Review - Robin Hood "The Deer Hunters" (Big Finish)
They say - “Reward: fifty in gold or a Royal pardon for any man, no questions asked, be he Norman or Saxon, poacher or deserter, cut-throat or cut-purse, if he be the one to bring Prince John the intact hide of the fabled White Stag, seen in days past in the forests south of Sherwood Rise...”
When Much sees a rare albino deer, he accidentally starts a race between rival hunters to bring the prize to Prince John. Robin resolves to find the stag first, while Tuck hatches a plan to keep the poachers off his trail. All Tuck needs is a lot of wool, a lot of luck, and two volunteers...
I bought this at the same time as “The Tiger's Tail” and, to be honest, if I'd only bought that I would not have bothered to get this.
Spoiler free review - I liked it. It's not great and once again the story is a bit pointless, but it's carried off in an enjoyable way, thanks largely to the excellent narration of Sam Troughton.
The spoiler-y review is -
The Good -
Sam Troughton really is a joy and his Allen is well worth the CD alone. He also does very well with Kate, Robin and particularly John. His OC voices are distinct and different, so much so that it really wasn't necessary to have the “he saids” and “she saids.”
Maybe its bias, but ST really makes up for the what's lacking in the plot just by animating the words so well.
I loved the descriptions of Much's hidden vale.
Much and his “numbles” speech to Robin. An adorable little moment that's one of a few decent chuckles to be had, most of which are at Much's expense but not in a mean way.
Robin apologises to Much. The moon was blue that night I guess.
There's an interview with Sam Troughton at the end, which is nice, if short. The main question he's asked is about coming from an actor family, something which he must be tired of talking about, but his reply is very good.
The Bad -
The story itself is pretty lame. The gang decide to distract the poachers (because the poor didn't need feeding or defending today, I suppose) and Tuck's Big Idea for this is to have John do a Herne the Hunter impression with Allen's help and prance around Sherwood in a fake white stag costume.
They lead the poachers away from where Much saw the deer and seem surprised when the poachers sneak up and shoot at them!
Meanwhile, Much and Robin fill up CD time go looking for the stag in its secret glen, but that does leave time for some nice dialogue so it's not all Bad.
The Downright Ugly -
For a company that's had so much experience in creating audios, there is a real lack of basic story blocking here. It's as if the writer himself didn't know what was going to happen later on the plot and just wrote off the hoof.
The best example of this is when John and Allen are shot at by the poachers. In story blocking, that would have shown up and led the writer to put in a line earlier on about the danger they faced from the poachers.
It works in two ways - it proves their not stupid and heightens the excitement of the listener - and makes the story more realistic and the narrative flow better.
It's just sloppy on the part of Big Finish.
7.5/10 (Sam Troughton is let down by a mediocre plot otherwise the score would have been much higher)