Time Lord Victorious: DALEKS! by James Goss, The Enemy of My Enemy, by Tracy Ann Baines
Another update on the Time Lord Victorious stories that I've been working through, all recently released in an order that will surely build to some kind of climax.
First off, a webcast series called DALEKS! starring Nicholas Briggs as the voice of the Daleks, with Anjli Mohindra and Ayesha Antoine as the Mechanoids. (Anjli Mohindra needs no introduction; Ayesha Antoine played the professor's assistant Dee Dee in that great Who story Midnight, and has also been Bernice Summerfield's companion Ruth on Big Finish.) Since they are webcasts, you can watch the five episodes starting here:
The series is by James Goss (also the mastermind behind the wider Time Lord Victorious cycle, who as my regular reader knows I rate as one of the best Who writers who has never written for TV). I must say it’s pretty impressive. Both the Daleks and the Mechanoids are bad guys, but the story gives both sets of metal monsters agency and motivation, which means that they actually become interesting. Facing the Daleks with a dangerous cosmic mystery means that we are brought into te exploration of the problem with them. The character of the Dalek Strategist, already introduced in Defender of the Daleks, becomes an intriguing plot vector. Animation means that there is no need to worry about the special effects budget, and the Mechanoids can look impressive rather than just a little cheap as they did in 1965. And the five individual episodes (1 as above, 2, 3, 4, 5) are only 15 minutes long, so you don’t get bored. I was certainly converted enough by the end to be eagerly anticipating the release of the last couple on Thursday nights.
The next two Big Finish plays in the Time Lord Victorious sequence, together with He Kills Me He Kills Me Not, form a loose trilogy starring Paul McGann as the Eighth Doctor - all written by women, in fact, Carrie Thompson, Tracy Ann Baines and Lizzie Hopley. The new two both involve the Daleks where the first did not.
The Enemy of my Enemy brings the Doctor and the Daleks together to the world of Wrax, which the Doctor thinks should not be there (like the planet of the previous story). The Wrax start off sounding like nice cuddly human-type aliens who you want to be friends with and then turn out to be way more evil and monstrous than you could believe. The Doctor is pushed into alliance with the Daleks. Or is he? It plays out very well, with Nicholas Briggs again being several different Daleks and Rachel Atkins tremendous as the Wrax leader. And McGann, who sometimes is not on form, is very much on form here, playing superbly against Briggs and Atkins.
I have listened to the third of the trilogy, Mutually Assured Destruction, but apparently it's a follow-on to the Una McCormack novel which I have got but not yet read, so I'll write it up when I have done them both. Just to say that it has Daleks too.
First off, a webcast series called DALEKS! starring Nicholas Briggs as the voice of the Daleks, with Anjli Mohindra and Ayesha Antoine as the Mechanoids. (Anjli Mohindra needs no introduction; Ayesha Antoine played the professor's assistant Dee Dee in that great Who story Midnight, and has also been Bernice Summerfield's companion Ruth on Big Finish.) Since they are webcasts, you can watch the five episodes starting here:
Click to viewThe series is by James Goss (also the mastermind behind the wider Time Lord Victorious cycle, who as my regular reader knows I rate as one of the best Who writers who has never written for TV). I must say it’s pretty impressive. Both the Daleks and the Mechanoids are bad guys, but the story gives both sets of metal monsters agency and motivation, which means that they actually become interesting. Facing the Daleks with a dangerous cosmic mystery means that we are brought into te exploration of the problem with them. The character of the Dalek Strategist, already introduced in Defender of the Daleks, becomes an intriguing plot vector. Animation means that there is no need to worry about the special effects budget, and the Mechanoids can look impressive rather than just a little cheap as they did in 1965. And the five individual episodes (1 as above, 2, 3, 4, 5) are only 15 minutes long, so you don’t get bored. I was certainly converted enough by the end to be eagerly anticipating the release of the last couple on Thursday nights.
The next two Big Finish plays in the Time Lord Victorious sequence, together with He Kills Me He Kills Me Not, form a loose trilogy starring Paul McGann as the Eighth Doctor - all written by women, in fact, Carrie Thompson, Tracy Ann Baines and Lizzie Hopley. The new two both involve the Daleks where the first did not.
The Enemy of my Enemy brings the Doctor and the Daleks together to the world of Wrax, which the Doctor thinks should not be there (like the planet of the previous story). The Wrax start off sounding like nice cuddly human-type aliens who you want to be friends with and then turn out to be way more evil and monstrous than you could believe. The Doctor is pushed into alliance with the Daleks. Or is he? It plays out very well, with Nicholas Briggs again being several different Daleks and Rachel Atkins tremendous as the Wrax leader. And McGann, who sometimes is not on form, is very much on form here, playing superbly against Briggs and Atkins.
I have listened to the third of the trilogy, Mutually Assured Destruction, but apparently it's a follow-on to the Una McCormack novel which I have got but not yet read, so I'll write it up when I have done them both. Just to say that it has Daleks too.