Tag Archives: writer: lizzie hopley

The Battle of Giant’s Causeway: Big Finish gets Ireland wrong

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In Belfast in April, I spotted that Waterstone’s was selling a CD copy of the Big Finish audio drama “The Battle of Giant’s Causeway”, by Lizzie Hopley, which came out earlier this year. The story reunites the Eighth Doctor, played by Paul McGann, with his audio companions Charlie Pollard and the alien C’Rizz, played by India Fisher and Conrad Westmaas respectively, to a conflict between Sontarans and Rutans playing out at the Giant’s Causeway in 55 BC. I didn’t buy it in Belfast, but I got it from the Big Finish website as soon as I got home.

It’s charming to have the old gang back together again, fifteen years after C’Rizz was written out of the Big Finish continuity, but a lot of plot is left unexplained, presumably because it’s the first story in a series. I bounced off it, I’m afraid, because I was less than impressed by the throwaway remarks in the script about Celts and Ireland.

At 7:30, we have this exchange:

Doctor: “Humans are one of the deadliest life forms I know. No offence, Charlie.”
Charlie: “Oh, none taken.”
Doctor: “This is 55 BC. The reign of the warrior race. The Celts are definitely vying for most barbaric.”

Nobody’s perfect, but it’s news to me that the Celts were particularly barbaric by the standards of 55 BC, and it grates to have the Doctor declare this as a fact without supporting evidence. Indeed, Charlie Pollard clearly thinks differently at 9:40 when the travellers discover a pile of corpses on the Giant’s Causeway:

C’Rizz: They’re soldiers! Judging by their armour.
Doctor: Not just soldiers. They’re legionnaires. Except…
Charlie: Roman legionnaires? Goodness.
C’Rizz: Are legionnaires not Celts then?
Charlie: Oh, Romans are far more deadly.

This however is not endorsed by the Doctor. We progress a bit further when the Doctor and Charlie confront the Sontaran commander for a bit of exposition at 21:45.

General: We plan a revenge raid against the Celtish devils at dawn.
Charlie: The Celts did not kill your Sonturions. tell them, Doctor.
General: Sonturians?
Doctor: It’s a long story. But. It appears you lot are a battalion from Sontar that somehow travelled back in time to Earth in the distant past, met some Romans, lost all sense of identity and purpose, and now think you’re part of the first Roman invasion of Britain.
Doctor (thinking): Actually that means – that this isn’t where you landed. Why target Ireland? Even the Romans weren’t that stupid.

The whole scenario is weird anyway; at the time of Julius Caesar’s raid into Britain in 55 BC, it would have been impossible for Roman troops to seriously mount a similar exercise in Ireland. Even with that in mind, perhaps my hackles were up, but the line that invading Ireland is in itself a particularly stupid idea landed rather badly with me; along with the explicit assumption that Ireland is part of Britain.

And a third line from the Doctor at 40:15, where he refers to “Rutans and Sontarans in Celtic Britain”, also landed badly with me.

The Giant’s Causeway is not in Britain. Ireland is not in Britain. Celts were frankly about as barbaric as Romans. It’s a shame that the script for this play says otherwise, and it’s a real shame that these words are put into the mouth of the Doctor. Big Finish normally does better than this.

Recent Big Finish: Tenth Doctor, Fourth Doctor, Martha Jones

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So, I’m rather far behind with writing up my recent Big Finish listening – last time I mentioned it was in July. Three boxed sets of audio plays to cover quickly in summary here.

My favourite of these is a set of three stories with the Tenth Doctor and Classic Companions. All three bring David Tennant together with John Leeson as K9. The first, Splinters by John Dorney, features Louise Jameson as Leela; the second, The Stuntman by Lizzie Hopley, has Sarah Sutton as Nyssa, and the third, Quantum of Axos by Roy Gill, has Sophie Aldred as Ace. All three stories have fantastic chemistry between Tennant and the others – the arrivals of Leela and K9 are the first changes to the regular cast he remembers as a young fan, and clearly everyone is thrilled to bits to be performing with each other. It was also interesting that all three stories play with themes of identity, memory and nostalgia, which always appeal to me too. Dorney, Hopley and Gill are among Big Finish’s more reliable writers, and they have delivered here. Strongly recommended. Here’s a trailer to whet your appetite.

Another New Who spinoff comes in the form of The Year of Martha Jones, set during the year that Martha travels the world while the aged-up Doctor is the Master’s prisoner. We’ve already had a print anthology set in this period; this however is better, getting off to an excellent start in The Last Diner by the always reliable James Goss, a more Western-y The Silver Medal by Tim Foley, and a well-executed climax in Deceived by Matt Fitton. Martha is joined by Adjoa Andoh playing her mother Francine, who has apparently escaped the Master, and Serin Ibrahim as old friend Holly. (Also Clare Louise Connolly plays the Toclafance in all three stories.) Guest stars include Marina Sirtis, best known as Deanna Troi in Star Trek, in the first episode.

The fifth set of Ninth Doctor adventures, Back to Earth, sees Christopher Ecclestone’s time as the Doctor on audio overtaking his record on TV. To be honest I was less wowed by this trilogy than by some of the others, but these are all decent enough stories. Station to Station by Robert Valentine has the Doctor helping a young woman (Indigo Griffiths) out of a strange predicament in a deserted railway station. The False Dimitry by Sarah Grochala brings a Whovian spin to a corner of Russian history, the title character playedby Alexander Arnold. And Auld Lang Syne, another one by Time Foley, has a spooky New Year’s Eve party where all is not what it seems; veteran Wendy Craig makes an appearance as the great-aunt. I got the sense that Big Finish is trying out younger writers and actors in this range, which is fine. Here, again is a trailer.

I’m also way behind on noting the Fourth Doctor box sets that I have been listening to, but I think I’ll save those for another post – the above three are all worth getting anyway.

Ninth Doctor and Thirteenth Doctor audios

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The end of a week of Doctor Who audio-blogging – book-blogging will return shortly, but I also will try and keep more up to date with the other media I have been consuming here.

Lost Warriors is the third volume of plays featuring Christopher Eccleston as the Ninth Doctor, following from the welcome first set and the excellent second set. Two are OK and one that is excellent.

The first of these is The Hunting Season by James Kettle, a new writer for me, bringing the Ninth Doctor to a posh country house in the early twentieth century, which he naturally dislikes, with aliens infesting the estate. Not all is as it seems of course. Annette Badland is great as the cook, but it doesn’t quite seem to find its soul. One reviewer comments that it is the only one of these three not rooted in historical events, which may be part of it.

We’re on an upward curve with the next one, The Curse of Lady Macbeth by Lizzie Hopley. This is largely a two-hander between Eccleston and the lovely Neve McIntosh as Gruach, the historical Lady Macbeth, with an optimistic reading of her role in Scottish history which surely nods to Dorothy Dunnett’s King Hereafter, bothered by aliens again of course but also fulfilling a progressive government role.

And it peaks with Monsters in Metropolis by John Dorney, where a lone Cyberman gets involved with Fritz Lang’s movie-making in 1920s Berlin. It has a similar plot to the TV story Dalek, with Nicholas Briggs playing the monster which is changed by its survival in a human world, but the historical setting and intersection with early sf make it very different. Helen Goldwyn, a Big Finish veteran actor, director and writer, shines here as one-off companion Anna Dreyfus, Fritz Lang’s assistant.

You can get them here.

Dorney throws in a lovely and not completely gratuitous reference to Norman Hartnell, the fashion designer whose career was just getting started at the time that Lang was making Metropolis. His cousin William, seven years younger, is also known to Doctor Who fans.

And finally, I finish this write-up of recent Doctor Who audios with one that didn’t come from Big Finish.

Doctor Who: Redacted is a ten-part audio story featuring Jodie Whittaker’s Thirteenth Doctor, released by the BBC between April and June 2022, mostly by Juno Dawson. Although Whittaker makes frequent appearances, along with Anjli Mohindra as Rani, Jemma Redgrave and Ingrid Oliver as Kate Stewart and Osgood, and a recast Doon McKichan as Madam Vastra, the protagonist is Charlie Craggs starring as Cleo Proctor, supported by Lois Chimimba as Abby and Holly Quin-Ankrah as Shawna, three podcasters who are trying to get to the bottom of the mystery of the Doctor and her blue box – especially when people associated with the mysterious traveller start to disappear. It’s all very well done.

The whole thing is very different from a Big Finish production – much more podcasty, much less TV-on-the-radio. It’s something of a hymn to fandom, but given Dawson’s authorship and Craggs’ leading role, it’s not surprising that it’s also a salute to Who as a safe space for inclusivity. And it’s the BBC showing the way yet again: it’s difficult to imagine Big Finish running a story with a trans lead and the two most important supporting roles played by actors of colour, or at least it was until the BBC showed it could be done.

Even outside the UK I was able to download all 10 episodes (none longer than half an hour) for free from here.

Back to books. Soon.