The Black Hole

The TARDIS is drawn to a research colony on the edge of a black hole, and the Doctor realizes he is not the only one of his people on the scene. Jamie and Victoria believe that a second member of the Doctor's people would be an asset on the scene, but the Doctor is nervous at the prospect. Constable Pavo, however, is eager to work with the Doctor, and the station's commandant, Flail, just wants the trouble sorted out, but as the Doctor becomes more involved in the perilous situation, he realizes that this is more than a dangerous situation; this is a trap.

It took a while but Big Finish finally produced something I did not enjoy very much. This is the one.

The Black Hole starts off with just as much promise as every other Big Finish audio has so far, with the Doctor, Jamie and Victoria all heading into a new adventure together, Fraser Hines doing double duty as both Jamie and the second Doctor once more and sounding awesome. On the other hand, though, there's Deborah Watling returning as Victoria and... well she doesn't do such a good job of regressing her voice back to her youth. Don't get me wrong, she delivers her lines with conviction and style but just sounds like an older lady - she's not been as fortunate as some of her peers to be able to sound timeless. So yeah that threw me off a little.

The other thing I didn't enjoy was not really anyone's fault; I just finished The Dark Path which also features another of the Doctor's people, so here we have another the very next tale. And as with The Dark Path this isn't just any old person from the Doctor's planet, it's another nemesis of sorts - last time the Master, this time the Monk (although this is supposed to be a secret but I have a feeling the few of you who read this aren't going to be too impacted by this revelation). If I had known that part a bit sooner I would have enjoyed this earlier, perhaps between Dreams of Empire and Combat Rock where an audio between two novels would have been a nice switch of medium. And of course far enough away from The Dark Path. Still, distanced or not there are a few similarities between the two, with there being other members of the Doctor's people hiding in plain sight in the narrative and both of them undergoing their own regenerations during the stories. It's a bit disappointing in a way to have the same plot elements re-used so near each other; I would have hoped an experienced author like Simon Guerrier would have done his homework.

And what of the Monk himself? It's a different incarnation for starters, but he's been made a bit manic, not unlike how the Master was played up when he returned to the series in 2007. Looks as if The Black Hole was influenced a great deal by the current state of the series, and we all know how I feel about that. The Monk was always referred to as a time meddler but this time out he's not really adhering to that m.o. at all; he's messing stuff up, sure, but he's more psychotic about it - less playful and now more focussed. And angrier. Fair dues there, though, the Doctor messed him up twice in the past, he'd certainly want revenge for that.

Here's a little something else in this one which... I'm not sure about. I've often said how I don't like it when authors put too much work into explaining the unanswered questions in the series which were meant to be throwaways - the exceptions being when they are really clever at it and it is just brilliant to behold (and those instances are few and far between) and Geurrier goes and tries to do exactly that by sending the Doctor and Jamie off on a mission in the middle of the story. It's a ways off before I reach this one but in a 1985 episode called The Two Doctors the second Doctor and Jamie cross paths with the sixth Doctor and his current companion at the time, and this little mission here in The Black Hole is meant to explain that little jaunt. I don't like it.

Oh well. Can't win em all I guess.

NEXT EPISODE: LETHBRIDGE STEWART - THE BEAST OF FANG ROCK