Robot
The Relics of Jegg-Sau
A Benny Audio Adventure
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Robot |
Big Finish The Relics of Jegg-Sau A Benny Audio Adventure |
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| Author | Stephe Colen |  |
| Released | 2004 | |
| Cover | Adrian Salmon |
| Synopsis: Bernice Summerfield believes the relics of the failed colony of Jegg-Sau remain, and she's come a long, long way in search of them. What she'll find is that others have reached Jegg-Sau before her. She'll find herself cat's-paw in a dark outpost of frailty and obsession. And she'll find the robots. |
Move over Doctor Who... by Joe Ford 5/2/05
That was one of the most dramatic and entertaining Bernice Summerfield adventures. And also one of the most stupid...
Imagine you were a Big Finish producer and you were in charge of ensuring that the Bernice Summerfield range was selling well and had the ingenious idea of pairing up Benny with all sorts of Doctor Who monsters to get the fans interested. Who would you choose? The Daleks (Death and the Daleks), the Rutans (The Bellotron Incident), the Sea Devils (The Poison Seas), the Draconians (The Draconians Rage), even book monsters such as the Grel (The Grel Escape). Oh and of course the Giant Robot, that is a real obvious choice. OR NOT. I mean honestly, of all the returning baddies this has to be the most headache inducingly stupid... a monster that was created in the 1970's transported hundreds of years forward in time to turn up in a Benny story? Surely the Autons or the Zygons would be more plausible? Even the Zarbi would do! Throughout the story I was waiting for a rational explanation as to how this giant hunk of metal wound up several centuries in the future and to Steve Cole's credit he almost succeeds. The idea of the Robot being a relic sneaked away to Jegg-Sau and one of Kettlewell's ancestors going looking for it for the money it was worth works, but it still seems a little long winded when you consider how dim witted using the Robot is in the first place. Oh well they made their choice and least Steve Cole is on hand to give the Robot a damn good exploration...
The script is chock full of great ideas and considering there are only four characters it seems a little cluttered in places. But like they say it is better to have too many good ideas than too little and it has the knock on effect of every bad idea (the Robot getting its ideas of human values from a porn simulation) there is a great one waiting to spring out (the Robot assembling its own colony with fake humans, reproducing itself over and over and the astonishing idea of it allowing the robot humans to believe they are real so they act real...) The Relics of Jegg-Sau has an intriguing framing device that sees Benny and the Robot discussing the action after the event. This helps build up some drama and give the action some depth. Plus it helps the story switch location convincingly without lots of characters going "Right I'm in the dome now!" and "Now I'm outside" which plagues so many Big Finish stories.
I must agree whole-heartedly with Rob when he praises Cole on his ability to write humorous and intelligent dialogue as Jegg-Sau is another wonderfully scripted story from the former BBC books editor. He has a perfect grasp on Bernice who comes across as colder and less likable than in The Bone of Contention and far less emotional and more resourceful. It is her astonished reaction to the story's twists that make it so powerful; her sudden rush of anger when she confronts who shot her down, her disbelief at the Robot's attempts to re-colonise the planet, her attempts to justify killing before swinging the axe and her horrified reactions after she realises she was wrong... and best of all is the climatic last scene where she desperately tries to salvage something from the situation, making the horrors that took place on Jegg-Sau mean something...
If I ever met Lisa Bowerman I would hug her to death. She is fantastic. No she is better than fantastic, she is by far the best actor(ess) on Big Finish's staff, just knocking Colin Baker off the top spot. The strength she brings to the role of Bernice is phenomenal and she has passed the point now where she has not only earned a spot on the new series, they should be begging her to do it. This may seem like overdoing the praise a little but I cannot fault a single one of her performances, even if the script is worse than useless (Dragons' Wrath) she manages to salvage something. At her best she emotes beautifully (her disgusted/fascinated/pained reaction to the Robot in this story is a great example) and drags you into the story, desperate to see her survive another day. The climax to Jegg-Sau where Benny is on the run for her life with every automaton after her life is thrilling stuff mostly thanks to Lisa who brings vulnerability and desperation to her character through her voice alone. The main reason I enjoy the Benny adventures so much is Bowerman's endless ability to discover new facets to the character and here we are, five seasons in and she is still keeping me on my toes.
I am glad they managed to secure Michael Kilgariff to play the Robot again because his familiar voice and clomping feet do achieve the sense of nostalgia the script aims for. There are even snatches of music from Robot and a scene at the end where one of them grows. This might seem derivative but would you have a story with the Giant Robot and not make it GIANT? I felt a similar pang of sympathy for the creature here as I did in its debut, how it cannot grasp the situation because humans are so damn unpredictable and devious where it is working from a logical centre. The interrogation scenes between Benny and the Robot are well written to exploit the differences between them and when she cold-heartedly points out that the Robot does not know how to feel and that it cannot feel exploited because it is as discardible as a toaster you realise with some regret that she is right. No matter how pained the creature might seem it is ultimately a flawed box of flashing lights with a screw loose.
There are a great many twists for such a short tale and they help to disguise some of the story's unanswered questions (Why were the relics brought to Jegg-Sau? Who were the original colonists?) and the final scene provides the finishing flourish where the entire escapade can be swept under the rug like a Voyager episode but Benny so desperately doesn't want it to be... she wants people to know about what happened on Jegg-Sau and take some proof away. Whether she succeeds or not is left pleasingly ambiguous.
Some flaws then but such an entertaining ride I cannot fail to recommend it to you folks. The production is great and some of the scenes will take your breath away, the guest actors giving fully charged performances. And whether the idea to use the Robot was daft or not they certainly had a successful stab and giving it a swansong far more dramatic and satisfying than the last episode of Robot.
Just listen to it for Lisa. If only she were blind and I were straight I'd marry her!