Image Credit - Big Finish
You’d have to have been living in a cave for the last five years to be unaware of Doctor Who, but before the 2005 re-boot with Christopher Ecclestone as the Ninth regeneration, there were, of course, eight other doctors. Probably one of the least celebrated of these is the Eighth, played by Paul McGann. He only appeared on film once, in the somewhat ill-fated 1996 TV feature simply called Doctor Who: The Movie.
The film itself is not especially good, and it’s not what I want to talk about in this article. What I want to talk about is what Eight went off to do afterwards. Because despite never being seen on TV again, he has what I can only classify as a rather brilliant line in audio.
The Doctor Who Audio Adventures are produced by Big Finish and, of course, all the stories in the series take place before the events of the 2005 re-boot. It means effectively that, despite the fact these are all new stories and still in production now, they do take place in the cannon of ClassicWho rather than NewWho. The Time War hasn’t happened yet, McGann has not regenerated into Ecclestone, Gallifrey still exists and other Time Lords tend to pop up at intermittent intervals to generally get in the way and make The Doctor stroppy.
What does this mean for a listener only familiar with the new version of Who? Not a whole lot, actually. You don’t need a degree in Time Lord history or a comprehensive understanding of the prior seven Doctors to enjoy these audio dramas. Pretty much everything you may need to know is explained through his various companions and their responses to the strange things they encounter. These audios are neat chunks of great sci-fi in their own right, and there’s a level of humour in the Eighth Doctor that he never got to display on screen. McGann has a voice almost purpose-built for radio, and his character is crafted with a perfectly-realised combination of smooth cleverness and persuasive charm. He’s also one of the more overtly compassionate of the Doctors. He can layer meaning behind a thoughtful hum and worries believably over the welfare of his companions without ever getting mawkish or sentimental about it.
The Eighth Doctor
The plots themselves are a changing mix of sci-fi, horror and straight drama, and because audio broadcasts aren’t limited by visual effects budgets it’s also a chance to roll out some fairly enormous and impossible scenarios that couldn’t be convincingly fitted on screen. From kitchen-based time-warps to battle machines the size of skyscrapers, there’s even a spin through a spacecraft trade show that lovingly tears to pieces the iconic BBC car review program Top Gear.
So, if it’s all this great, why is it a guilty pleasure? Well, it really shouldn’t be, but when you mention the Eighth Doctor most people’s first reaction is “Wow, that movie was bad,” and Eight himself can get a little bit discounted as a side effect. In some respects I almost don’t mind. It means the brilliance of his Audio Adventures never quite ceases feeling like a glorious little secret, reserved just for those in the know.
Big Finish also produce audio dramas for Peter Davidson’s Fifth Doctor and Sylvester McCoy’s Seventh, as well as various spin-offs and talking books. All of these can be purchased and downloaded directly from the Big Finish website.
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Lady T
Lady T is a great lover of British TV, which is helpful as that's mostly what she gets to watch. She strongly believes that tea can't be made using a microwave, that children's programming really was better when she was a kid, and that there's nothing in the world that can't be solved with a liberal application of common sense. She very much enjoys reading but like most of the rest of the world would some day like to write a book herself. If she ever succeeds in doing so there's a pretty good chance she'll never shut up about it. She can be contacted at lady_t_220 @ yahoo.co.uk.
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