We’re back to the Big Finish-exclusive “post War Games” era of the Second Doctor with “Conspiracy of Raven”, featuring three strongly-linked stories moving the plot forward. I stress moving forward rather than “bringing to an end” as it is just the next chapter is this storyline rather than anything else, and as a chapter it’s not really that interesting. Still, the performances are great, so that elevates the material a bit! Let’s take a look.
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At the end of my review for Part One I said “I guess and we’ll see if any of this actually pays off in a meaningful way or not…” and now I’ve listened to Part Two, guess what? Not! Yes, somehow Part Two is just as much of a muddled mess as the first half despite what I thought would be getting the Doctor-lite set up episodes out the way leading to a bigger role for the man whose last adventure it actually was turned out to not be the case, instead we just got another six episodes of loads of companions and old foes, a lot which nobody remembers all, running around with little direction until a final episode that tries to tie it all together but fails, instead giving us a pretty nasty and crappy way to send off the Seventh Doctor, possibly even worse that his undignified end from the TV movie… Yikes. Let’s take a look, shall we?
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Well, how to I start this review off? The Celestial Toymaker was one of my least favourite Who stories period, one I was dreading on day reviewing and having to sit through three episodes of painfully boring slideshows and a bit of a naff final episode. Then along came the news it was being animated! Great, that at least takes care of the photo slideshow not doing the glacial pace any favours, but then the animation turns out to be in a 3D CG style that looked pretty terrible in the trailer and in watching it is only a bit better than I feared. Did it make it easier to watch? Yeah, but it’s sort of like replacing something I hated with something I really don’t like, so… it’s not a major win… Well, with all that rambling over with, let’s actually take a look, shall we?
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The second half of the latest Fourth Doctor set is comprised of two very different stories, not just in narrative tone but in quality. “The Caged Assassin” I found to be extremely annoying and quickly forgettable, while the boxset-titular “Metamorphosis” is a perfectly fine Master story that much like the Celestial Toymaker story that kicked off the set won’t surprise you but will still keep you entertained. Let’s take a closer look!
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The latest series of Fourth Doctor Adventures continues with a doubly timely appearance of the Celestial Toymaker, after the character appeared in the TV series last year and the character’s debut story having just been completed with animation (the next Who review I’ll be getting to after this boxset, for the record!) both of which weren’t known to the writers when this was written/recorded a few years ago. The Toymaker appeared in one of my all-time favourite audios in “The Magic Mousetrap” so I had my fingers crossed we’d get another good one. Did we? Well…
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After an unfortunate (but necessary to… well, earn money and live) work-related delay I thought I’d better finish off my review of the “Star-Crossed” boxset before getting back on some sort of track. I ended the previous review mentioning how this was the proper highlight of the box and a true standout story so I guess it’s finally time to tell you why!
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It’s time for a good old fashioned Russell T. Davies two-part finale, complete with world, nay universe-ending stakes and a returning foe. Strange feeling nostalgic for something that was only last done 10 or so years ago, but there you have it. Was it a good RTD finale though? Let’s find out and close out the Fifteenth Doctor’s first season.
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The latest and final (for now!) Ninth Doctor boxset has arrived and unusually all three stories are connected by a recurring companion-like character, in this case River Song herself, ticking the Ninth Doctor off of her audio Doctor checklist (which is now pretty much complete!) The first two stories are good, showing a very different kind of relationship between the two, so let’s take a look.
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I normally don’t like putting reviews of two of the same thing in a row on the site, but it’s been a very busy week at work (as tends to happen in the summer, sadly…) so back-to-back new Who episodes it is! Rogue was a strange one, on the one hand I enjoyed The Doctor exploring a more romantic side to himself, but on the other hand the rest of the story was quite generic. Not bad, but felt very samey. Still, Ncuti Gatwa pulls the story up with his performance yet again! Let’s take a look…
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“Dot and Bubble” is a strange story to review. It starts off as a very on-the-nose look at modern society’s reliance on mobile phones and social media and then towards the end turns the spotlight on a much nastier and longer-lasting aspect of society instead in a really great last 10 minutes. Can the latter make up for the rest? Let’s take a look!
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Hogan Reviews 