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.

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.

Memory Lane

I didn’t hate it. Wasn’t wowed by it either. I like the aliens. I liked the idea of a race that has a hard time remembering things. It amuses me. I like that they’ve kept Tom in a prison so that they can watch the first contact with an alien race over and over again. And then because of their memories it’s like the first time every time. Poor Tom, but good humor. Tom was kinda annoying anyway.

Mainly this one left me even more worried about C’rizz. I think it’s clear that something horrible is going to happen with him. What with his belief that killing people=saving them. And the Dalek living in his head, that just can’t be good. Also Big Finish lists him in the next audio, but not the one after that. So I’m worried about C’rizz.

I like C’rizz, I think he’s a fun character, but his time has always been limited. More so than most characters on Doctor Who. Something horrible is going to happen to make the Doctor either leave him or end in C’rizz being dead. Bah.

Anyway back to Memory Lane. I can still talk about C’rizz though. I loved his bitchiness. He hated the lady astronaut (who’s name I can’t be bothered to remember) and didn’t feel like he should have to deny it. Also I love the way he wasn’t polite to anyone. Such a contrast to Eight, who always tries to be polite. Really about the only memorable part of this one was C’rizz and the aliens.

Oh and the fact that the Doctor’s fantasy about saving the day envolves Charley and C’rizz telling him how brilliant he is. That caused me to laugh out loud, which isn’t a good thing on the bus (people look at you funny and carefully edge away…so maybe it is a good thing).

Yeah, that’s all I’ve got.