character plots contributes in a significant way to the overall story. It's a very well put together script.
Really enjoy this one.
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Post by Star Platinum on Jun 23, 2022 1:53:23 GMT
Yeah, it's definitely a strong end to the first series that wraps everything up nicely. I especially liked just how willing it was to embrace the chaotic, timey-wimeyness of the setting. The whole convoluted timelines sending the Timonic Fusion a device this way and that were perhaps a little too confusing, but I really appreciate the attempt. I feel like, in the fog of my unreliable recollection at least, the future sets generally failed at exploring the potential of time travel to the same extent. Like the next arc, the Imperiatrix thing IIRC, wound up being a fairly straightforward political drama, and the following arc was more about parallel universes than time loops or paradoxes. This set also introduces the idea of parallel "temporal powers" which also, sadly, are not adequately explored in the following sets. I didn't really catch the reference to Wormery, though, but TBH that's not one of the MRs I remember particularly well. Was that the one where Romana was tortured? I think that you're thinking of the Apocalypse Element, where Romana was tortured by the Daleks. The Wormery reference is just a throwaway line saying that Torvald Bungled something at Bianca's nightclub. Doesn't really add much to the story, more just flavour text really. |
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Post by Kestrel on Jun 30, 2022 4:38:03 GMT
In truth I was thinking about just about everything but A Blind Eye -- a story I forgot even existed. In my mind, the finale to Gallifrey Series 1 was The Inquiry. Funny how that works.
It's weird, in this first series we've got two stories that form a loose arc and tie in to the larger arc that Gallifrey Series 2 will leap into headfirst... right alongside a pair of fairly episodic, standalone adventures. I think it would've made more sense to keep the two episodic stories in the center of the series, together, bookended by the arc-heavy ones. Ah well.
Anyway, A Blind Eye is a weird story. I really appreciate that it explores British fascists, a not-insubstantial group of people that are all too-often ignored when it comes to fiction set in and around WWII (not unlike the American fascists who were just so damned great at being fascy that they inspired Hitler himself) but I'm not sure India Fisher was the best person to use for that. Don't get me wrong, I love Charlie and think India Fisher is a great actress... but she doesn't exactly have a ton of range. And while the continuity with the 8th Doctor's adventures was nice, Cecelia ultimately just comes across as "evil Nazi Charlie," which is a little boring and a little farcical and absolutely does not culminate in the kind of emotional resonance it otherwise could have had with her "downer ending."
Mephistopheles, again, is a comic book villain. It's a real shame he became a recurring character--I think he's probably the single element mostly holding these early Gallifrey stories back. He simply does not fit with the tone of the stories they're trying to tell here.
And then there's that weirdness with Andred. On the one hand, I really like how Gallifrey just immediately abandoned Leela's whole relationship with him so that she could be a more active and dynamic character in this range... it was a good narrative choice. So I'm not sure what, exactly, is to gain by brining Andred back, save that it makes for a suitably "shocking" (was anyone actually surprised?) twist. It's also a bit clumsy in that, in audio, this is the only version of Andred that we actually get to meet--and he's a jerkass. Yes, to an extent we can blame that on regeneration wonkiness, but it calls into question Leela's judgment in choosing to marry this dude in the first place.
On the other than, there's a glimmer of an interesting theme in exploring how relationships might work (or not) across regenerations... but sadly it's not really explored. Too often, I think, Doctor Who fails at imagining suitably alien alien cultures. And making romance and marriage on Gallifrey correlate 1:1 with how it works in contemporary Britain just feels... kind of lazy. Surely the Time Lords would have evolved a pretty unique approach to family life, given that they're immortal beings who can radically transform themselves in almost every conceivable way? Surely, maybe, possibly? Nah, guess not.
I am reminded of the very 1970s-style newscasts Tom Baker got to watch when he first popped in on Gallifrey. Oh the mundanity.
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