Big Finish

News about and reviews of plays produced by production company Big Finish

Audio and radio play reviews

Review: Doctor Who – Phobos

1 February 2007 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

Immortal BelovedSo we’ve had something Dalek, something silly, something thought-provoking and now, something traditional. Blah, blah, blah, blah, Doctor and companion arrive, Doctor and companion find people being killed off one by one, Doctor and companion get put in peril and discover monster is behind it all.

Ring any bells with anyone?

Yes, it’s standard Doctor Who plot #3. It worked for countless episodes of the old series (Image of the Fendahl, Curse of Peladon, The Dominators and just about anything else you care to name) and it’s readily deployable to the halfway house between old and new Who that is the Big Finish universe.

The question is, did you feel the fear?

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Review: Doctor Who – Immortal Beloved

22 January 2007 Rob Buckley 4 Comments

Immortal BelovedIf you’ve been a Doctor Who fan for long enough, you’re probably a bit of a Nigella by now. Take any new Doctor Who story and in an instant you can come up with the recipe used to make it.

Immortal Beloved‘s quite an easy one:

  • 25% Mawdryn Undead
  • 25% State of Decay
  • 50% The Romans.

Ta da!

Are you impressed? Thought not.

Anyway, despite being relatively easy to pin down, Immortal Beloved‘s a reasonable addition to the new BBC7 range of eighth Doctor stories. Better than Horror of Glam Rock, not as good as Blood of the Daleks, it still has some interesting, slightly sicko ideas and some good performances. Apart from son of Who’s, that is, but we’ll get onto that later.

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Review: Doctor Who – Horror of Glam Rock

17 January 2007 Rob Buckley 6 Comments

The Horror of Glam Rock

Well, we’re between cases so I’m using my pre-afternoon break to blog. If I don’t do it now, I never will and there’s no point starting on a whole article just yet. So here we go: Horror of Glam Rock, the second of the Big Finish plays for BBC7.

In contrast to the first story, the grim Blood of the Daleks, HoGR is a relatively jolly piece filled with guest stars previous Big Finish plays could only dream of. While not as good as its predecessor, it’s certainly not the epic disaster it could have been and is actually pretty entertaining.

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Audio and radio play reviews

Review: Doctor Who – The Year of the Pig

10 January 2007 Rob Buckley 4 Comments

The Year of the Pig Ah, truffles. Rich, indulgent, expensive, an acquired taste and ultimately not very satisfying.

Why do I mention truffles?

  1. I’ve never started a review with a discussion about truffles and I like a bit of variety.
  2. Big Finish’s The Year of the Pig is in many ways like a truffle
  3. It’s a lazy metaphor and I’m also quite lazy
  4. You need pigs to find truffles.

All good reasons, I’m sure you agree.

Anyway. Truffles. Much like the truffle, The Year of the Pig sounds good on paper, but isn’t so good in practice. It’s also found buried in forests. Hang on. Metaphor stretched too far.

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News

The end of days news

5 January 2007 Rob Buckley 3 Comments

David Tennant in drag

Well, Friday’s news anyway.

Doctor Who

Film

  • There are two batches of pictures from The Golden Compass on Ain’t It Cool News. That’s His Dark Materials in disguise, BTW.
  • George Clooney and Robert de Niro are set to appear in a remake of French film 36 Quai des Orfèvres, which starred Daniel Auteuil and Gérard Depardieu. Because all French films star Auteuil and Gérard Depardieu.

British TV

US TV