The Time War Volume Three is the continuing saga of the Eighth Doctor’s involvement in the greatest of cosmic wars between the Time Lords and the Daleks.  Big Finish Productions has released another audio box set featuring Paul McGann as the Doctor with Rahkee Thakrar joining him in the TARDIS as Bliss.  There are four stories in this collection all directed by Ken Bentley.  The Doctor is reluctantly also working with a Time Lord known as Tamasan, played by Adele Anderson, trying to help as best he can without getting pulled into the front lines of the fight.  Andrew Fettes, Tracy Wiles, and Michael Jayston are part of the guest cast as well.

State of Bliss by Matt Fitton starts off with an intriguing and somewhat confusing story of Bliss and her planet of origin.  This story explores the idea of the multiverse of possibilities concerning her part in the Time War and her relationship with the Doctor.  It’s a interesting idea but probably a little tough to pull off just as an audio story.  McGann is pretty good here, but he has yet to put in a disappointing performance.  I am not sure that I find Bliss the most interesting of the Doctor’s companions, but Fitton is a competent enough writer where I wasn’t totally lost.  Likely, I will understand a bi more once I eventually listen to it again.

Lisa McMullin picks up the ball with The Famished Lands where the Doctor and Bliss find a civilization which is facing mass starvation due to the Time Lord.  The solution forced upon the populace may actually end up being far worse, and the Doctor will have to find a much better solution once he learns the secrets of how the people are still surviving in such dire circumstances.  This is a pretty chilling episode here and effectively presented.  I am not familiar with this particular writer, or I just don’t remember what else she has written for Big Finish.  This turned out to be a pretty good addition to the set.

Fugitive in Time by Roland Moore is next.  The Doctor and Bliss are joined by Tamasan to find a dangerous fugitive before the Daleks do.  This is also a solid addition to the set and sets up the final story by the prolific John Dorney.

He’s back….the darker side of the Doctor made real.  Michael Jayston returns as the Valeyard in The War Valeyard.  It may not be the most inspired of titles, but the story is interesting in that the Valeyard apparently believes himself to be the Doctor and tries to be a figure for good.  However the Valeyard may not be living in the right reality, and the darkness from which he is manifested may be too strong.  Jayston still sounds wonderfully menacing in this role.  It’s an interesting move for Big Finish to explore what the Valeyard’s role in the Time Lord would look like.

I enjoyed this collection for the most part.  Even the Valeyard coming back was handled pretty well.  McGann still sounds great.  Bliss is becoming a companion I am starting to appreciate more.  Thakrar provides an interesting sass in the way she says some of her lines.  The sound effects were well executed, but Big Finish rarely messes that up.  All four stories provided some variety in mood, which is mainly due to being four different writers.  I also liked the rather strained relationship between the Doctor and Tamasan.  Anderson is the third actress to play this role since the series started.  Thank goodness for Time Lord regeneration!

This is a solidly entertaining and somewhat profound release from Big Finish.  The cast performances remain compelling.  The stories have appropriately diverse settings and circumstances.  Not all of it was easy to follow, but I still appreciated the experience as a whole.  And the Time War will continue into a fourth volume, but that’s for another blog.

Who Slays the Wicked is another historical mystery that features Viscount Devlin, Sebastian St. Cyr.  C.S. Harris raises the stakes for her elegant and indomitable hero when his niece is looking at being suspected of a pretty horrific murder.

Sebastian is happily married with a child and is still a member of the English aristocracy in 1814.  He has a very troubled family history and has been to war.  As an intelligence operative for his country, Sebastian has developed an interest and talent for investigation and is often asked by the local constabulary to lend a hand if a murder touches a little too close to the Crown.

Sebastian’s niece has been compelled to marry the loathsome Lord Ashworth.  Ashworth is known for cheating the hired help, abusive behavior and language, and some very twisted sexual interests.  He is murdered quite grotesquely, and Sebastian is not sure that his beloved niece is in the clear.  Either way, he wants to help.  Sebastian certainly has no affection or sympathy for the victim here, but Ashworth is only the first.  He once again has to search through the deception littering the chambers of power as well as the most dangerous streets of London to close in on a killer who will not hesitate add him to the body count.

This is a pretty bloody one here from C.S. Harris, but it was good.  I generally like this series so I won’t have anything overly critical to say about this novel.  Although Sebastian went through an emotional wringer in several of earlier novels, it’s nice to have him in some contented circumstances with his headstrong but loving wife and his young son.  The one major reservation I have about this series is that there are some events that seem a little repetitious such as Sebastian having to once again fend off a murderous attack in some alley by someone who doesn’t appreciate his nosing around.  I like that Sebastian isn’t just a cerebral protagonist and is an effective fighter when necessary, but I wouldn’t object to a bit more variety in the threats to his physical well-being.

The mystery itself was rather interesting, and Harris does employ the red herrings pretty effectively.  I was a somewhat surprised at the identity of the killer.  The novel also touches on the political and world events of the time.  Napoleon was a real threat at the time.  Also, there are some visiting Russian royal figures visiting that cause some distraction for the young viscount.  Harris has become quite adept at weaving real history into the more fanciful entertainment of her plots.

Sebastian St. Cyr can come across as a little too noble and confident to be all that believable at times, but he is never unlikable.  He also has enough darkness of his own to make him interesting to a reader and as formidable as the killers he is seeking.  Not only would I recommend this novel for my fellow mystery fans, but I would say the whole series is definitely worth the time.

So I am in this little book club in the Texas Panhandle, and occasionally we land on something outside of my own personal wheelhouse of literary amusement.  I am diving into the world of non-fiction with an interesting little chronicle Joel Stein.  Next up is a book entitled In Defense of Elitism: Why I’m Better Than  You And You Are Better Than Someone Who Didn’t Buy This Book.  It sounds like an obnoxious title, but I do my best to reserve judgment until I read it.

The Flames of Cadiz is a Doctor Who audio play from the range known as The Companion Chronicles.  It is another release from Big Finish Productions and is written by Marc Platt with the ever reliable talents of Lisa Bowerman in the director’s chair.  William Russell and Carole Ann  Ford reprise their rules of Ian Chesterton and Susan, respectively, and share narration duties.  Guest actor Nabil Elouahabi plays a character named Esteban.

The TARDIS brings the Doctor and his companions so Spain during the Anglo-Spanish War in the late sixteenth century.  History says that Cadiz will fall victim to the raids led by Sir Francis Drake, but the presence of a particular group of time/space travelers may derail that flow of events.  Ian is taken captive by the Inquisition alongside a man named Esteban, and the Doctor, Susan, and Barbara must conduct a rescue in the midst of war.

Ford and Russell have done too many of these things performances to not come through with making this fairly compelling.  Their age has yet to be a major detriment to their energy and chemistry in these releases.  I an a little behind with this range since this episode was first released in 2013. I don’t know that much about this piece of world history depicted here.  The Doctor makes a pretty serious blunder which I am not sure I liked as part of the plot.  Elouahabi does fine in his role as well.  I am not sure this episode was as enthralling as I hope.  It’s another one that avoids being necessarily bad, but this probably won’t be one I return to anytime all that soon.  I will listen to it again one day, I am sure, but it will likely be a while.

 

The Girl Who Drank The Moon is a children’s fantasy novel written by Kelly Barnhill and has apparently won a literary award or two.  Why am I reading a children’s novel? Well, I am part of a book club.  To be fair, the page count almost reaches 400, so it isn’t for very young children.

The plot involves a society who believe they need to sacrifice certain children to a mysterious witch in the woods, however the witch is not as terrible as the people and takes in the child to raise as her own.  The girl is fed moonlight which awakens her own magical abilities as she gets older.  A young member of the Protectorate decides it’s long  past time to rid themselves of their supposed obligation to this witch.

Anyway, the novel isn’t my usual preferred literary diversion, so I had some trouble staying drawn into this tale.  I didn’t notice anything glaringly terrible about about the author’s prose style.  It probably deserved the acclaim from whoever decides such things, but it’s all subjective and this particular genre isn’t my forte.  It is still interesting enough for me to be glad to step outside my box a little.  I am sure those who enjoy fantasy literature more would have some thing more profound and complimentary to say.  I do believe that many adults would find it complicated enough to enjoy even if it is marketed toward the younger viewers.  It is a New York Times Bestseller, so I am sure others more in tune with this type of fiction would have plenty of legitimate reasons to find enjoyment.  I certainly hope Kelly Barnhill does have a long successful career in whatever genre she lends her talent.

Next up is a return to early nineteenth century London where the Viscount Devlin finds himself embroiled when in the murder of one the most loathsome men he has ever known, and the police are starting to suspect his niece of the crime.  C.S. Harris reveals Who Slays the Wicked in what is to be next literary diversion.

Malevolent is a horror film released on Netflix in 2018. It was directed by Olaf de Fleur and written by Ben Ketai and Eva Konstantopolous.  The film’s cast includes Florence Pugh, Ben Lloyd-Hughes, Celia Imrie, and Stephen McCole.

A couple of siblings named Jackson and Angela run a team of supposed ghost hunters who basically scam those who believe they have haunted houses.  Then they meet Mrs. Green and find the apparitions to be more than they could ever try to concoct.  Then it seems that Mrs. Green has some very disturbing secrets of her own and some chilling methods of silencing screams.

So I found this film to be fairly good considering the genre.  It does not have a very impressive budget, but the crew seems to make good use of their limited funds.  There are some effects and moments that do cause the spine to tingle a bit.  Pugh seems to be a rising star in recent years, and I have yet to find anything wrong with that. She seems to do well enough in the lead role.  There are some odd decisions made by some of the characters toward the end.  Of course, with horror movie, I often find the endings to be somewhat problematic.

Although this falls a long way from being in masterpiece territory, it is fairly interesting enough to avoid me judging it a complete waste of time.

Only the Monstrous is a Doctor Who audio box set with three episodes featuring John Hurt as the incarnation the Doctor refused to acknowledge.  The producers and fans know this version as the War Doctor.  This gets a little tricky since he refuses to claim his usual moniker or name.  John Hurt, before his recent demise, had done some voice work for Big Finish Productions.  The War Doctor was realized onscreen during the fiftieth anniversary episode of the television series entitled Day of the Doctor, which also starred David Tennant and Matt Smith.  This particular audio saga was written by Nicholas Briggs.  I will usually go into some depth reviewing each episode, however this will be a little different since there is only author, and the individual stories all lead into one larger story on one planet during the Time War.  The War Doctor was the incarnation that fought more actively in that massive conflict between the Time Lords and the Daleks.  This was the incarnation with the stomach to cross lines that his other selves an would have blanched at.  This is not an evil version of the Doctor, but he is decidedly more dangerous in many ways.  He will make the tougher decisions when the usual merciful or humane options could prolong the agony of the War.

Hurt is joined by a pretty impressive gathering of acting talent such as Jacqueline Pierce, Lucy Briggs-Owen, Beth Chalmers, and Barnaby Edwards,  Briggs returns to the mic himself to voice the Daleks as usual.  John Banks and Barnaby Edwards are welcome reliable contributors to Big Finish audio plays as well.  Carolyn Seymour, Alex Wyndham, Kieran Hodgson, and Mark McDonnell round out the guest cast.

The Innocent is the first episode which sees the War Doctor barely survive a blast from some big cosmic bonb that destroys a Dalek fleet and crash lands him on a planet known as Keska.  Keska has its own war with a race known as the Taalyens.  He meets a woman named Rejoice and recovers a little of his previous humor from his earlier iterations.  After the War Doctor decides to help the Keskans in this small potatoes sort of war, he finds himself returned to the Time Lords where another mission awaits him.

The Thousand Worlds and The Heart of the Battle are really one story where the War Doctor returns to Keska after the Taalyens and the Daleks have joined forces to devastate the world.  The War Doctor is reunited with Rejoice, who is much older, and has to extract another Time Lord determined to find a peaceful resolution to the Time War… a task in which the War Doctor has serious doubts as to its success.

I was a fan who was not too excited about the unveiling of the War Doctor when it first happened on television.  The acclaim that John Hurt has received is well earned.  I just typically don’t like these sudden adjustments in canon when it comes to the Doctor’s past.  Still, I enjoyed this set quite a bit.  John Hurt masterfully brings out all kinds of complexities in his performance as the War Doctor.  There are times I recognize characteristics of the other incarnations, but some of these new dimensions did end up being quite captivating.  Hurt shifts effortlessly from a crushing sadness over what he has already done to preserve Gallifrey to a sudden fury over what he is left to do.

Jacqueline Pearce as the ruthlessly ambitious Cardinal Ollistra is also a wonderfully cast foil for this darker version of the Doctor.  Pearce has always been great as the icy ruler or commander of some force or entity.  It’s always great to hear her participate in these audio dramas.  It’s a shame that she has also passed away recently, but there are plenty of her works for Big Finish I have yet to hear.

Nicholas Briggs is an executive producer for Big Finish and is always busy in some capacity for the company, but he is primarily a talented writer.  His ideas rarely fail to intrigue me, He was a great choice to kick off this new exploration of the War Doctor. Only the Monstrous is the first of four sets featuring the War Doctor, and I am now intrigued enough to follow through with the remaining three.

Come to Daddy is a rather interesting if bloody film directed by Ant Timpson and written by Toby Harvard.  The stars include Elijah Wood, Stephen McHattie, Michael Smiley, and Martin Donovan.

Wood plays a young man named Norval, who has answered a summons from a father who abandoned him many years ago.  He finds Gordon, played by McHattie, living in some secluded and uniquely constructed cabin on an Oregon coast.  Gordon seems somewhat welcoming at first, but Norval starts noticing a dangerous streak in the old man.  There are also troubling sounds coming from under the house.  Anyway, Norval soon finds that his father is in darker waters than he can imagine.

This film gets rather gruesome as the story unfolds.  It’s labeled as a comedy horror, and there is a certain guilty amusement to be found here.  Nothing supernatural occurs, so I think I would define it as a dark comedy, although there is not much I found terribly funny.  I will say this is still an interesting piece with some pretty clever plot twists.  The explanations that come to light are not entirely unexpected.  Other dangerous and psychotic fellows turn up along the way adding more pieces to the absent father’s puzzling history.

The cast actually does well even during the more absurd moments of the film.  The story does have its moments of absurdity, but those seem to fit in.  Michael Smiley gets to go way over the top with his creatively vicious Jethro, but he doesn’t veer off into the realm of being totally unbelievable.

This is probably one of the strangest movies I have seen lately, but it has some strong points if one can stomach the blood and cruelty depicted here.  There is also the harsh language throughout.

The premise of the film is pretty absurd, but the performances and actual creativity in the red herrings are executed with a certain style I can appreciate.

The Vast of Night is a science fiction film in which the story takes place in Cayuga, NM in the 1950’s.  Andrew Patterson serves as director, and the script is credited to James Montague and Craig W. Sanger.  The main cast is comprised of Sierra McCormick, Jake Horowitz, Gail Cronauer, Bruce Davis, and Greg Peyton.

The movie has a supposedly clever hook in that is presented as an episode of a show similar to The Twilight Zone.  Two small town high school students become intrigued by a mysterious signal that emerges through radio and phone lines.  Is it a malfunction, a government experiment, or something more unearthly?

I am not sure that the umbrella element of this being an episode of a science fiction anthology series was really all that necessary, however most of the film actually works quite well.  The main cast leads were not those I found familiar, however they appeared to be well chosen.  The dynamic between McCormick and Horowitz worked well.  The depiction of a small town in the 1950’s did feel genuine as I was watching it.  Of course, I have no first hand experience of 1950’s New Mexico, but it didn’t seem the producers were too far off. The movie had some moments where it dragged a bit, but it also had some pretty suspenseful moments.  A character known as Billy calls into the radio show which is hosted by Horowitz’s role and has a very compelling story to tell.  Although we only hear the voice of Bruce Davis, it really is quite a fascinating performance.  I am not sure I was that fond of how the film ends, but I will not get too much into that. Overall, it’s a pretty cool film in spite of the flaws.  The lead roles were solidly cast.  The setting looks pretty convincing.  There is some pretty engrossing intrigue for the  most part.  The main story still feels a bit overdone at times, but the presentation of this particular effort is executed well enough for me to exhibit some forgiveness for that.  Yeah, I would say this one was worth the time.

The Obsidian Curse is a B horror film that is about as B as it can get.  It could probably be considered a C movie of such a classification existed.  It is written and directed by Rene Perez.  The film has such unknown stars such as Karin Brauns, John Caraccioli, and Reggie Bannister.

Brauns is the lead here, playing a woman who is released from jail after a yearlong stay.  She is trying to get a job and is directed to try out some kind of tourist attractions concerning some caverns.  While there, she encounters some old witch who curses her with a spell that attracts all of the evil beings in the world.  So she is running around the countryside bashing zombies and assorted creatures with a baseball bat, trying to retain some kind of visitation with her daughter as well.

There is really no excuse to watch this thing unless there is an inexplicable taste for B movies of this sort.  Unfortunately, I am prone to strange bouts of curiosity that lead me to try these out, and then another peculiar compulsion to actually include the experience in this blog.  I know I could keep these indulgences to myself, or better yet not succumb to these inexplicable cinematic whims.

Anyway, it’s cheap and not that worthwhile.  I will say this though….I have still seen worse.  There was some effort for some kind of creativity in the creatures, but the costumes were cheaply constructed.

This is just a silly and rather trashy diversion for those with bizarre and macabre taste.

 

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The Elysian Blade is a Doctor Who BBC audio book written by David Bishop.  Frazer Hines is the reader of this new Second Doctor adventure.

The Doctor, Victoria, and Jamie arrive on a planet where the meet those who survived the arrival of Elysian Fields, a travelling hospital.  The attack of what appears to be a swarm of peculiar insects causes the TARDIS crew to be consumed by hallucinations.  Jamie imagines a return to his Scottish Highlands while Victoria sees her deceased father again.  Who knows what the Doctor faces in his mind.  Anyway, a choice is given between the Blade of Longing and the Angel of Forgetting.  Of course, it may not be that simple with the Doctor on the scene.

Hines does well enough in his presentation, although his impression of the late Patrick Troughton doesn’t seem quite as convincing as before.  The story is told in the first person from Jamie’s point of view.  Somehow I found this decision to be a little off putting.  It ended up being a bit underwhelming.  I was curious to obtain a new Second Doctor adventure and scratched that itch.  I may like it a little better once I play it again, and I eventually will, but the first impression was that it falls short of being all that memorable.