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.

Flip-Flop

If I had to make a list of my top five favorite Doctor Who storylines ever; tv show, audio, comic (not that I’ve read any of those), book, whatever this would be on it.

First off it has Mel. I love Mel. I kinda dread finally seeing an episode with her because apparently she is not awesome. Audio Mel is made of win. Flip-Flop is made of win. And Seven is made of win.

I hadn’t actually read anything about the plot for this before I listened to it, so was confused by the lack of CD1 or CD2 and instead the choice of Black or White. I randomly picked one and went at it. Imagine my delight when I found out it doesn’t matter which one you start with because each side you start with because each one ends with the beginning of the other. It was brilliant. The Doctor and Mel are looking for some crystals to stop something or another and end up on the only planet in the universe that has them. Only before they can cause any trouble they’re already wanted by the authorities and are arrested.

This leads on into the story of how they piss off the authorities and cause themselves to be arrested. Because the planet has a very neat paradox attached to it wherein each timeline creates the other. It’s brilliant and I love Mel’s drawn out explanations of things the Doctor just said. The way they have to deal with running into alterna!versions of the people they already knew. The way both sets leave the problem to their other set to fix. The entire circular nature of the storyline. It’s brilliant.

Also I love Mel.