Big Finish Main Range
First of all, this is almost a throwback to The Church and the Crown, which I loved. But this, this just doesn't quite do it for me. Where it fails for me is actually in the character development of Erimem. It seems like these audios with the two women (Caroline Morris and Nicola Bryant) and Peter Davison's soul-searching Doctor are about the characters making a new bond or getting along together in a "crowded" TARDIS. Yet the characters of Erimem and Perry seem to have hit it off from the beginning! Eye of the Scorpion is one of my favorite earlier dramas, too.
Yet these last few with the three of them have been dull and drawn out at times. Erimem is sticking up for her moral views here but at the cost of the friendship she's create with Peri. Killing people wasn't okay in earlier dramas but now it is? The acting goes along at quite the nice clip. Everyone's well settled in their characters and just acting their hearts out. But the development of Erimem as a member of the crew seems curtailed--even in Three's a Crowd she was learning by being the least isolated in the group she was with. I just wasn't interested in her defense of the religious folks she hooked up with.
Sometimes these period drama pieces come off really well but this one didn't. I didn't know anything about the Council of Nicaea but now I do. I like how the characters fit into the storyline but perhaps there just wasn't a lot to it to start with so it's pretty slow at times. They have to do a lot of explaining about what's going on with the council and the emperor and it just doesn't quite work for me. Erimem doesn't really develop much except to be contrite at the end and I just was left going "eh." Not horrid but the thing that saves it is the Emperor Constantine’s speech at the end or it would’ve been a two jelloid adventure. Everything’s just too scattered in the plot and though Erimem takes her “faith” from her sense of honor and fairness. Ultimately, the chaos pulls the plot apart and not as intriguing and fun as it has the potential to be.
Peter Davison, Nicola Bryant, and Caroline Morris
Writer: Caroline Symcox
Director: Gary Russell
Release: July 2005