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5th Doctor 6th Doctor 7th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

Sirens Of Time

Doctor Who: The Sirens Of TimeThe seventh Doctor is drawn to a jungle world, where he rescues a hapless bystander and discovers an elderly couple nearby. The couple have a unique relationship based on a mutual loathing that seems like it could become murderous at any moment – and they both have very dark secrets to hide. The fifth Doctor, meanwhile, finds himself locked out of the TARDIS, which has materialized aboard a doomed British ship in the North Atlantic. The ship is torpedoed by a German U-boat, and the TARDIS is lost at sea. The Doctor, along with an Irish woman from the British vessel, drifts along with the debris until taken aboard the German sub as a spy. Elsewhere, on the starliner Edifice, the sixth Doctor’s TARDIS arrives, coinciding with an experiment being performed on a time-sensitive creature known as the Temperon. But shortly after the experiment fails, the entire crew – with the exception of its android helmsman and a waitress who appears to have survived through pure luck – is killed, and the Doctor must find out why. Each incarnation of the Doctor is unaware that he is facing the same threat, but in different places and times. And each Doctor has a piece of the puzzle that could save their besieged home planet of Gallifrey.

Order this CDwritten by Nicholas Briggs
directed by Nicholas Briggs
music by Nicholas Briggs

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Colin Baker (The Doctor), Sylvester McCoy (The Doctor), Andrew Fettes (Commander Raldeth / Schmidt), Anthony Keetch (Coordinator Vansell), Michael Wade (The President), Sarah Mowat (Elenya / Helen / Ellie / Knight Commander Lyena), Maggie Stables (Ruthley), Colin McIntyre (Sancroff), John Wadmore (Commandant / Lt. Zentner / Pilot Azimendah / Subcommander Solanec), Mark Gatiss (Captain Schwieger / Edifice Captain / Knight 2), Nicholas Briggs (The Temperon), Nicholas Pegg (Delegate)

Timeline: part one takes place in an unspecified time frame while the seventh Doctor is traveling alone; part two takes place while Tegan and Turlough are traveling with the Doctor, but since he makes no reference to being Lord President of Gallifrey, this may place it between Terminus and The Five Doctors. Part three takes place between Trial Of A Time Lord and Time And The Rani, since the sixth Doctor is traveling alone.

LogBook entry and review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

Phantasmagoria

Doctor Who: PhantasmagoriaThe Doctor and Turlough arrive in London, 1702, amidst a rash of disappearances, murders, and robberies. Well-to-do men have been vanishing without a trace, and the only connection anyone can draw between the victims is that they were last seen playing cards with the sinister and enigmatic Sir Nicholas Valentine at the Diabola Club. Turlough himself witnesses one of the horrifying disappearances and finds himself separated from the Doctor, and joins the intrepid Jasper Jeake as he tries to uncover the whereabouts of his friends. The Doctor befriends self-proclaimed occultist Dr. Samuel Holywell, who claims to have made contact with the dead – but the Doctor believes the explanation is simultaneously simpler and more complex than that. And largely unnoticed by the time travelers is the sudden transformation of a well-known robber into a murderer. At least two of these players are not from Earth – and even if the Doctor can discover who they are, the game is almost up.

Order this CDwritten by Mark Gatiss
directed by Nicholas Briggs
music by Alistair Lock

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Mark Strickson (Turlough), David Walliams (Quincy Flowers), Jonathan Rigby (Edmund Carteret), Mark Gatiss (Jasper Jeake), Jez Fielder (Poltrot/Major Billy Lovemore), David Ryall (Sir Nicholas Valentine), Steven Wickham (Dr. Samuel Holywell), Julia Dalkin (Hannah Fry)

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

The Land Of The Dead

Doctor Who: The Land Of The DeadThe TARDIS materializes in mid-air over Alaska, 1964, and then vanishes again when a small airplane nearly collides with it. The TARDIS takes the Doctor and Nyssa to the same location in 1994, where British millionaire Shaun Brett oversees the construction of an enormous house. Brett’s employees include the half-Inuit, half-American Tulung, who acts as a mediator between Brett and the local Inuits who have labored on the huge project, and Monica Lewis, an interior designer who hopes that this house’s unique and sometimes macabre designs will enhance her resume. The Doctor and Nyssa encounter savage creatures roaming the frozen wasteland outside the isolated house, and it soon becomes evident that the same beings are in the house as well. Tulung and the elderly Gaborik believe that the creatures are manifestations of angry spirits of the land, which has been defiled to create Brett’s house. The Doctor quickly discovers that the creatures have properties unlike any other creature on Earth, and yet they are native to the planet. It’s only a matter of time before something kills everyone at the house – the only question is whether it will be the increasing hoarde of ancient monsters, or the mad blood feud for vengeance that has tied Brett and Tulung together since childhood.

Order this CDwritten by Stephen Cole
directed by Gary Russell
music by Nicholas Briggs

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Sarah Sutton (Nyssa), Lucy Campbell (Monica Lewis), Neil Roberts (Tulung), Christopher Scott (Brett), Andrew Fettes (Gaborik), Alistair Lock (Supplier)

Timeline: after Time-Flight and before Arc Of Infinity

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

Red Dawn

Doctor Who: Red DawnThe TARDIS takes the Doctor and Peri to a cathedralesque structure on the surface of Mars early in the 21st century at a particularly historic moment – the day of the first American manned landing on the red planet. But NASA’s crew is a motley assortment. Two American astronauts are accompanied by a pair of British civilians, Tanya and Paul Webster, whose only claim to their seats on the mission is their relation to a rich uncle whose financial backing kept the Mars shot from being scrapped. But the Websters’ presence is more than just a favor to the mission’s benefactor. The Doctor, Peri, and the astronauts discover that the elaborate building is an Ice Warrior tomb, guarded by a contingent of Warriors in suspended animation. Paul Webster suddenly shows his true colors: as an ambitious and unscrupulous agent for his equally corrupt uncle, he is on the Mars mission to bring back as much alien technology as he can find. The honor-bound Ice Warriors have a hard time coming to any conclusion other than vengeance – which could kill both the innocent members of the expedition and the time travelers as well. The Doctor feels personally responsible for the entire incident, which might not have happened if not for his presence on Mars.

Order this CDwritten by Justin Richards
directed by Gary Russell
music by Russell Stone

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Nicola Bryant (Peri), Matthew Brenher (Lord Zzaal), Robert Jezek (Commander Lee Forbes), Maureen Oakley (Pilot Susan Roberts), Stephen Fewell (Paul Webster), Georgia Moffatt (Tanya Webster), Hylton Collins (Subcommander Sstast), Alistair Lock (Zizmar), Jason Haigh-Ellery (Sskann), Gary Russell (Razzburr)

Notes: Georgia Moffatt is Peter Davison’s daughter, but she’s not the first offspring of the leading actor to appear in the series. Sylvester McCoy’s two sons played Haemovores in 1989’s The Curse Of Fenric, and the late Patrick Troughton’s son David made three appearances, a bit part in 1969’s The War Games and much more prominent roles in 1972’s The Curse Of Peladon and 2008’s Midnight. Moffatt would later appear in a 2008 episode of the revived Doctor Who TV series, ironically titled The Doctor’s Daughter, and married the tenth Doctor, David Tennant, in 2011.

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

Winter For The Adept

Doctor Who: Winter For The AdeptA girls’ school in the Swiss Alps in late 1963 is the site of some unusual incidents. Two of the students have escaped, but they’re wandering through the already bitterly cold snow with a major storm just hours away. The headmistress of the school is convinced that evil is lurking just around the corner. And a man sent to track down and rescue the two truants finds only one girl, who identifies herself as Nyssa, and claims that some kind of experiment gone awry has brought her to this place. Nyssa is taken back to the school to warm up, while Lt. Peter Sandoz, her rescuer, continues his struggle to find the other missing girls. When they are found and brought back, unexplainable – some might even say paranomal – happenings begin to take place, endangering them all. At the height of one of these “poltergeist” events, a Police Box materializes in the school’s attic. A man who calls himself the Doctor emerges, and is immediately drawn into the mystery. Is the school truly haunted? Or is a much more sinister – and more tangible – threat at work here?

Order this CDwritten by Andrew Cartmel
directed by Gary Russell
music by Russell Stone

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Sarah Sutton (Nyssa), Sally Faulkner (Miss Tremayne), Liz Sutherland (Alison Speers), India Fisher (Peril Bellamy), Peter Jurasik (Lt. Peter Sandoz), Hannah Dickinson (Madamoiselle Maupassant), Christopher Webber (Harding Wellman), Andy Coleman (Commodore), Nicky Goldie (Empress)

Timeline: between Land Of The Dead and The Mutant Phase

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

The Mutant Phase

Doctor Who: The Mutant PhaseThe Doctor and Nyssa are thrust into a deadly situation involving the Thals and the Daleks. An unknown contaminant has invaded the Daleks’ biology, a contaminant which is spreading like wildfire through the interconnected consciousness/data network of the metallic terrors. The Daleks are now asking their arch nemesis for help – but they’re still not beyond their usual brand of treachery, and the Doctor discovers that helping the Daleks could unravel his own history, creating a temporal paradox… assuming that the paradox hasn’t already trapped him.

Order this CDwritten by Nicholas Briggs
directed by Nicholas Briggs
music by Nicholas Briggs

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Sarah Sutton (Nyssa), Christopher Blake (Ptolem), Jared Morgan (Ganatus), Mark Gatiss (Roboman), Andrew Ryan (Albert), Sara Wakefield (Delores), Mark Gatiss (Karl)

Timeline: between Winter For The Adept and Primeval

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor

Loups-Garoux

Loups-GarouxThe TARDIS brings the Doctor and Turlough to Rio de Janeiro in the year 2080, just in time for the carnival. During the festivities, both of the time travelers become aware of another presence that seems out of place – something lurking, waiting patiently in the dark as it has done for centuries – something that will draw them both into the center of a battle for dominion over the human race.

Order this CDwritten by Marc Platt
directed by Nicholas Pegg
music by Alistair Lock

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Mark Strickson (Turlough), Elanor Bron (Ileana De Santos), Nicky Henson (Pieter Stubbe), Sarah Gale (Rosa Caiman), Jane Burke (Inez), Burt Kwouk (Dr. Hayashi), David Hankinson (Anton Lichtfuss), Derek Wright (Jorge)

Timeline: between Phantasmagoria and Singularity

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor

Dust Breeding

Doctor Who: Dust BreedingThe Doctor brings Ace to a distant desert world called Duchamps 331 to look for a painting – Edvard Munch’s “Scream” – which he hears will be destroyed under mysterious circumstances. He hopes to rescue it from whatever fate awaits it, but a more serious event is already underway there. A murder has occurred on one of the planet’s refueling stations, and the dust seems to be coming to life. Ace is delighted to see an old friend there – Bev Tarrant, one of the survivors of the Doctor’s clash with the Daleks on Kar-Charrat – but the Doctor is more concerned when he autopsies the murder vicrim and finds no blood and no organs – only dust. In orbit, the patrons of a lavish spaceborne art gallery are unwittingly bringing an evil presence to Duchamps 331 to fulfill one of his most diabolical plans – a plan that can only be foiled by his arch enemy, the Doctor.

Order this CDwritten by Mike Tucker
directed by Gary Russell
music by Russell Stone

Cast: Sylvester McCoy (The Doctor), Sophie Aldred (Ace), Caroline John (Madam Salvadori), Louise Falkner (Bev Tarrant), Mark Donovan (Klemp), Geoffrey Beevers (Mr. Seta), Johnson Willis (Damien Pierson), Ian Rickett (Guthrie), Gary Russell (Jay Binks), Jane Goddard (Maggie), Jez Fielder (Skredsvig), Alistair Lock (Albert Bootle)

Timeline: after The Genocide Machine and before Colditz

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor

Eye Of The Scorpion

Doctor Who: Eye Of The ScorpionAs the Doctor is trying to show Peri how to find her way around the TARDIS, something yanks the timeship violently off-course. By the time they reach the console room, however, the TARDIS has landed, depositing them in the sands of Egypt around 1400 B.C. Worse yet, as soon as they step outside the doors, they spot a young woman in a chariot being chased by the driver of another chariot. At Peri’s urging, the Doctor lends his assistance, saving the girl’s life – and earning both of the time travelers the favor of Erimem, the Pharaoh-in-waiting. But the Doctor is concerned – he can’t remember a female Pharaoh from this time period, and the other chariot’s driver was trying to kill her. Erimem asks the Doctor and Peri to accompany her to Thebes, where she plans to honor their heroics with a banquet, but only more court intrigue awaits them, including an assassination attempt thwarted by the Doctor, and the presence of an alien mind who can take humans – willing or unwilling – as hosts.

Order this CDwritten by Iain McLaughlin
directed by Gary Russell
music by David Darlington

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Nicola Bryant (Peri), Caroline Morris (Erimem), Jonathan Owen (Antranak), Stephen Perring (Horemshep), Harry Myers (Yanis), Jack Galagher (Fayum), Daniel Brennan (Kishik), Mark Wright (Slave)

Timeline: after Red Dawn and before No Place Like Home

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor

Primeval

Doctor Who: PrimevalNyssa has fallen critically ill, and the Doctor has brought her to her home world of Traken 3,000 years before her birth (and its destruction), desperate to find someone who specializes in Traken medicine. Unaccustomed to visitors, the Consuls of Traken are alarmed by the presence of the Doctor and Nyssa, but as with virtually every decision in this era of their recent history, they defer to the wisdom of the Source…only it seems to refuse to render a decision for them. The Doctor is told to leave and take Nyssa with him, dying or not. Unable to appeal to the Consuls, the Doctor takes his plea for help to Kwundaar, a telepathic being who has been trying to take over the Union of Traken for centuries. But Kwundaar’s price for saving Nyssa’s life is steep – the Doctor must give him the means to invade Traken and enslave its people. Still certain he can find a way to save Nyssa without allowing Kwundaar and his fanatical pirates to overrun Traken, the Doctor tries to play both sides against the middle, unaware that Kwundaar has forseen his actions – and has taken full advantage of them.

Order this CDwritten by Lance Parkin
directed by Gary Russell
music by Russell Stone

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Sarah Sutton (Nyssa), Stephen Greif (Kwundaar), Susan Penhaligon (Shayla), Ian Hallard (Sabian), Billy Miller (Captain Narthex), Romy Tennant (Lt. Anona), Marc Woolgar (Hyrca), Rita Davies (Janneus), Alistair Lock (Foster Etrayk)

Timeline: after The Mutant Phase and before Spare Parts

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

Excelis Dawns

Doctor WhoOn a momentary sidestep after dropping Gravis off harmlessly on an isolated planetoid where it can no longer harm the people of Frontios, the Doctor arrives on Artaris, a primitive world where he meets a gruff warlord named Grayvorn. Grayvorn is en route to a convent whose nuns are entrusting him on a quest for an unidentified Relic. But the Doctor is horrified to learn that the nuns have taken on a new visitor: the irrepressible Time Lady known as Iris Wildthyme, the Doctor’s sometimes old flame and sometimes nuisiance. To make matters even worse, the convent’s Mother Superior has entrusted the only known map leading to the Relic to Iris, and insists that the troublesome time traveler accompany Grayvorn on that quest, with another nun, Sister Jolene, in tow. The Doctor, smelling trouble, tags along, and finds himself more than once keeping Grayvorn and Iris from each other’s throats. The Doctor is also suspicious of Sister Jolene’s motives for coming on the trip – and indeed, those of the Mother Superior who is behind the quest. Is the search for the Relic a deadly trap, or a true holy quest which may require terrible sacrifices of those who undertake it?

Order this CDwritten by Paul Magrs
directed by Gary Russell
music by David Darlington

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Anthony Stewart Head (Lord Grayvorn), Katy Manning (Iris Wildthyme), Posy Miller (Sister Jolene), Patricia Leventon (Mother Superior), Billy Miller (Zombie King)

Timeline: during part 4 of Frontios

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor Doctor Who

Spare Parts

Doctor Who: Spare PartsThe Doctor and Nyssa visit a planet which seems to be almost exactly like Earth, but the sky is nowhere to be seen – the cities are all underground. The people have already taken plastic surgery one step further as well – they’ve added artificial organs and limbs, not just altered their skin, and even the indigenous animals are being subjected to the augmentation surgeries. It all adds up to confirm the Doctor’s worst fear: the TARDIS has landed on Mondas, at the moment in history poised precariously between the extinction of the Mondasians and the birth of the Cybermen. And if he and Nyssa stay there too long, they may be captured and converted themselves.

Order this CDwritten by Marc Platt
directed by Gary Russell
music by Russell Stone

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Sarah Sutton (Nyssa), Sally Knyvette (Doctorman Allan), Pamela Binns (Sisterman Constant), Derren Nesbitt (Thomas Dodd), Paul Copley (Dad), Kathryn Guck (Yvonne Hartley), Jim Hartley (Frank Hartley), Nicholas Briggs (Cyberleader Zheng)

Timeline: between Primeval and Creatures Of Beauty

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor Doctor Who

The Church And The Crown

Doctor Who: The Church And The CrownThe TARDIS brings the Doctor, Peri and Erimem to the eve of the French Revolution, though they aren’t aware of this at first. As soon as the Doctor realizes what period of history he’s brought his friends to, he tries to round them up to make a quick exit, but it’s too late. Peri has attracted some unwelcome attention due to her striking resemblance to Queen Anne, and Erimem’s usual curiosity has led her to some of the more colorful locals. Peri has become a target of kidnappers plotting against the Queen, and in trying to defend her, the Doctor has made a target of himself as well.

Order this CDwritten by Mark Wright and Cavan Scott
directed by Gary Russell
music by Russell Stone

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Nicola Bryant (Peri), Caroline Morris (Erimem), Andrew Mackay (King Louis), Michael Shallard (Cardinal Richelieu), Marcus Hutton (The Duke of Buckingham), Peter John (Delmarre), Andy Coleman (Rouffet), Robert Curbishley (Captain Morand), Wendy Albiston (Madame De Chevreuse)

Timeline: between No Place Like Home and Nekromanteia

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor Doctor Who

No Place Like Home

Doctor Who: No Place Like HomeThe Doctor is giving Erimem a tour around the TARDIS, but begins to lose track of where he is inside his own ship. When the timeship’s power fades, the Doctor knows that some outside force is acting on his TARDIS… or is it something on the inside? The Doctor and Erimem discover that a new life form has evolved within the TARDIS itself, and finally it has gained the sentience and knowledge required to take control. The Doctor hopes he can reason with the being, but the creature seems to have other ideas…

written by Iain McLaughlin
directed by Gary Russell
music by David Darlington

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Caroline Morris (Erimem), Mark Donovan (Rovie), Nicholas Briggs (Shayde)

Notes: The character of Shayde, an artificial intelligence spawned from the Time Lords’ Matrix itself, was created by writer Steve Parkhouse for the first fifth Doctor comic strip, “The Tides Of Time” (issues #61-67 of Doctor Who Monthly, 1982; art by Dave Gibbons).

Timeline: between The Eye Of The Scorpion and The Church And The Crown

Logbook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
5th Doctor Doctor Who

Nekromanteia

NekromanteiaThe Doctor, Peri and Erimem visit an alien market square – Erimem’s first adventure on a world other than Earth – where Erimem stumbles across information that leads her to suggest a visit to the Nekromanteia system. The Doctor goes along with the idea, unaware that he’s landing himself and his companions in the midst of a grim war – between a well-armed corporate entity and a coven of powerful witches – which has been plotted out from the beginning by an unscrupulous businessman seeking immortality for himself.

Order this CDwritten by Austen Atkinson
directed by John Ainsworth
music by David Darlington

Cast: Peter Davison (The Doctor), Nicola Bryant (Peri), Caroline Morris (Erimem), Gilly Cohen (Jal Dor Kal), Glyn Owen (Commander Harlon), Kerry Skinner (Cochrane), Ivor Danvers (Wendle Marr), Kate Brown (Tallis), Nigel Fairs (Yal Rom / Guard), Andrew Fettes (Salaysia), Simon Williams (Paul Addison), Gary Russell (Thesanius), Jack Galagher (Comms Officer), John Ainsworth (Soldier)

Timeline: between The Church And The Crown and The Caves Of Androzani

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green