Gallifrey 7: Intervention Earth
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Big Finish Productions Gallifrey 7: Intervention Earth |
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| Format | Compact Disc |
| Released | 2015 |
| Starring Sophie Aldred and Juliet Landau |
| Synopsis: Somewhere, across the stars, an ancient force is stirring: one of the Time LordsŐ greatest heroes is returning to our universe. But he may also prove to be their greatest threat. |
7 Reasons Why Gallifrey 7 is What It Is by Stephen Maslin 3/3/17
Reason 1: Relegation.
There have always been one or two of Big Finish's ranges that have come across as a bit, well, second division. If one looks at a list of writers of the earlier series of Gallifrey, one finds some of the great and the good of the Who-Audio-Spin-Off world: Messrs Cole, Richards, Barnes, Lyons, Hopkins et al. Not second-tier personnel by any stretch of the imagination. Care was being taken for this franchise not to fall into the quality void that so bedeviled UNIT, Dalek Empire, Iris Wildthyme, Graceless and the like. Yet all that changed. Big Finish, quite rightly, decided to devote more of its efforts to the greatly expanded range of Doctor Who stories on offer. There are only so many half-decent scripts to go round, and Gallifrey, amongst other things, has been the loser.
Reason 2: Juliet Landau.
One gathers that the lady in question was in some TV show or other, and no doubt she was very good in it. Sadly, someone has told her that appearing in audio-only drama involves talking. Not acting, just talking. It is not her fault that the lines she has to spout are as dreary as could be, but every time Ms Landau opens her mouth, one realizes just how good Lalla Ward was in keeping the whole Gallifrey franchise above water. I have no problem with Big Finish recasting Time Lords and Time Ladies (their choices for the regenerations of the Master, the Monk, the Rani and Drask have been inspired), but this one is an out-and-out failure.
Reason 3: Sophie Aldred.
...and if Juliet Landau is no substitute for Lalla Ward, then Sophie Aldred is certainly no substitute for Louise Jameson. Ace is working for the Celestial Intervention Agency?! In an infinite universe, peopled (or so it would seem) with a myriad of humanoid life, she was the best they could get? (Contrast this completely inappropriate setting for Ace with that gloriously re-established in the novel adaptations...)
Reason 4: The Reveal.
It may come as a surprise to many but Gyles Brandeth is NOT one of the reasons why G7 doesn't fly. Not at first anyway. When we first meet him, he sounds just right for the part but (spoiler alert) his being forced later on to stretch his acting chops to disguising his voice fails miserably. Portreeve Sir Giles Kalid Estram was the Master all along!
Reason 5: Nomega.
Stephen Thorne has obviously decided that he does not want to spend too much time revisiting the 1970s and seems to have asked for any workload that Big Finish puts his way to be light (see also Eldrad Must Live). Yet if one is lucky enough to have that imperious voice, even for only a short time, why waste it? He does have one long screed of dialogue, but in it Thorne is effectively masked by Sophie Aldred saying the same lines in tandem. Ultimately, Omega is only there for the time it takes for him to regenerate into a much cheaper actor. He "should have been a God!"
Reason 6: Blah.
Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.
Reason 7: Awareness of Who's Missing.
A certain character turns up at the end, saving a whole load of people we couldn't give a f**k about from a well-deserved demise. As with the absence of Lalla and Louise, one is made agonizingly aware of how much better things could have been had that character been there right from the start. There is, sadly, no one up to dragging this sorry script out of the reject pile where it belongs: Sean Carlsen gives his best and Toby Longworth manages to build a sympathetic character from practically nothing, but neither comes close to hiding the dreary ineptitude of the dialogue they have to utter. And nothing of what we do hear actually has to happen. I'd like to bet that once G8 kicks off, it will be as if G7 had never happened (which is, in truth, no bad thing).
In a word?
Atrocious. Really. This is as embarrassing and half-hearted a confection as Big Finish have ever attempted. If you managed to make it to the end of this appalling guff then you either have the forbearance of a saint or the aesthetic sense of a pigeon (or, like me, you simply can't believe just how bad it really is).