Doctor Who – Unregenerate!

‘Unregenerate!’

Story 70
Written by David A. McIntee, directed by: John Ainsworth
Released June 2005

Fresh from her experience on the planet Lakertia, Melanie Bush is back on the planet Earth. But it’s not the right time period, everyone is obsessed with pop culture and reality television, making her feel more out of place than ever. When the TARDIS finally turns up, the Doctor is absent but in his place is a holographic recording telling her where to find him. Sadly, the Doctor has gone mad and is being held in a mysterious asylum.

With only an ex-bouncer turned cabbie for protection, Mel must free the Doctor and unravel the mad trap that he has found himself ensnared in. Unfortunately, this particular trap is a cat’s cradle that even the Doctor has become caught in. What hope can Mel have when the newly regenerated Doctor has gone insane?

This is a terribly unusual audio adventure set in a time when the program had completely reinvented itself as a soft harmless family entertainment with weird dark undertones. In addition, the companion Mel is, at best, controversial. Introduced as a successor to Nicola Bryant’s Peri, Mel is so traditionally English and sweet that she ends up appearing comical. To boot, her backstory makes absolutely no sense at all. A companion of the Sixth Doctor, she is first seen in a future adventure yet pulled out of time (along with Sabalon Glitz) at the conclusion of Trial of a Time Lord. In effect, she has no first adventure and no back story! As viewers we have no idea who she is or why she is traveling with the Doctor. She is also the only connecting thread to the Seventh Doctor from the past and in that sense she fails miserably.

An awkward screaming companion played by a sexless former child actress, Melanie Bush is one of those companion that fans wish never happened. But before you ditch her, you should hear her in these audio adventures where she shines most brilliantly. Appearing opposite both Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy, Mel is a superb companion on the Big Finish productions, full of fire and intelligence. She remains a homely kind of personality who is so pure and good that she becomes almost comical, but a more experienced Langford (and a better set of scripts) manages to breath some life into the character.

But you may ask yourself why I am spending so much time on Mel and the answer is that throughout most of Unregenerate!, the Doctor is a gibbering mess, spouting nonsense and helpless in the thrall of the facility he has become trapped in. Only Mel stands a chance of helping the Doctor out of the mess he has landed himself in, and as such she becomes terribly important.

The Seventh Doctor (Sylvester McCoy) tries to make sense of himself

I wasn’t sure what to make of Unregenerate! as it was frankly a convoluted premise made all the more complicated by a non-linear narrative approach. This meant that the many pieces to the complex puzzle were arranged out of order. Even so, it’s a thrilling and inspired plot that utilizes McCoy range to the utmost. Granted, much of the story demands that McCoy echo the lines of his fellow cast members or speak in riddles, but when he finally ‘arrives,’ he is in fine form. Set in an early period of the Seventh Doctor’s reign, this version of the character is less of a wise manipulator and more of a clownish innocent galactic vagrant. This is of course a period that Doctor Who books, audios and comic strips side-steps most avidly, so I am impressed with the bravery of McIntee’s script in delving headfirst into a world of playing the spoons and pastel colors.

As the story (slowly) unfolds, the overly convoluted plot is impressive to say the least. The paranoia of Gallifrey has reached a fever pitch to the point that they are convinced manipulation of the lesser species is necessary to insure that time travel be regulated and controlled. In short, they are transplanting artificial intelligences into various alien races that could develop time travel capability in hopes of controlling them. Unfortunately, the Doctor sets off an experiment and becomes taken over by another intelligence. He is driven insane, but no one knows quite what to do with him. Mel cons a cabbie into helping her break into the facility and finds that she has other confederates that have escaped manipulation.

After finally getting the Doctor back in his ‘right mind,’ the pieces start to fall into place but not before numerous violent attempts to gain control of the situation by the facility staff. There is a lot of continuity and Doctor Who self-reference going on in this story, but it is also a very interesting concept, albeit told in a manner that is a bit too complicated for its own good. The idea of featuring a Doctor so soon after his regeneration seems a bit out of place as this confusion was, more or less, resolved in screen in Time and the Rani. Even so, it’s an unusual choice and that must be applauded.

The biggest star of Unregenerate! is of course Bonnie Langford, who is given so much to do that one unfamiliar with her TV appearance would think her to be one of the more celebrated companions. Another surprising star is Jennie Linden, who played the role of Barbara in the feature film version of Doctor Who and the Daleks.

Unregenerate! can be ordered directly from Big Finish and from other online retailers such as Mike’s Comics and BookDepository.

Doctor Who on the docket- Dragonfire and The Happiness Patrol

The Ace Adventures box set arrived in the post today and I have to admit that I’m a bit over-eager to dive in. There have been much better DVD releases (and worse) and many stories that I adore, but this is a bit of a personal fave for me as it marked the period where I rediscovered Doctor Who and connected with it in a unique way.

On this blog I have cited the importance of the Hartnell stories, the inventiveness of Troughton’s era and the comic book-like insanity of Pertwee’s turn at the wheel. No one can argue that Tom Baker’s tenure as the Doctor was important as was his successor Peter Davison whose youthful exuberance attracted a new fanbase, especially in the US. But it was when Colin Baker scared away the remaining fans and Sylvester McCoy arrived that things got really interesting.

McCoy is a love him or hate him Doctor, I have to admit. A classically trained actor, he is also a former children’s entertainer and his diminutive size and odd facial expressions make him appear comical and so strange that he might really be an alien. His arrival shook up the program and challenged the notion of what made Doctor Who what it was.

The stories of his first season in 1987 have been judged as the worst ever seen, but you have to give the BBC props for innovation. At the very least, Colin Baker could look at Delta and the Bannermen and admit that there is no way he could have been in that one!

Dragonfire was a game changer of sorts as it introduced Ace, a companion that would go on to become one of the most beloved characters of the 1980’s Who. A street kid transported to another planet and yet living a boring life as a waitress, she has plenty of personality and loads of determination. In her first outing she contrasts Melanie’s screaming female with a wide-eyed wonder of the unknown. She is daring, brash and reluctantly naive and inexperienced. An ideal companion as the Doctor embarked on two years’ worth of stellar stories.

There are loads of problems in Dragonfire, an eerie hunt after a monster is made rather light-hearted due to intense lighting and the cuddly nature of the ‘monster’ who could barely move in any case. Edward Peel as Kane steals the show as the devilish and maniacal villain, so icy cold and cunning that he is a worthy adversary for the Doctor.  The whimsical ‘treasure hunt’ plot is delightful and turns sour when the true nature of the planet is revealed and things get rather grim.

Ace, the Doctor, Sabalom Glitz and Mel go treasure hunting

The weird biomechanoid holds many mysteries

The Ace Adventures Box Set also contains Happiness Patrol, a story that divides the few remaining fans that actually hold an opinion on the McCoy era. A bizarre artistic statement on the state of the UK under Margaret Thatcher, it also showcases one of my personal favorite monsters, the Candyman. I know he gets a lot of stick, but its his resemblance to a children’s program host that makes him work for me. He’s just far too silly to be taken seriously, yet he is also a blood-thirsty maniac.

The Happiness Patrol was screen in omnibus format in the US along with Remembrance of the Daleks which I thought was perfect. Both stories were equally superb yet entirely unique. Each got heavy handed at times with their messages and Fifi was dreadful, but there’s always some component that trips up Doctor Who, even at its best (killer clams, magma beasts, cute giant rats, giggling actors off-screen). Even so I admire what the team was attempting here and felt that it was a far stronger story than Remembrance which was rather straight forward.

The new era of Doctor Who appeared to be a pastel-colored kids show with a goofy lead actor and his androgynous assistant. Yet under that veneer, lurked the lotus eaters of Time and the Rani, the cannibals of Paradise Towers, the killer bees of Delta and the Bannermen and… the shocking conclusion to Dragonfire. In the case of Happiness Patrol, it was a candy floss affair mixed with pulp science fiction tidied up with a message about the dangers of tyranny and the dangers of denying sadness. Series 24 and 25 shocks and entertains while making the audience think about some pretty heavy ideas without reverting to gore or horror tactics (that would come later in the final season, which I also like a lot). There’s a cleverness and ingenuity in this period that I don’t think gets enough respect.

The Happiness Patrol also included a stirring moment when the Doctor literally philosophizes an assassin out of his job.

Great stuff and very iconic of the era.

The Doctor confronts the Candyman

Ace joins up with the Happiness Patrol?

This box set holds many elements that would later crop up in the BBC Wales revival of Doctor Who, but it is important to see how they were done here (and done right). Just the right amount of attention is given to Ace (she never threatens to take over the program) and the absurdity of the drama and action is incredibly over the top yet also taken very seriously.

Wish me luck as I take a trip back in time to 1987 and beyond…

Sophie Aldred

Doctor Who Big Finish- Master

Master

By Joseph Lidster
Story 049
Released October 2003
“Do you see me as I see myself? Do you see you as you see yourself? When you see the color red, do you see the color red that I see? Or is your red my blue?”- Doctor

Late one night, Doctor John Smith receives a pair of old friends, Victor and Jacqueline Schaffer, for dinner. A somewhat secluded and tragic individual, Smith tries his best to play the host to his friends and avoid unpleasant conversation, but it seems impossible. A series of grisly murders is the popular topic and its ghost haunts the proceedings. As the weather turns ugly, a stranger arrives in a roar of thunder.

The Doctor has arrived far earlier than he planned to resolve some unfinished business. An old debt has been called in, one that he always knew must be paid, but one that he also knew would demand a tremendous cost. But even the Doctor could not predict how this well constructed situation would pan out, or what path it would take.

Built largely on ideas developed in the Virgin New Adventures line of novels, this version of the Doctor is ‘Time’s Champion,’ a title that came with a  price. The Doctor made a bargain with the abstract cosmic entity of Time and part of that deal involved his old nemesis the Master being placed in a fictional world where he would live out a life without the history of his past crimes. The fact that the Doctor has entered the fiction means that it must end and his debt must be paid. The Master will be allowed to accept or dent his role as the devious evil genius or accept the life of a new man.

Of course the Master knows nothing of this and the pair of intellectuals engage in a series of philosophical discussions on the nature of evil. The Master states that a sociopath driven to commit acts of murder suffers not from a damned soul, but a psychological differentiation.

“So, one who suffers such an affliction is merely helping the universe see the same color red?”- Master

“Perhaps.” – Doctor

“So there is no such thing as evil. It doesn’t exist!”- Master

“A man who kills because of motive can be questioned. A man who kills because he is ill can be helped. A man who kills because he was born, fated to be evil is a true tragedy in itself.”- Doctor

This story adds depth to the unspoken relationship that the Doctor and Master had in the classic program. When he is first introduced as a rough Moriarty to the Doctor’s Sherlock, it’s clear almost immediately that the Doctor and the Master are more than just old classmates ort acquaintances. Letts and Dicks had planned a story that would reveal that the Doctor and Master were part of the same person when the third Doctor regenerated into his fourth body, but Roger Delgado’s untimely death prevented that story from being screened. In Planet of Fire, after the Doctor committed the Master to a fiery death, John Nathan Turner inserted the line, ‘how could you do this to your own brother?’ which was cut from the final transmission.

The Doctor and the Master are more than just former friends and committed foes. Their past is shrouded in mystery, allowing for stories like this to be written. ‘Master’ furthers the story of the two characters by implying that while the Doctor is Time’s Champion, the Master is Death’s Champion. Both the Doctor and the Master have decided their paths, but in each case, they have taken on the responsibility of abstract concepts, placing them further part from the rest of the universe.

There is a story of the Doctor and Master’s childhood where one of them committed murder, accidentally, to defend the other from a bully. The Doctor remember that it was the Master who killed to protect him, but Death informs him that it was the Doctor and in order to escape the guilt, he placed the blame on his closest friend, the Master. The back story and turnabout are both a bit too pat for my taste and make an otherwise brilliant meditation on sociopathy too contrived.

As the Doctor and Master learn of their true selves, so too do the Schaffers. Jacqueline reveals her secret love for the Master and Victor admits to committing unconscionable acts of violence. The intention is obviously that the potential for evil lies in all of us, but the conclusion of ‘Master’ involves the acceptance of an abstract concept of evil and death that makes this somewhat confusing.

Part of a quartet of stories delving into the inner workings of the Doctor’s greatest nemesis’s, ‘Master’ is an odd duck, but in places it is absolutely marvelous. Geoffrey Beevers once again delivers a sterling performance and given the magnificent material to work with, McCoy knocks it out of the park.

Doctor Who – Master can be ordered directly from Big Finish and from local retailers such as Mike’s Comics.