Missy 4 Bad Influence Due Spoilers OK

Our review:
who-review.com/2024/05/22/review-missy-bad-influence/

Haven’t got round to it myself yet, but the quiet response is less a sign of the set and more just how the spin-off ranges get little traction on here now, post-release. The War Master & River Song seem to be the exceptions, but only a couple of posts for the likes of Gallifrey, Paternoster & Rose, and even some of those are external review links.

First story was a waste of Patterson Joseph - and a bit of an insult to veterans, as one myself. Making a joke about why WW1 started, when we remember every 11/11? No.

But honestly the sets show Missy doesn't work as a lead. She's a character. She's not the protagonist. She just doesn't work that way. And sorry - BF do not have writers who deliver funny enough material for her. Steven Moffat gave her gold. BF give her QVC imitation costume jewellery.

True enough. I feel kind of bad about it, since I kinda stalled out on the Gallifrey Relisten thing and still haven't gotten back to it, and have been completely off of the Benny audios ever since David Warner passed. Still, Master-y stuff is typically pretty popular, yeah? And pretty much everyone loved Missy on the TV show, so you'd think this range would be pretty popular -- goes to show how badly Big Finish fumbled the ball with it, I suppose.



I'm not sure I can really agree with that first point. I am very firmly of the opinion that anything can be a great story, if it's written well. Any plot, any setting, any character. And I'd say the first 'Missy' boxset Big Finish put out was pretty good.

And, based on that set, I might say the "trick" is to tell the stories from other characters' perspectives, so Missy is used more as an antagonist than a villain-protagonist, like the War Master.

But, yeah, when it comes to comedy -- as, I think, we've often observed -- Big Finish seldom seems to do well when they're deliberately trying to be funny. And, more broadly, I think that's true of Doctor Who as a whole. Ideally, I think, the humor ought to arise from the characters' various eccentricities when dealing with whatever strange, surreal, or supernatural shenanigans they're involved with. In other words, it should be a byproduct -- secondary, always, to the demands of plot, characterization, and development.