The Dying Light

The TARDIS brings the Doctor, Jamie and Zoe to what looks like a perfect place, and to an extent it is: they are on a perfectly balanced planet where the people live contentedly. The arrival of the TARDIS, unfortunately, has thrown the balance off and the perfect balance begins to decay. Leaving would be an option but the Doctor encounters an old acquaintance: Quadrigger Stoyn has been here for millennia waiting for the Doctor to return. This perfect place, it turns out, is a trap.

This one was released as part of Big Finish's 50th anniversary celebration back in (did I just say "back in"?) 2013 and it follows along from the adventure The Beginning where the Doctor and Susan first leave the society of the Time Lords, and then Stoyn is left behind by them as they continue their travels. Unlike the Doctor, though, Stoyn does not want to see the universe, he wants to go home. He is desperate to do so. And he's not a fool either; being a fellow Time Lord he has enough intelligence to know how to snare a TARDIS and has plans for it once he does get it. If he gets it. He's not to the demented madman place yet, but his anger at being left by the Doctor is there and it's only growing the longer he is kept from going home. Veteran actor Terry Molloy is Stoyn once again, doing a fantastic job as an unwilling renegade Time Lord; he's effectively a "baddie" as he is opposed to the Doctor's ways, but he's not to the degree of other Time Lords like the Monk. He drops the odd reference to the Time Lords without naming them directly, but he tells Jamie that they are gods and the Doctor had defied them and would have to pay.

This is also another of the Companion Chronicles without that future perspective from Jamie and Zoe, so it doesn't need to be left off until after they have departed the series and can be plunked somewhere else, maybe between a couple of the BBC Books novels if for nothing more than to give anyone a break between media should they choose to follow the continuity I am drawing up. There are no obvious hints about where this is taking place within season six; Stoyn knows that Jamie and Zoe have seen certain things with the Doctor and have been to certain places so it's not unrealistic to place it closer to the end of the season, although the more expanded universe material that comes out the longer that season becomes (it has gone from seven televised stories to thirty five stories across video, audio and printed prose).

And now there is just one more Companion Chronicle left in the range (to date, that is)...

NEXT EPISODE: SECOND CHANCES