Big Finish Productions Earth Aid

Written by	Ben Aaronovitch and Andrew Cartmel
Format	Compact Disc
Released	2011

Starring Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred

Synopsis: Grubs are eating their way through a crucial galactic shipment of grain, and the captain is not happy, since she's a twentieth-century explosives expert.

• We Must Eat This Delicious Grain for Our Mother by Jacob Licklider

We Must Eat This Delicious Grain for Our Mother by Jacob Licklider 8/10/23

The finale to Big Finish's adaptation of the original Season 27 was the story that was originally slated to be the season opener, Ben Aaronovitch's third script for the television series of course came from his and Cartmel's idea for a Doctor Who stage play of War World. This was moved to the finale for the adaptation and only changed to include Raine Creevy as secondary companion for the Doctor, which was rather easy to implement. Oh, and Andrew Cartmel helped with finishing the scripts for the story, as they did not survive completely through the passage of time. The plot involves the Vancouver, a USS Enterprise-like ship tasked with guarding an aid ship full of millions of tons of grain to a poor planet. A novice called Ace is in the captain's chair, while the medical officer is the mysterious Doctor. Everything goes to hell when the Metatraxi attach themselves to the Aid ship and the Doctor finds Raine Creevy in stasis on the ship as well as Grubs that eat their way through the grain. The story eventually takes us to the home planet of the Metatraxi, which gives us great insight into their past and history with the Grubs. If I were to rank the three Aaronovitch's stories in the performed medium, Earth Aid would fall in between Remembrance of the Daleks and Battlefield. The plot is great all around and is really good at parodying Star Trek: The Next Generation, which was beginning to air and gain traction at the time. It is a loving tribute to the franchise with all the jabs at technobabble and the incompetent captains that can only come from a fan like Aaronovitch.

The Metatraxi here are at their best as they are allowed to be fleshed out without having the comedy of Crime of the Century and their cameo in Animal weighing them down. We get to see the full extent of their culture and the exact reason why they refuse to fight women: they're complete mommy's boys. John Banks voices them and is great in the role and gives a great scene where they try to insult the Doctor to death, and it almost works. They pick up on the flaws of those around them and use it to break them. They have flaws that Ace can easily exploit and beat them because of it.

Sophie Aldred as Ace really shines in this story, as she has to be the leader, which she is woefully unprepared for becoming. She has to be the captain of a spaceship, which entails piloting the thing, which she cannot do. She has to make the tough calls and is really quite good at doing it, and Aldred is in her element as Ace. Beth Chalmers as Raine, while written into the script, still has a lot of good moments as she gets to have the awe of going into space and seeing a different planet and culture. Chalmers pulls it off extremely well in every aspect, even if she doesn't have a lot of things to do early on. Her reactions to the Grubs are also great, as they are a truly revolting race in almost every way. Sylvester McCoy as the Doctor is in his element here, as now he's allowed to be his master manipulator persona as he knows the Metatraxi are going to attack from the off, which is great. This story and Thin Ice are the only two that I can really feel like McCoy is playing a version of his own Doctor.

The Grubs are voiced by Alex Mallinson, and he gives this creepy performance that is just great in almost every way for everything because of the way he modulates himself. The Grubs are complete gluttons who get into the grain and begin to eat the stuff that is supposed to be going to those in need. They are a nice parallel to the Metatraxi, as they are interconnected as species, which is done extremely well. Paterson Joseph is billed on the cover for his portrayal of Victor Espinosa, who - let's be honest - is really good at being totally insane. He provides a nice foil for the Seventh Doctor, who has to keep his masterplan going while Espinosa is acting like a psychopath. Ingrid Oliver also appears here as Lieutenant Baraki, along with the rest of the Vancouver's crew, who are all good as well because they don't really believe that Ace is qualified for being a captain, and Baraki is just a good character in general.

To summarize, Earth Aid is the best story of the Season 27 Lost Stories, as Ben Aaronovitch actually brings in a lot of good for the story to have the story work. There are a few flaws in that it is just a little long, but almost everything else really holds up well. The main cast really give the sense that this was supposed to be the start of a series of adventures with Ace and Raine, even if they never materialized. 90/100