The second and third stories in the “Pioneers” set are, um, something alright. Not quite sure what happened here but there seemed to be a bet between the two authors as to who can write the duller pseudo-historical as they both cover historical periods / characters but while both are clearly written by people who are genuinely interested in the subjects both are really… not very engaging. Oh well, let’s take a look…
“Northern Lights” focuses on Fridtjof Nansen (Ian Conningham) and Hjalmar Johansen (Gerard Kearns) during their apparently well known trek back from the Arctic to Norway, but I’ll hold up my hand in honesty here and say I’ve never heard of them. The Doctor (Christopher Eccleston) arrives and follows them about for a bit as he’s tracked something alien in the local area and wants to protect the timeline and all that jazz. It soon turns out that the particularly strong aurora is a sentient lifeform that is eating local wildlife. It sounds exciting but sadly most of it is talking, delving deep into Fridtjof and Hjalmar’s courageous journey back and how they go on to influence great things in the future. It’s probably great if you know of them but it didn’t make me want to learn about them like other historical-set stories featuring characters / time periods I’m unfamiliar with have done in the past, so something was off…
The Doctor in a polo-neck! Highlight of the story… which says it all really, especially as its an audio-only production!
“The Beautiful Game” sees The Doctor “treat himself” to attending the meeting that ends up creating the football league itself but he arrives a week early only to find it good luck as an alien being known as a “Strike” (Becky Wright) that is dangerously driven by being a fan of something has latched onto the titular beautiful game and will eventually be driven to devour anything and anyone who is connected to its obsession. With the help of local maids Eva (Beck Wright again, but in her natural voice I assume!) and Daphne (Rachel Fenwick) he must try and stop it from changing history forever. Daphne is rigidly sticking to her place in life and doesn’t want to ruffle any feathers while Eva is really into women’s rights and equality, which given it the time period is somewhat controversial. Eventually William Sudell (Raymond Coulthard) gets caught up in events, apparently the then-head of Preston North End who is pivotal in the creation of the league (but otherwise a bit of a git). Again I hadn’t heard of him before this audio, but given I’ve never really had interest in football shouldn’t come as a surprise.
It has a few good moments but a lot of football analogies and references, which obviously makes sense but I really didn’t get on with it…
The Continuity:
This image made me think that I’m pretty sure an actual football doesn’t appear in the story at all… odd that.
Neither of these stories connect to any other story, though The Doctor has shown interest in football a few times before, including the Eighth Doctor comic “The Nightmare Game” and the Eleventh Doctor TV Story “The Lodger”.
Overall Thoughts:
One more look at the overall Pioneers cover, although apart from Daphne the Maid it’s really just a second “Green Gift” cover…
Both of these stories share a lot in common and sadly that’s focusing on a historical time / figure that I had no interest or knowledge of and instead of making me interested in them they just bored me for close to an hour each. Ah well, the Ninth Doctor stories have normally been at least good so I suppose we were bound to hit a bad one or two eventually, it’s just a shame two came along at once!
“Northern Lights” is an odd one as Aurora ends up being a reasonable alien, agrees not to harm anyone and then the Doctor repairs its ship so it can leave peacefully, which it does. That happens two thirds of the way in so the last 10 or so minutes see The Doctor popping into the future to give one of them a trip to the North pole after he admits getting so close but not making it was his one regret. So you really got the feeling the writer really want to tell a story about how great Fridtjof and Hjalmar were and almost resented having to sci-fi it up!
“The Beautiful Game” sees Eve get killed but she could’ve been saved had the nearby men listened to Daphne’s advice not to move her. This inspires her to speak up for herself and join the same factions Eve always talked about. Meanwhile The Doctor manages to corner the Strike and wipe its mind, then immediately talk about riverbeds, making it become obsessive about those instead of football, therefore not harming anyone. At least it was a more traditional ending but still not particularly interesting (for me anyway).
Hogan Reviews 