Big Finish, Fourth Doctor Series
The Doctor and Leela land on a planet with pollution going crazy and a population very subjugated to the will of the Eminence! Dum-dum-dum. We’ve heard of this particular “villain” in the Sixth Doctor story The Seeds of War and in Dark Eyes 2, with the Eighth Doctor. For a disembodied creature, this Eminence doesn’t really mess around. Out to subjugate the entire universe, it looks like. Hmmm. Anyway, so the Doctor and Leela get separated on their mission of mercy to try to assist the resistance. And Leela and the Doctor ultimately help each other succeed. It does make me wonder whether this is an alien evil too difficult to stop and which Doctor will actually deal with it. The Seventh Doctor makes sense for that “job” but it’s difficult to know.
Though I do love the resolution and the plotline of this story, it is a bit slower paced than I expected, in a strange way. Things happen quickly but the Doctor and Leela seem to be moving in a slower arc than everyone else. Things are pressing and crazy all around them but they are moving in a different direction completely. This doesn’t take away from the story but it just seems odd. And there are just tantalizing hints about the Eminence here but not much more than before. And shouldn’t it know about the Doctor as it’s encountered him twice before? Or was it before? It’s the consciousness at the end of the universe, filling the void, so is it living backwards in time? Overall a good story but no infinite destroyed here (just a ship)!
Tom Baker, Louise Jameson, David Sibley (The Eminence), Michael Fenton-Stevens (Moorson), Clive Mantle (Tillegat/Lieutenant Treeves), Hywel Morgan (Larivan/Lieutenant Garrett), Christine Roberts (Sarla), Ian Hallard (Davent/Infinite Warrior)
Writer/Director: Nicholas Briggs
Release: June 2014