The Memory Thieves is a two-parter that has the unfortunate fate of being the other story not featured in the boxset title so kinds of falls off the radar even before its released. In this case it’s a shame really because while the titular “Hellwood Inheritance” fell off as it went along this at least kept me entertained for its admittedly shorter runtime, even if it was still very much a vanilla Who experience. Let’s take a look!
The Doctor (Tom Baker) and Leela (Louise Jameson) arrive on the planet New Pasithea where some colonists are struggling to survive as every so often an electric pulse travels across the city and wipes the minds of anyone not in the safety of the special dome. The Doctor is soon taken in by the head of the colonists in Governor Bryce (Ayesha Antoine) and goes through the usual line of questioning before we get a predictable “let’s just kill him as we need to worry about ourselves!” reaction from her head guard Commander Wolfe (Wayne Forester). Meanwhile Leela and local scientist Edler (Luyanda Unati Lewis-Nyawo) are caught outside during a blast and while Edler soon loses her memory and starts talking about a glittering city Leela remains mostly unaffected, though she does start to see the same city herself…
Wolfe does the even more predictable coup leaving The Doctor and Bryce to head out into the wilderness and meet up with Leela and Edler, who soon finds a fellow memoryless colonist in Barford Harrison (Glen McCready) who is trying to build the glittering city out of mud and rocks, something Edler soon helps out with. The Doctor thinks he knows what’s up, but Wolfe and his loyal men arrive to fix things in a more direct manor…
For roughly an hour it doesn’t break any new ground but it does do everything in a fun and traditional Who fashion, so it’s a good way to spend an hour honestly. Tom Baker is even taking the material a lot more seriously this time, which is quite refreshing at this point for Audio Tom!
The Continuity:
It’s funny, this story’s background image actually takes up more of the cover than the title one does!
Not really any continuity to speak of. Reused tropes? Oh God yeah, but that would be an entirely different paragraph and would be pretty damn full for every story too!
Overall Thoughts:
“The Memory Thieves” is a perfectly fine two-parter that while it won’t shock and awe you it will definitely entertain you for its roughly one hour duration. I’d rather that than a two hour story that’s half bad, let’s put it that way!
Turns out the culprits of the memory wipes are an alien race called the Annoya, who plant seeds on planets that wipe the local sentient population’s minds and implant their own “souls” into them, invading without the need of taking their own bodies with them. That was a fun and pretty original idea at least. What wasn’t original was how it was fixed, as The Doctor and Bryce manage to make it to near the alien device but it’s Bryce who ends up sacrificing herself to destroy it while the Doctor screams her name and wishes it could be him. How many times have one-off side characters made the heroic sacrifice instead of our titular hero?
Hogan Reviews 