Times that Big Finish really made me love the audio medium

I’ve been thinking lately about how much I love Big Finish. I can thank Big Finish for really catapulting me into Old Who. Cause I listened to the One Doctor and had no clue what the hell was going on, but I knew I liked it. I knew I wanted to know who the hell these people were any why they were so fantastic. So I listened to Seasons of Fear which did nothing to relieve my confusion. It did inspire me to get more dedicated in my Who viewing though. And my wiki reading.

But there are a couple of audios that made me sit up and go wow. There are audios that made me realize just how fantastic the audio medium can be. These are those audios. They may not be my favorites (although some of them are) but they all made quite good use of the fact that they only way I was interacting with the story was with my ears.

In release order:

03: Whispers of Terror

I wasn’t sure whether or not to include Whispers of Terror or not. It’s a pretty forgettable story. Overall it’s not that great. What it did though was have the enemy be sound. The Doctor (Six) and Peri end up in the Museum of Aural Antiquities. A museum of sound. The enemy is the ultimate earwig and they have to stop it. Like I said not a very good story, but a really interesting enemy. This was made all the more effective because I was listening to it.

35: …ish

…ish is once again with the Sixth Doctor and Peri. It’s a celebration of language. They arrive at a conference for lexicographers and find the Doctor’s old friend dead. While discovering the murder there is a pure joy in the use of language. The murder is a word. The Ish. They defeat it with words. Like Whispers of Terror this one probably could have been done just as well on tv, a bit less well in a book, but was quite good as an audio. I’d highly recommend it to anyone looking for something to get them into the Sixth Doctor. I just find the use of language as it was in …ish to be particularly suited to the audio medium.

39: Bang-bang-a-boom!

Bang-bang-a-boom! gets included because it a) takes place on Deep Space 8 (yes that is a bit of a parody of both Babylon 5 and Deep Space 9) which is hosting the Intergalactic Song Contest. As a result parts of the story are told via the announcer for the contest during his segments and other parts are told with personal log entries from the Chief Medical Officer. Both of which are purely audio mediums as the announcer is doing his job via radio. Which is just a cleaver use of the audio medium to convey a story. Also it is damn funny and has the Seventh Doctor and Mel being awesome.

52: Scherzo

Sherzo has the Eighth Doctor and Charley in almost complete sensory deprivation. The only sense they have available to them through most of the audio is their hearing. Big Finish did a fantastic job of conveying that through the story. This is the first audio that Big Finish did that just would not work as a tv episode. It just wouldn’t. Book form could work, but do to the nature of the story it would never work on tv. They have no sight and part of the brilliance of the audio is that you can go along with them on that part of the journey.

54: The Natural History of Fear

The Natural History of Fear is pure audio joy. The most I will say about this (to avoid spoiling it) is that it simply would not work in any other medium. Not one bit. So go buy it. Find a download because for some reason Big Finish isn’t offering a download. Just listen to it.

74: Live 34

Live 34 is the Seventh Doctor, Ace, and Hex. It’s the next step up from Bang-bang-a-boom! in that the story is told entirely from a radio show, Live 34. Everything that happens is being broadcast from the show. The entire story is told there. It’s brilliant and fantastic and one of the best uses of the audio medium. It’s the story of a revolution as it’s happening from the perspective of a radio announcer. Brilliance.

94.5: Urgent Calls

Urgent Calls is one part story that comes with ID. It’s the Sixth Doctor making a series of phone calls. It’s way better then the premise sounds. Honest. But it’s a story told through a series of phone calls and how awesome is that? It’s pretty awesome.

And those are the Big Finish stories that I think made the best use of the audio medium. They range from clever use of enemies to pure perfection on the use of the audio medium. I just thought I’d share. Please feel free to share your favorite uses of the audio medium.

Oh and I kept this with the main Doctor Who line, but if you wanna discuss something else feel free.

Scherzo and why I love it, in 1673 words.

I’ve been saying for ages that I was going to sit down and write all the reasons I love Scherzo. It’s on my top ten list of Doctor Who stories. I adore this story. I would like to preface this with several things:

1. I’m a bit batshit about Charley. I know and acknowledge this so hopefully I don’t let the crazy out too bad.

2. Well I like Charley/Eight I’m not batshit about it. If given the choice between two stories, one Eight/Charley and one something else I really like (Peri/Erimem, Six/Evelyn, Ace/Hex, etc) based only on the pairing and told I could only read one I would probably choose the other one.

3. If given the choice between a Charley story and someone else I would choose the Charley story.

4. I think Scherzo is the third part of a trilogy started with Neverland and then going to Zagreus.

I think these are important things to consider before discussing Scherzo.

I think the first thing to mention when talking about Scherzo is the fact that Charley stowed away on the TARDIS to go with Eight. He didn’t want her to go with him into the Divergent Universe, something he had to do. He wanted Charley to stay safe in our universe and had asked Romana to look after her. Now the question is why did she stow away?

I think there are several factors involved. The most obvious being that Neverland and Zegreus had both Charley and Eight telling each other that they loved the other. And in the romantic in-love sense not the friendship sense. So we have that. Scherzo is in one sense the cumulation of the Eight/Charley relationship. They do just about everything you can ask for in a relationship in this audio and after Scherzo they go into a weird just friends place. I think this is because the Big Finish writers wrote themselves into a corner here and couldn’t find a way out so they just pretended that it hadn’t happened. Which makes for some weird dynamic later, but for the purpose of Scherzo there is a brilliance in the Eight/Charley relationship.

The next thing to consider about Charley choosing to go with Eight is that she has no one else in the universe. Literally. By the end of Neverland Charley understands, as much as anyone who’s not a Time Lord can, the importance of the Web of Time as well as how fragile it is. This means that she knows she can never go back to her time. She can never see her family again. Not without putting the Web of Time in danger and Charley knows that she can’t do that. She had a very eloquent and passionate speech about just that in Neverland.

Charley is an adventurer. Unlike a lot of people that the Doctor picks up Charley was already on the search for adventure when she runs across the Doctor. She’s on a journey as Charlotte Pollard, Edwardian Adventuress. She loves the danger and the excitement and the discovery of new things. If she could have lived without meeting the Doctor and had done so she would have been traveling Earth in search of adventure. It’s what she was wanted to do.

At the end of Zagreus Charley is sitting with Leela discussing going with the Doctor to the Divergent Universe and she tells Leela, “The choosing is easy. It’s the leaving that’s hard.” I think this means that choosing to leave was easy, she loves him and he needs someone at that point in time. The leaving is hard because it’s leaving behind everything she knows. But she’s already done that, she can never go home again. And going to another universe is about the biggest adventure you can have. So Charley leaves.

Now the beginning of Scherzo. They have entered the Div!Universe and the Doctor is still unaware that Charley is there. He has gone a bit insane at this point. He never quite regains his sanity throughout the Div!arch, but it’s at it’s most pronounced here. He’s ready to give up and die and it’s Charley who saves him. She’s the one that drags him out of the TARDIS before they can die and they enter into their first world of a new universe. And then Eight does one of the best things ever.

He yells at Charley. He screams at her. For a period of time he refuses to believe that she’s really Charley (see: insanity). Because Charley wouldn’t have betrayed him like that. Everything he did in Neverland and Zagreus was to keep Charley safe and she wouldn’t have betrayed him like that. He is pissed at her. And they have a huge fight over it. Charley argues that she had the right to choose to come with him, she loves him and he loves her and he needed her. And she’s young and still a bit naive so those are good enough reasons to her. Eight is still vastly annoyed with her and he stays annoyed with her until the end of Scherzo. I love that there was this consequence for her actions. She wasn’t patted on the head and greated with a smile. She was yelled at and forced to justify her actions. I love it.

Then there is the setting. A featureless (as far as we can tell) landscape with a light so bright it blinds them. So throughout this they are forced to hold hands with each other to keep from getting lost. It’s almost complete sensory deprivation. All they have is sound. Accept for those occasions where the light dims and feeling returns and they get to eat. So they walk along this landscape (later revealed to be a circular tube in a laboratory) holding hands and eventually sussing out their relationship. Such as it is.

There is also a noise creature in this strange new world. It’s important later.

Eventually Eight accepts Charley’s reasons for coming with him, he’s not happy about them but he accepts them. They spend a lot of time in this place. They don’t know how long as they lose all track of time. At one point in time Charley becomes complacent in this new life they have. She talks about how it’s not so bad. It could be worse and really all things considered it’s not bad. Eight then has a lovely little piece of dialog about how she can never forget that they are in a prison. Her mind is tricking her into thinking the way she is and she should never not be angry that they are stuck there. Later Eight has a moment of false hope, thinking he’s found a way out, and it’s Charley that pulls him back and makes him face reality. It’s brilliant. They save each other. Neither one could have survived without the other one there. And I love that. I really do.

Now back to Mister Sound Creature. He is in a weird way their child. He came into existence because of them and they fed him and kinda cared for him in a weird way. Only now he needs to kill them in order to live. So in order to fight Mister Sound Creature Eight and Charley merge into one person. Literally. It’s kinda creepy, but it works. Now MSC has to convince Charley and the Doctor to agree to die for him. Charley says no. Eight says yes. There is convulted troll logic used here.

So what does Charley do? She bursts in and tells Eight that because he can’t say no she’s going to do it for him. So she saves him once again. So the finale battle to fight their weird child thing is won because of Charley. I like any story where the Companion saves the Doctor and the day. One where the Companion does so while merged together with him to destroy their weird child thing? Wins.

And then we have the Doctor asking Charley to stay merged with him. To stay locked together forever. And Charley again says no. She’s the one that tells him they can’t do that. She’s the one that backs away. Again win.

So by the end of Scherzo we have what could be seen as an entire relationship between Charley and Eight. They make up, again admit to loving each other, have a child and then break up. I love that aspect of this story. As I said the writers had backed themselves into a corner with the Eight/Charley story. They didn’t want to(couldn’t?) go forward and they’d gone too far to go back. So the writers essentially did what could be seen as a relationship in all it’s forms in one story. So as far as the Eight/Charley arc goes it was the best conclusion we were ever going to see for it.

Then we have Charley saving Eight. I love that. I love that she saves him as much as he saves her.

Eight being bloody well pissed at Charley for sneaking aboard the TARDIS. Yay for consequences!

Charley being Charley and following her heart and her sense of adventure.

Really there is nothing about Scherzo that I don’t like. Hopefully I conveyed that well in this little essay.

The Perfect Day

Relisten.

I was less confused as to what was going on this time round and thus understood the ending. That was exciting. The first time I listened to this one I got to the end and had the feeling that the writer realized he was running out of time and then just wrote something. This time not so much.

I really like the premise of this story. I like the idea of a bunch of people choosing to live the same day over and over again. For their own reasons, but as per usual with these things not entirely bad reasons. They are reasons you can relate to. I always like the Sapphire and Steel stories where I can’t say I wouldn’t make the same choices as the people in them. Makes them that much creepier.

I really liked the idea that the passengers had trapped Time in a bottle. How fricken awesome is that? It is awesome. Then Time wasn’t trapped because It’d escaped and no one noticed.

Gold is of course awesome. I love Gold. I love his impulsiveness, his arrogance, and his giant crush on Steel. His giant crush on Steel is fantastic. He basically asked Steel to run off with him and Steel said no. It amuses me.

The ending still fell a bit short. Least I understood it this time. It still seemed a bit tacked on. Oh no Gold is dead! Oh no Sapphire is dead! Wait, Gold isn’t dead, Sapphire was sneaking and set him free of the bottle earlier off screen! Oh look Steel tricked Time into not only bringing Sapphire back to life but trapping Itself again!

Really the only reason to listen to this one again is Gold. And since I’m a huge Gold fan I’ll probably listen to this one again.

The Passenger

It’s the introduction to the Sapphire and Steel audios.

And such a good introduction it is. Two minutes in (after S&S have been introduced) and they haven’t told you anything about the characters, but in such a fantastic way as to make you think it’s brilliant. I was able to appreciate the Sapphire and Steel interactions a lot more this time as I understood what the hell was going on. As I was eagerly listening to it this time as opposed to be on a plane with nothing else to listen to. Thank you Comic Con once again for introducing me to the awesome.

I love the character of Burgess. He’s so tormented by what happened and unable to let go. *hugs him*

Also the introduction of Gold. He is lovely. Also Sapphire’s horror at running into him. She couldn’t believe that Steel asked him to come. It’s brilliant. Cause it’s done in that wonderfully prime and proper way of hers. Also the end where Gold takes care of Burgess and gets him home. Making sure he’s okay cause as much as I love Sapphire and Steel really don’t care about those things. But Gold put him through so much and for his own good and then he went and made sure he was okay. Gold does care about the stupid humans. /Gold!fangirling

And all the ghosts. Poor ghosties. Sapphire and Steel does ghosts so well. And I love how they just take it in stride that all these people are dead. Time is a right bastard.

Anyways, I love this one as it captures everything wonderful about Sapphire and Steel. After watching the show I love it even more, because I can see just how well it keeps to the show and makes it work wonderfully on audio.

I loves it. Loves it lots.

First season of the Lucie’n'Eight Adventures (not real name)

So I listened to the Eight’n'Lucie audios. Out of order by accident. Not sure if that helped me or hindered me. When I started listening to them I was determined that I’d like Lucie.

I didn’t like her at first. She’s very reminiscent of Tegan. Without a lot of Tegan’s good points really. At least at first. I did end up liking her. I think if the quality of the audios had been a bit better I would really like her. But there was just some bad writing in there and thus my liking of it all was lowered. Perhaps with the next season? Anyways onwards and upwards in their proper order and not the order I listened to them in.

Blood of the Daleks (1&2)

I think having the Time Lords dump Lucie on him was an interesting idea as a way to get a companion introduced that wasn’t played very well. Lucie seemed far too accepting of her circumstances despite everything. I just find it hard to believe that anyone would take things as well as she did. There were a million ways to make the Doctor more accepting of Lucie that I can’t help but feel the lack of. The Time Lords would have at least tried something, because a cooperative Doctor is much better than a sulky Doctor. Well known fact of the universe.

The story in and of itself just kinda falls flat. Again I liked the idea in theory, but there just seemed to be too many attempts at humor that just fell flat. Not the least of which was to have Red Rocket Rising survive Daleks to be converted by the Cybermen. I didn’t find that funny, though I think I was supposed to. Other than that the storyline just seemed like your stock Cybermen storyline replaced with Daleks. Thus is didn’t really work nearly as well. I mean really if Hex worked on Red Rocket Rising it could have been The Harvest.

I liked Lucie and the Doctor’s interactions more towards the end of the story, but they still just weren’t clicking for me. I think a lot of it had to do with my dislike of the story itself.

Horror of Glam Rock

Yet another interesting idea that just didn’t seem to work. Aliens communicating through music should be a really neat concept. Lucie running into her aunt when her aunt was a twenty-something should be neat. Yet it wasn’t. I kept waiting for the story to be good and for Lucie to do something and it never happened. I don’t even remember much of the story and I listened to it a few days ago. That’s how little of an impression it left. Yeah.

Immortal Beloved

This one I liked. It was an interesting concept that was played with well. It showed Lucie in a positive light and not just as a nagging person the Doctor has to take around with him. I liked the idea of the planet where people had set themselves up as the Greek Gods. I liked the cloning and Lucie’s horror at it. This was really the episode that gave Lucie a few more dimensions. So that was good. I liked that Lucie wasn’t above being really shallow about a pretty boy. Of course in retrospect this one could have been good simply because the others were so very bad. Hmmm…

Phobos

Again they managed to make something of an interesting concept. Which is a win for the writers. Lucie seems to be a bit too free about saying she’s a time traveler though. That annoyed me a bit. Discretion girl. I just finished this one and I’m really kinda angry that they didn’t just go ahead with the Drew/Hayd stuff instead of chickening out with it. It’s annoying.

But I liked the idea. I liked that the Doctor scared the fear creator with what he’s seen. I liked Lucie doing the companion thing and talking and making friends with people. I liked her experiencing things. I’m just annoyed about the Drew/Hayd thing at the end. Do it or don’t do it but don’t fucking go halfway.

No More Lies

This one won me over due to Lucie driving. Just because I can see her telling the Doctor in no uncertain terms that she doesn’t want to be stuck in space dependent on his driving so he damn well better teach her how to drive the TARDIS thank you very much. Or else she’s not getting back on at the next stop. Because she would do that. I think Lucie has been moved to the head of the Companion Most Likely to Nick the TARDIS list.

I really liked that this episode finally highlighted that Lucie is an intelligent person even if she’s a mouth on legs to use Tegan’s self description. She figured stuff out and almost saved the day till the Doctor buggered it up.

Bonus points for referencing Ramsey. I like Vortisores and now apparently the other being that live in the Vortex. I hope we see more of them.

Human Resources

This one suffered from a lot of the same problem as BotD did. It wasn’t funny when it was trying to be and an interesting idea just somehow wasn’t written well. Also there was randomness that didn’t make sense. Like when did the Doctor get a cell phone? Hmmm? That confused me. I can see Lucie making him get one, but unless I fell asleep for that part we never had a scene where she gave him one or anything. He just suddenly had a cell phone.

Also I find it hard to think that Eight wouldn’t find out who they were fighting before sabotaging things. Maybe I’m wrong there but that’s the way I see it. Also after everything else and Lucie freaks out because she should have been a dictator? Really? I’m so glad it wasn’t her in the end cause that was just stupid. Why the hell would the CIA care about a human becoming a dictator on Earth? If it went against the Web of Time then they’d be able to fix it no worries from anyone else. Otherwise why the hell would they care? I haven’t listened to the Gallifrey stuff so maybe it’s explained there.

Anyways the plot was thin at best and the characterization overall seemed off. And for all the build up with the headhunter it was a rather small pay off yes?

Overall the series suffered from a number of similar problems. Good ideas not properly written. Bad ideas as to what is funny or should be funny. Shoddy character development and plot arc payoff. I did end up liking Lucie in the end, but I think I’d have liked her a lot more if her stories had been good.

Absolution

They killed him. Killed him dead. I am sitting here listening to the cast and crew interviews with tears streaming down my face because they killed him. They killed my lovable little psychopath. The killed C’rizz and the Doctor didn’t care. My favorite Doctor didn’t care that C’rizz was killed. I really hope The Girl Who Never Was has a scene that shows that he actually cares that C’rizz is dead.

That’s all I can think of right now. C’rizz is gone. Later I’ll think on the comment about Charley being mostly human. Right now C’rizz is dead and I’m not okay with that.

The Reaping

Wasn’t as good as The Gathering as there was no Tegan.

It was still quite good though. Even without Tegan. And I think I listened to these backwards as I listened to the Gathering months ago and had a hard time finding a copy of the Reaping. So I spent a good portion of the audio waiting for the horrible thing to happen to Nat and for Kathy to go evil.

Also at the beginning I suddenly got the Six/Peri stuff and my mind hurt. Quite a bit and that’s all I will say on it.

Although they do have a rather fantastic friendship yes? They argue and insult each other but there is such a nice bit of underlying love for each other that it’s all of the good.

On to the story. I rather liked this as it was a way of showing why Peri never goes back home on the show. By the end of the story she doesn’t have a home to go to. And that is sad. But at the same time makes her never going home understandable because old Who never really thought of these things. And her pain at her mom’s death and the Doctor coming back for her. It was all very sad. I did really like the decision to have Peri decide to stay with her family. It was the only thing that was going to make sense by the end. And the way that Six was utterly shocked by it was fun. He really didn’t think that she would ever leave him. Especially like that.

And then he went to go see what happened to her and came running back. That was the part that almost made me cry. He went back and gave her a hug and let her cry on him and then took her off into the TARDIS again. Cause he’s her best friend.

I just have this sudden love for the Six and Peri dynamic. It’s kinda weird.

And the Cybermen story made very little sense, overall. It was way too convoluted and not with the making of sense. It almost felt tacked on at the end. Like the writer went, oh shit I only have twenty minutes to resolve this *throws stuff together* ‘eh it’s good enough. I think if the Cybermen part had been a bit better done it would have been a very good story. I still liked it, but more as a character study then as a story.

Also ear disk things=ear pods y/y? Rusty do you have any original ideas? At all?

Son of the Dragon

I liked it. I like pure historicals, things that give Erimem a chance to be the ruler type, and things where Five gets confused for the court jester. So those were all there and thus it was good. Peri rather annoyed me with her instance in believing that all of the legends about Dracula were true though. She was worried about her girlfriendErimem so that gets a pass.

Although I am left confused by all the people who think it would have been great for Erimem to have run off with Dracula and had this be her exit story. Umm…no. Sure he wasn’t as bad as the myths claim, but he was still called Vlad the Impaler for a reason. Also the part where he tried to kill Erimem, several times. And basically forced her to agree to marry him. Honestly, not as bad as previously claimed, but not really good enough for Erimem.

Overall I liked that it had the overall lesson that no one was really the good guy in the situation and the even Dracula had reasons behind impaling 10,000 people. Also killing all those other people. I also liked the message that Rado wasn’t that different and everyone was a product of their times and upbrining.

It kinda felt like going a bit backwards in Erimem’s character arc though. She’s been going in the direction of leaving behind all of the Pharaoh stuff while still maintaining her basic outlook on life and this felt like it was going back to the Pharaoh stuff. Erimem is a leader, but I think she has the potential to become the kind leader who doesn’t agree with impaling people on spikes. Or marring a guy that thinks impaling people on spikes is a good plan. But maybe that’s just me.

Overall I liked it. Can’t understand the squee for Erimem/Dracula. Although that’s a pairing made in crack heaven.

Neverland

How much do I love this audio? I love it so much that I can’t even describe it. This is really the audio that made me sit up and go I LOVE CHARLEY!!!ELEVEN!!! in my head. Yes, there were capslock.

She just has these two amazing speeches, one at the beginning and one at the end. And they’re both about doing the right thing, even if the right thing isn’t what you necessarily personally want and will lead to her death.

The first one where she makes the decision to go back and face the Time Lords is just brilliant. I love that she calls the Doctor Peter Pan and refers to herself as Wendy. And how Wendy eventually had to leave Neverland and go back to the real world and grow up and leave Peter Pan behind. She knew she wasn’t supposed to be alive and that her being alive was causing problems to time and so she went back to face the Time Lords and accept her fate. Because she had all those months of life that she wasn’t supposed to have and they were wonderful but it was time to grow up and accept the consequences of what happened on the R101.

The second one is at the end when the NeverPeople are going to use her to get back to Gallifrey and destroy the Eye of Harmony and the Web of Time. She’s begging the Doctor to kill her because the thought of those things being destroyed is worse then her dying and if she died then they wouldn’t be destroyed. If she hadn’t been tied to that chair she would have done it herself. And her horror when the Doctor doesn’t kill her, because everything will cease to exist in any meaningful way. No past, no future.

And there are clearly other things I like about this audio, but I’m a bit stuckbatshit about Charley. And December will be here soon and The Girl Who Never Was will be release and she will be GONE! Gone! And the title of the audio just doesn’t make me in anyway happy about her exit. Hopefully it’s not as horrible as it sounds. Cause the matrix fixed the paradox of her existence so I’m really hoping that they write her out good. Give her a beautiful exit and don’t make me cry.

And and umm…CHARLEY!

Yeah, that was really just a bunch of squee about Charley. One day I will be able to write up stuff about Neverland without squeeing. Today is not that day.

Shada

And why did I take so long to listen to this? Shada was brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Didn’t quite make it into the list of audios I probably shouldn’t listen to in public as people look at you funny when you burst out laughing, but it came close. Eight and Romana are so fantastic together. Things to love about them:

Eight begging Romana to come with him.
Eight calling Romana a genius, several times.
Witty banter!
Just everything good about the Doctor and Romana being in the same room together. The stuff that there even when Six and Romana are being awkward with each other and not knowing quite how to act. That stuff.

Also K-9 was fantastic. And the stupid bike thing. And one of the worst criminals in Gallifrey’s history turning into a forgetful Cambridge professor. Love.

I really liked Shada.