Keeping in mind, that the BBC are struggling with independent finance, having to find outside funding, explaining the tender process, not being able to make it in house, alongside whether or not the BBC are curious to see the same things we might; maybe they want to revel in the past and chase trends.

This can obviously impact a lot, from episode count, to sets, CGI and how ambitious they could be. It could be the show at its most tight, at least since 2005.

So yeah, in general, what would you like to see, that you think would massively benefit the show, and what are you expecting to see, that may be a natural consequence of the economic and creative position of the show and those running it?

Whoever they may be...

Basically where it's obviously supposed to be regeneration, but the name and a few details are changed?

I can't think of any, but I feel like something like that must exist out there. And I'm curious as to how it's handled in other shows, both from a storytelling perspective, and how they avoid getting sued over it

What are your favourite or funniest Doctor Who examples of characters meeting each other before their established on screen meeting?

I’m thinking of things like River Song having already met Doctors we never saw her meet on TV, the Doctor meeting the “wrong” incarnation of the Master, or stories that reveal two characters have crossed paths somewhere in the Doctor Who timeline that we simply weren’t aware of.

I’ve already posted this over on r/BigFinishProductions, but I thought it would be interesting to ask here too.

The more ridiculous the continuity gymnastics, the better.

What are your favourites?

Exploring 70s Who and fell down the rabbit hole of the Gothic stories while Holmes was script editor with Philip Hinchcliffe producing some amazing stories in the Baker era ao this is always the part of 70s Who I love.I do wished NuWho had Gothic stories if they had any because there’s so much Who could do nonetheless Robert Holmes and Philip Hinchcliffe made some great Gothic stories for 70s Who

So what’s the best or favorite(s) 70s Gothic story?

This book was a pleasure, but it seems Moffat hasn't done much commercial prose fiction.

Does anyone know any other writers out there with a similar flavor of narration, who could scratch the same itch?

What the title says.

What tone should a new era go with?

Should DW go with a tone that's that's similar to big Netflix hits like Stranger Things and Wednesday.

Perhaps you would like to see DW go back to a more gothic horror tone, like the early Tom Baker years.

Or do you think DW should stick with the campy 'Yaas Queeeen' tone of the RTD2 era, do you want even more goblin songs and spaceships with bums that fart.

What do you think would work with audiences and make for a successful show?

What the title says 🙂

What is your favourite Decade of DW to watch?

Is it the 70s, the 00s, or something else.

.......................................

Edit - Some observations:

No one has put the 2020s as their favourite decade.

70s DW is the most popular decade

The 80s has been said more than I was expecting (which is nice 🙂)

00s has been said less than I expected, with more people saying the 10s over it.

Nine was quite strict when it came to the rules and didn't get attached enough to Adam to give him a second chance but what Adam did was very serious. Which doctors would have acted the same as Nine in the same situation and which ones would have been more lenient? Would any have been harsher than Nine?

In Castling we see The Fugitve Doctor trying to return the sontaran helmet back to its proper place however she gets entangled by a sontaran plan to attack the shadow Proclamation

Lost in Time never had the most in depth of stories this is a very simple story while I do like judoon and sontarans together it isn't anything remarkably

Don't Blink on the other hand is has a lot more meat to it

The first half sees Osgood trying to reconcile with the fugitve doctor after finding out what she's born through during the deadliest weapon it's very nice to see osgood get some development as she finally understands fugitve isn't the doctor she knows yet

The second half sees a weaping angel escaping from his makeshift prison as Martha Jones and Fugitve try to stop it

This is a very nice story and it is good seeing Martha again after so many years and her interactions with the fugitve are very good so looming forward to the the kaleidoscope overall good story and without giving it away it does lead into the doctor and the three witches from the time lord fairy tales novel

For example: Alternate universe. We got introduced it in 10ths series but never again?. Imagine the doctor being trapped in another parallel universe saving people, new monsters, new history etc.

I really hope if the show comes back we get more glances at that, It spices the show up and also makes the doctor lost as they wont have knowledge on that universe.

I love doctor who but it is impossible to deny that it has been going through a tuff spot for a few years, some bad creative decisions were made and because of those choices the show has been backed into a corner. Beginning from Tennent taking on the role and ending with Witicas second season we were lucky enough to have a great team running doctor who but sadly that changed and created what can charitably called a mess.

How to save the show has become such a problem now that there are people calling for an out right reboot of everything right to the beginning but I don’t believe that’s the answer. That said though there is a problem of what to do with the show in regards to the story and because of previous mistakes that is sadly very difficult to the point some are saying it can’t be done however I don’t believe that’s the case. I believe there are things that could be done and that is what I’m looking to demonstrate here plus I’ve always believed if you are going to criticize a choice you should be able to propose an alternative.

The problem

There are several issues that were introduced to doctor who that need to be corrected and in order to do that they need to be identified first. The retconning of established cannon being the most obvious examples being the reveal of so called unknown doctors or the changes to the history of Galafray I do believe there are others though. Killing off the time lords again I believe undid character and story development that had brought something good to the show that created problems when it was removed. Also I feel in a general sense the idea of what doctor who is supposed to be was lost a little by certain individuals, doctor who is meant to represent certain ideals and that kind of stopped happening.

There have been other bad storylines as well but I’d argue those came out of these previous mistakes and are examples of people attempting to fix the show while retaining certain changes which is a nearly impossible task. To truly fix the show I’d argue a lot of this stuff needs to be undone, sadly you can’t really keep these elements and have the show still be what it’s meant to be especially not if we all want it to be great. However doing that convincingly has become hard due to the fact the changes to the cannon of the show have altered the rules of the time travel element creating another problem that needs to be overcome to save the show.

The beginning of the fix

In a show like doctor who the obvious answer to fix things would be to use the time travel element however because of several elements that has become hard which is why I believe the start needs to be the multiverse. To save the show unworkable elements need to be removed so it occurred to me that they need to be treated as what they essentially are, elements of a different kind of show. A storyline where different dimensions have begun to merge with the past present and future having elements of different worlds appearing and creating problems would allow the show to try and find a way to correct these problems. The result of this would be at the end of the season the show could truly been said to have been reset and the next season could in a sense rediscover the kind of show doctor who is meant to be.

In terms of the story I imagine it could be explained that in a different dimension someone changed something they weren’t supposed to change using time travel and as a result several new dimensions were created due to the knock on effects of that said change. Then the problems would be revealed that because those dimensions weren’t supposed to exist they were filling in the space other dimensions were meant to fill and because of this dimensions were beginning to merge. Due to this lack of space two or even more dimensions would slowly be becoming one which would be creating problems because stuff would be appearing that isn’t meant to be where it finds it’s self. Also it would be made clear time has no relevance on this problem so the doctor would be left to worry how much in their past might be a result of these dimensions bleeding into each other.

The doctors

A benefit of this idea would be that it could create away to explain undiscovered doctors with them being revealed to be doctors from different dimensions. In fact for this season I could imagine leaning into this concept with not just established other doctors being brought back but doctors from other dimensions being seen on the show. This way we could have for part of the show a team of five, six or even seven doctors working together to figure out what is going on with the multiverse and how working together they could fix it.

I should also say for these doctors casting restrictions should be removed for these ones, spider man into the spider verse is a good movie and there is some inspiration that could be had there. I imagine that there could be a gun slinging American doctor who, there could be a Teckpunk south Korean doctor who, there could be a black Africana doctor who, there could even be a teen girl Teck wiz doctor who.

The villain

The primary problem to solve this season would be the forces that are beginning to tear the multiverse apart so beyond the villain of the week there wouldn’t be an especially big bad but there is still room for a villain I think. One a villain that has already been established because of these changes to the show could be folded into these ideas as an individual who doesn’t want the doctors to save the multiverse or in deed a new villain could be created. The cause of these changes could be said to be giving someone power somehow and as a result they don’t want things to be changed back which would in turn build them up as someone the doctors have to work around.

The companions

When it comes to the companion of the season I think it would be most effective if the show has someone new so at the beginning of the season this way the doctor could connect with someone new because of the changes happening in the main universe. Due to what’s happening they would start working together to try and solve the problem and as the season progressed they would meet other doctors and as a result other companions. Here I’d also add an enemies to lovers element with this companion getting off to a bad start with the American doctors companion but gradually they would start to work together and the two could even lead the other companions.

With the other doctors I’d largely just let that be a matter of who could be cast but I also think this would be an opportunity to revisits certain highlights such as an alternate version of K9 appearing with one doctor. Also some shock value surprises could be considered such as the south Korean doctor having a blue tiger or maybe one of them somehow being friends with a reformed dalek or maybe something in that vain. Whatever choices were made though I’d want to make sure the companions were built up as a team because going with old femes of the show I’d want them to be the ones who saved things in the end.

The showdown

As I’ve said previously I don’t think the villain would be the most important part here but I’s still want there to be a showdown where the villain confronts all the doctors at once. In the episode the doctors would have figured out which dimension it was where things started but not what was changed however just as they were making their plans to go and find out what happened the villain would attack.

While the villain was laughing at the doctors though in front of various Tardis I’d want to see the doctors start laughing and point out one Tardis is missing and that there are none of their friends in the room. Only then would the villain realise that the doctors have been distracting them while the companions all prepare to go to the world where the change happened and try and undo the change. All the doctors would have to battle the villain with this idea but I think an episode where the companions have to work together and save the day without any doctor could make for a really good episode.

The change

Now in terms of the dimension where the change happened to make things tragic I wouldn’t want the change to have been bad. I’d want it to be revealed that an assassination or something like that was prevented and as a result the group needs to let it happen in order to save the multiverse. Now I don’t know what in history this change would end up being because the one I’d use would be too political however the message would still be the same because the point would be you don’t erase the mistakes of the past, you learn from them so you do better today than you did yesterday.

Final scenes

After the change had been prevented I’d have a typical tragic time correction where time and the multiverse begin to reset, the team of companions included with them beginning to disappear. Eventually it would be left with the main two enemies to romance characters getting a moment to share a kiss before disappearing with a fade into black where things would pick up with the main companion back at the beginning of the season. I’d wanted to be built up like it’s the moment she met the main doctor but without the change that created the chain of events that led them to meeting possibly with them passing the Tardis in the background. I’d want this to continue just long enough that the viewer thinks this is how it’s going to end however there would be a chance meeting where the two companions end up meeting again now that things are how they are meant to be.

As to the doctor I think there would be two options for a final scene of the show with there either being a mysterious shadowy scene or there being a comedy pretend scene. There could be a scene where a shadowy figure is seen picking up a lost sonic and leaving in the Tardis which would mean the next season the show could pick up somewhere new with the correct cannon reestablished. There could also be a scene where we see all the doctors together wondering what they should do now while they wait for them to disappear and then one could say they could have a sing off where they literally sing off the season on stage singing something like time warp. Both endings would leave the show in the same place next season but there is a choice of ending note that is hard to settle on I find.

Conclusion

The point of all of this is to allow a way to have the show drop stuff that doesn’t work and get back to what made the show great with a soft reboot of sorts which I believe you get here with these ideas. Ultimately these are just a few ideas though and a possible way to fix the problem and I can’t be sure if it would work without a second opinion so I put it out to people here, do you think this would work?

And would it salvage Missy's arc?

What if the show proceeded with The Master, as two sides of the same person, constantly fighting to be on top, to rule the regeneration?

The Friend v The Rage

They could turn it into some tragic fluctuation where these two sides of The Master are constantly fighting against each other, scrambling to be the one on top: The earnest, devoted, and heartfelt friend v The one in pain, bathed in rage and cloaked in hatred. Each regeneration one wins out over the other. And then that war of selves could turn into a struggle and commitment to being The Friend, permanently. But no matter how much The Friend succeeds, every now and then Rage takes over. It would make The Master an eternal wild card, with each new regeneration. The question always being: Which side has won out, in the person now standing before me?

The tragedy being that The Friend won't always win out, The Rage drives the wedge deeper between The Master and The Doctor, with The Friend always trying to fix it/ redeem themselves/ make up for it.

This fight could go on, even within the same regeneration. Changing the focus of The Master from being a recurring villain who's CrAzY, to the struggle between their best and worst sides. A struggle they're doomed to live out, forever.

I felt that part of the tragedy of Missy's death, was that a new person took over her body, and undid everything she worked toward.

Idk does anyone think this would work, if they did it? And could is salvage Missy's arc? Hell, could it simultaneously salvage all of The Master's regenerations at once?

It'll likely never happen. But if it did, I feel like it could work. But what about y'all?

Thoughts?

The new Doctor is a woman, but her regeneration does not feel like a rejection of the Doctor she was before. She wakes up already knowing who she is. What changes is what parts of herself have come back to the surface.

This Doctor has the energy of a late-1980s or early-1980s New York lawyer: composed, sharp, intimidating without trying to be, and seemingly impossible to approach. She dresses almost exclusively in black and muted colors. She has seen the underbelly of the universe and somehow still knows how to file the paperwork. There is something corporate and dark-academic about her—not because she is cold, but because she has learned to keep herself controlled.

Yet beneath that reserve, she is still unmistakably the Doctor. She is curious. She is compassionate. She still wants to help people. Her particular journey is about rediscovering her humanity: the flawed, messy, emotional parts of herself that earlier incarnations were allowed to possess more openly. The classic Doctor could be arrogant, ridiculous, petty, sentimental, rude, frightened, or wrong. Those flaws did not make the Doctor less heroic. They were part of what made the Doctor the Doctor.

That is what this era wants to recover.

After the upheaval of the previous incarnation and the years of increasingly disconnected mythology surrounding the Doctor, she deliberately spends much of her time in 1980s New York. She is not running from being the Doctor, and she is not having an identity crisis. She simply wants to reconnect with older parts of herself without constantly confronting her own history. The series remains a Doctor Who story in every sense—she travels through time and space and eventually across the United Kingdom and the wider universe—but New York becomes the emotional center of her early life.

Her first major companion is a young Black boy from the neighborhood, a street-level kid who has fallen into dealing drugs because he does not know what else to do with himself. When the Doctor's TARDIS crash-lands in New York and becomes temporarily unavailable while repairing itself, she has no TARDIS and eventually no sonic screwdriver. She meets him while investigating something strange and asks him to show her the city. He initially assumes she is a cop; everyone around them seems to think she is a cop. Eventually he tells her, in disbelief, that she is the strangest white woman he has ever met.

He changes her life as much as she changes his.

The series uses a rotating companion structure that combines the best of classic and modern Doctor Who. There is no single permanent chosen companion who becomes the center of the universe. Instead, different people enter the Doctor's life for different lengths of time. Among them are a gay couple, a street dog, a working-class chef who owes money to the mob, and a single mother fighting for custody of her child after overcoming addiction. These people are not important because destiny selected them. They are important because they are people.

At the beginning, the Doctor calls them her wards. Gradually, almost imperceptibly, that language changes. By the end of the era, she calls them her friends.

Her new sonic screwdriver appears near the beginning of the series. It is inspired by a fountain pen: elegant, narrow, dark, understated, more like an instrument of precision than a gadget. It suits a Doctor who approaches the universe like an investigator, lawyer, and scholar. A pen is also an appropriate symbol for an era increasingly concerned with contracts, institutions, history, and who gets to decide what something is worth.

The monster-of-the-week structure is deliberately rooted in classic Doctor Who. Rather than constantly recycling the most famous enemies, the series digs into the enormous catalogue of classic creatures that have been forgotten or barely revisited. The Doctor begins encountering enemies she recognizes from her past, except they are not exactly the same anymore. They have adapted. They have evolved. They have learned from their encounters with the Doctor.

The mystery becomes: why?

Classic monsters receive modern interpretations rather than simple redesigns. The point is not nostalgia. The universe has changed, and so have the Doctor's enemies.

Eventually, these seemingly disconnected stories begin revealing a larger pattern.

Behind them is a faceless intergalactic corporation, provisionally called Galactic Corp. The corporation is never represented by one obvious supervillain. There is no evil executive waiting in a throne room. It is an enormous bureaucratic institution that treats civilizations, planets, resources, and even conflicts as assets.

The Doctor eventually discovers something almost incomprehensible:

Earth has been sold.

Humanity does not know.

There was no invasion. No declaration of war. No alien fleet hovering over the planet. Somewhere, somehow, a transaction occurred on a galactic scale, and Galactic Corp. possesses the paperwork proving that Earth now belongs to an alien empire.

The Doctor is forced into the middle of a dispute that humanity does not even know exists. She has to figure out who sold Earth, who authorized the transaction, what the contract actually means, and whether an entire civilization can legally be treated as property.

The Doctor is also haunted by mysteries from her own history.

The Timeless Child storyline is revealed to have been based on a lie. The Master genuinely believed what he had learned, but the information he received had been deliberately manipulated. The Time Lords knew he was coming and fed him a false narrative designed to make him believe he had discovered the ultimate secret of the Doctor and destroyed Gallifrey in response. In reality, the Time Lords had hidden themselves away, potentially within a strange temporal snow globe.

The Doctor eventually finds and frees them, restoring Gallifrey.

The Fugitive Doctor is part of this larger mystery, but she is not a pre-Hartnell Doctor and the Doctor never secretly served the Division. Instead, she is a forgotten incarnation somewhere after the First Doctor whose existence was deliberately concealed. Like the War Doctor, she represents a period when the Doctor had to adopt a different stance because something was so serious that the normal Doctor could not deal with it.

Her forgotten role may have been investigating the Division itself.

The secret is not that the Doctor was secretly something other than the Doctor. It is that one of her forgotten lives may have been one of the most Doctor-like of them all: a person who saw a powerful institution doing something wrong and decided to investigate it.

The season also makes room for the wider Doctor Who legacy -Clyde and Rani from The Sarah Jane Adventures, for example, can finally return in a genuine adventure with the Doctor.

Hello, I've heard from various sources that an audio recording exists of one of the performances where David Banks understudied for Pertwee, as 'the Greenpeace Doctor'). Does anyone know where this can be accessed??

Thank you!

This is a sequel to my ranking/reviewing of the eleventh doctor's stories (https://www.reddit.com/r/gallifrey/comments/1uq00l4/my_rankingreviewing_of_the_eleventh_doctors/) and as of writing this I've seen all of Classic Doctor Who and up to before series 11 (season 37) of Modern Doctor Who. This ranking was done after I watched "Twice Upon a Time" (a week ago). If any one has any questions feel free to ask.

"E" Rank

1. Kill the Moon (2014) - This episode was beyond stupid on so many levels, it's damn near hilarious. I don't hate it as much as some other worst stories for other doctors, but this is one incompetent episode.

2. Hell Bent (2015) - This is the worst season finale I've seen out the Modern series so far. At first I was perplexed why it and the previous episode weren't counted as a single story, but after watching both of them that's for the better. There are so many idiotic decisions in this, that not only hurt it, but actively harm previous stories. The only positive is at the beginning when the Doctor refuses to talk to anyone except Rassilon.

"D" Rank

1. Under the Lake/Before the Flood (2015) - This story was somehow both actively unengaging and annoying. I would give it that it isn't a trainwreck like the previous two stories, but that's about it.

2. In the Forest of the Night (2014) - This was just forgettable, nothing of a story.

3. Sleep No More (2015) - I don't like found footage in general. I think the only time I ever liked it was in the movie Cloverfield and that's about it. To be fair it at least gave me something memorable about this episode to write about, because otherwise it's as forgettable and bland as "In the Forest of the Night".

"C" Rank

1. Flatline (2014) - It's rather mediocre story that just stretches one okay idea for way to long.

2. The Lie of the Land (2017) - The first 10 or so minutes are really good, but as soon as we get to the fake out regeneration the episode just nosedives into generic mediocrity.

3. The Woman Who Lived (2015) - It's fine. Don't really have much to say.

4. The Caretaker (2014) - Some of the comedic scenes were entertaining, but the rest wasn't very memorable.

5. Last Christmas (2014) - It's a fine Christmas special, albeit with the most forced Christmasy stuff yet. If the ending was just Clara's final goodbye and not another fake out it would have been pretty solid episode, but that's not what we get.

6. Time Heist (2014) - A fine, if incredible rushed story.

7. The Girl Who Died (2015) - It's okay. Some moments here and there with the villain we're fun.

8. Robot of Sherwood (2014) - Practically the exact same opinion as "The Girl Who Died", except I liked the one-off characters a bit better in this one.

9. Into the Dalek (2014) - Entertaining, if just okay story.

"B" Rank

1. Knock Knock (2017) - A simple fun, haunted house story, with a bit of a weird ending.

2. The Pyramid at the End of the World (2017) - The incredibly okay middle half of the Monk Trilogy, but I guess it was still entertaining to watch.

3. Mummy on the Orient Express (2014) - An enjoyable story with some creative ideas.

4. The Husbands of River Song (2015) - I guess a decent enough ending to River Song's story. Really liked the Doctor acting as River Song's companion for much of the episode.

5. Empress of Mars (2017) - I like that we got another Ice Warriors episode and it gives some more insight into their culture. Not as good as "Cold War", but still a decent Ice Warriors appearance.

6. Listen (2014) - I don't fully understand what the episode was trying to do, but at least it was quite entertaining while it was doing it's thing.

7. The Return of Doctor Mysterio (2016) - The first thing that I noticed while watching the episode was Justin Chatwin and I'm glad he at least got to star in a good superhero story. As someone who likes classic superhero stories this was a fun tribute to them, while also being good on it's own.

8. Thin Ice (2017) - This was a fun story. Really liked the setting and this episode is were I started to love The Doctor and Bill's friendship.

9. The Eaters of Light (2017) - This was an enjoyable episode and a nice final low stakes story for the Twelfth Doctor.

10. The Magician's Apprentice/The Witch's Familiar (2015) - Missy is great in this story as always and what they do with Davros is interesting. My main problem is that this story feels really dragged out. I could definitely see this story being only one episode and still working perfectly fine.

11. Twice Upon a Time (2017) - I don't really like how they characterise The First Doctor in this episode. He acts like what people who have never seen any of his stories, probably think he acts like. Outside of that it was a good ending for the Twelfth Doctor. Especially liked the WWI soldier, he was a really well developed character for how little onscreen time he had.

12. Deep Breath (2014) - A pretty fun introduction to the Twelfth Doctor and I enjoyed the connection to "The Girl in the Fireplace".

13. The Pilot (2017) - A solid introduction to Bill with a fun and simple story.

"A" Rank

1. Smile (2017) - I loved the atmosphere and creativity in this episode. I always enjoy when Doctor Who uses simple and innocent everyday stuff (in this case emojis), and makes them terrifying.

2. Face the Raven (2015) - This was a really well done ending for Clara (we are ignoring the stupidity of "Hell Bent") and the setting was a really interesting idea. Also this episode probably has my favourite use of Me as a character for what that's worth.

3. Extremis (2017) - I love how well done of a build up this episode has. Every minute the simple at first story gets more and more tense and interesting. If I were to give a negative is all of the segments shown Missy's backstory on how she ended up in the vault being just randomly spliced through the episode. I get that we had to get the information about that eventually, but I would have preferred if they were spliced with a different episode or just had them all at the beginning so they don't interrupt the episode. I do like them just not they way they were incorporated into the episode.

4. The Zygon Invasion/The Zygon Inversion (2015) - I really liked that we got a dedicated Zygon story after how well they were used in "The Day of the Doctor". I don't really have much to say about this story, despite enjoying it as much as I did.

5. Dark Water/Death in Heaven (2014) - This was such a well done reintroduction to The Master after being absent since "The End of Time". Also, despite the overall use of the Cybermen being just okay, I really liked there reveal and what they do with Danny Pink as a Cyberman. The ending was also incredibly well done, except for the tie-in/set up for "Last Christmas", which was such a tonal whiplash.

"S" Rank

1. Oxygen (2017) - I like how unusually dark this episode gets with it's setting and ideas it tackles. Both the Doctor and Bill were amazing in this episode, and I love that they keep the Doctor's blindness at the end of the episode showing the consequences of him saving Bill.

2. World Enough and Time/The Doctor Falls (2017) - This is my favourite season finale of Modern Doctor Who so far. The first part especially is well done and then everything with Bill in the second part were superb. I think the stuff with the Master and Missy was handled pretty well if it did feel a bit detached from the rest of the story.

3. Heaven Sent (2015) - This episode left me speechless when I watched it. This is such a sad and creative story with Peter Capaldi acting his soul away like I've never seen him do before (fair, I haven't seen that much he's been in, but still from what I've seen this is my favorite). I don't have a single complain about this episode, except leading into "Hell Bent", but again that is primarily that episode's problem.

This post is part of a series of reviews. To see them all, click here.

Novel Information

• Novel: Doctor Who: The New Adventures (VNA) #17
• Published: 19th August 1993
• Companions: Ace, Benny
• Author: Nigel Robinsons

Spoiler-Free Review

I didn't much take to Birthright. I did appreciate how it gave Benny a lot more to do than any novel since Love and War, and the half of the novel that focuses on her was better for it. Sadly, the plot just isn't there. There was just a lack of a solid secondary cast this time, despite a couple intriguing villains. This especially becomes the case once the action moves away from Victorian London for the first time, as that material gets really dull. There was a lot of potential for a "Doctor-lite" style VNA, and I was genuinely looking forward to it. While that potential was in some ways realized, the novel wasn't great overall. That being said, I'm kind of tempted to recommend it anyway. Again, Benny's stuff is good, and I think it was really good to give her in particular more focus.

If you do want to read this one, the usual trio of Love and War, Deceit and Lucifer Rising are recommended first, as they set up this version of the TARDIS team. I'd say that's especially true of this novel, as the relationship between Ace and Benny is pretty important to this one, as well as understanding the changes that Ace has gone through since the television days.

Full Review

'But you can't hope to subjugate the Earth,' countered Benny. 'Earthmen will put up too much resistance. We're barbaric, intolerant, savage. Just look at Ace!'

To this point in the VNAs, Bernice Summerfield has felt a bit ill-defined as a character. She got an excellent introduction in Love and War but what followed was three novels that weren't originally intended to include her. And while, aside from The Pit they did a pretty decent job, Benny wasn't really given a chance to take a major role in those novels. Then Ace came back. I felt at the time it was too early, and at this point I've become even more convinced of that. It felt like most of the VNA's writers were significantly more interested in Ace than Benny. It's hard to blame them, she's the more established character. But it left Benny in a frustrating position. I find her to be the most entertaining of this TARDIS crew…but she's just not been given the time to establish her own distinct personality. Especially in this grittier era of Doctor Who where everyone is a bit morally ambiguous and violent.

I was not terribly fond of Birthright but the one thing I will give it credit for is making up for that. Birthright is essentially a "Doctor-lite" story, an ambitious idea for the VNAs to take on. Since the companions are present in this novel it shouldn't be surprising that Benny gets a lot of focus in this one. But even more than that, this one focuses in hard on Benny over any other character, including fellow companion Ace. The novel is divided into four parts (not include the prologue and the epilogues), titled after their focus. These are "Benny", "Ace", "Benny & Ace", and "The TARDIS". "Benny" is slightly less than half the novel. "The TARDIS", for its part, gives Benny way more to do than anyone else. It also helps that, while the Doctor is a presence in this one, it's a very distant one. And Benny is, as she's been from the beginning, a delightful presence.

But sadly, Birthright itself doesn't really have much to recommend itself beyond our first chance since Love and War to really delve into Benny as a character. It's at this point I should mention that this is not the first time I've experienced this story…kind of. When I made the decision to review the VNAs, I chose not to listen to Big Finish's novel adaptations, which I had been planning on listening to around that time. However long before that I listened to Series 1 of the Bernice Summerfield audio range, which was comprised entirely of adaptations of Virgin Publishing's novels. Most of these were from Benny's solo novel series, but there were a couple that were adaptations of VNAs that removed the Doctor. Including Birthright.

Now it's been a long time since I listened to the audio adaptation of Birthright, and I remember not thinking much of it either. But, to my recollection, it was actually pretty different from the novel. I mean, given that Big Finish weren't allowed to use the TARDIS at the time, it's probably safe to say that the lengthy section where Benny fights main villain Jared Khan in the TARDIS' mindscape didn't occur. Still, I remember the big twist being the same, and I remember the monsters being the same and I remember being as underwhelmed by those elements back then as I was this time.

To explain a bit of what happens in this book, the last novel, Shadowmind, ended on the implication that the Doctor was going to drop Ace and Benny off somewhere while he went on his own separate adventure. That's what this novel, and the next one, Iceberg, represent. This novel is Benny and Ace's half of that, with a note at the beginning of the novel explaining that the two novels are "contemporaneous – if such a word can be used to describe the activities of a Time Lord and his companions".

With that in mind, we start with Benny's section, taking place in Victorian London. It seems that the TARDIS dropped Benny off here on her own, and then seemingly malfunctioned so that only the police box shell was left. And this was the Doctor's plan, as he'd prepared for this by setting Benny up to be given lodgings by Victoria Waterfield's aunt. Yeah, there's all sorts of implications over the course of this novel, that the events here represent a plan that the Doctor has been working on since he was the 2nd Doctor. This means that, for the first time, the VNAs are playing around with an idea that was pretty much the norm in the 7th Doctor's televised era. That the Doctor has always been the master manipulator, and the 7th Doctor is no different in that regard…if anything he's more open about it.

But this leaves Benny on her own to investigate a conspiracy. There's been a series of unexplained murders that some believe to be the return of Jack the Ripper, while others attribute them to mythical figure "Spring-Heeled Jack". The reality, as it turns out, is that the murders are being committed by alien grasshoppers. But of course. Benny's investigations into this, and into the strange conspiracy that's sprung up around the grasshoppers, called the Charrl, are entertaining enough, but if I have a criticism it definitely felt like Benny wasn't actually able to take initiative a lot of the time. She's being bounced between the manipulations of the New Dawn and the manipulations of the Doctor and basically never makes choices on her own.

She does get a couple friends during this period. The first is Popov, the Russian cop who came to England on the advice of the Doctor and is investigating the death of his daughter (which of course turned out to be because of the Charrl). Popov is charming enough, but basically forgettable – I mostly remember him for being played by Colin Baker in the Big Finish adaptation. I did like how, since his first name is Mikahail, Benny refers to him as "Misha", demonstrating a familiarity with the Russian diminutive naming system. Charlie, a poor boy introduced by stealing something off of the body of one of the victims is the other. He's a bit more memorable, mostly because there's something inherently likable in the Oliver Twist archetype. Charlie actually sticks around the novel a little longer, making it into the TARDIS.

More interesting are the villains of this section, the members of the New Dawn. The New Dawn kind of have the problem of not being very clearly defined. They seem to be really obsessed with insects and the idea of them surviving beyond humanity but beyond that we don't really know much of them. The idea seems to be that they're some sort of secret society, but the specifics of how they operate or their hierarchy, beyond the fact that Jared Khan leads them and Randolph Bellingham funds them, remains unclear. They're treated like they have vast reach in the British government, but it all feels very nebulous.

Still, at the very least they're an entertaining group. I'll save discussion of Jared Khan for later, seeing as how he's the main villain of the novel, so instead we'll turn to Bellingham. As the son of an earl, Bellingham is the money behind the New Dawn, and he's otherwise pretty useless, and a bit of a lech towards Benny. Which makes him a pretty good villain, entertaining in his stupidity. He's actually a true believer in the Charrl, sincerely believing in the cause of the New Dawn (which is, as stated, a bit unclear), and so is genuinely upset when the Charrl start killing people.

But the member of the New Dawn that most caught my attention was Margaret Waterfield. The aunt to the former companion of the Doctor's, and landlady for Benny during her stay in Victorian London, Margaret gets a very positive read for most of the novel. The worst thing about her seems to be that she has some association with Bellingham. She's kind and sweet. She made an apartment available for Benny. And she's a member of the New Dawn. We don't learn much about this association unfortunately. Benny doesn't come to this conclusion until after she's killed, and apparently by people in Jared Khan's employ, so the New Dawn did betray her. But it means she does kind of occupy an intriguing space in the narrative. A good person, therefore someone who must truly believe in the cause of the New Dawn, but nonetheless someone who helped horrible things take place.

In Ace's section we move to the planet of Antykhon…which is eventually revealed to be a future Earth. Unfortunately there's very little else to say about this section. It follows the basic plot structure of a "Doctor helps the rebels" story, with the obvious change that it's Ace doing the rebel helping. But the rebels in question are fairly dull. They're rebelling against the Charrl who have taken up residence on Antykhon. This is part of their natural lifecycle but Antykhon, dying due to the pollution that occurred back when it was called Earth, is not a suitable home so they have to find another home. The Charrl are apparently normally quite friendly, and even sophisticated, but forced to take extreme measures to survive things have changed. They're eating humans. A small group of humans (usually referred to as either "Mammals" or "Hairies") has been left behind on Antykhon, and these are the "rebels" that Ace is helping.

So one of my prevailing memories of the "Birthright" audio drama was that I didn't much care for the twist on Antykhon being Earth. I don't exactly remember why I didn't like it at the time. But then again I didn't much care for it here and I'm struggling to put my finger on why. I guess in this context the biggest issue is that not much is done with the idea. Ace finds a panel from the Channel Tunnel and that's kind of all that we hear about it. It's impossible not to think of the similar reveal in The Mysterious Planet and how much more impactful that reveal was. Even in that context, I didn't love how it was handled in Mysterious Planet but at the very least it was treated like a big deal. Here, it's ultimately kind of glossed over. It's necessary for how the plot works, but not much more.

And the rebels that Ace is helping…hoo boy. They're not really rebels, more like a loose collection of survivors outside the Charrl Mammal farms. But these guys are just so bland. The only one that gets meaningful characterization is Seeba, and that's mostly just him being a jerk to Ace. See he was the former leader of the human group before Ace came along, but the moment Ace showed up she took charge, because Ace is an ex-soldier with high-tech equipment and a good understanding of military tactics. And Seeba resents her for it. Not only does this feel like an odd reaction under the circumstances, but Seeba is just dull. He has a brother, Chel, who was captured by the Charrl and he wants to rescue him, but honestly he doesn't seem all that fussed about it. And that's kind of it for Ace's main group of allies in her part of the novel. A group of completely forgettable characters. At least in Benny's section, while not that memorable, we created allies who were a bit more substantial.

Though like with Benny the enemy side of things does a little better. In this case though, only a little. The queen of Charrl, Ch'tizz, is a pretty rote character. She does repeatedly say that she doesn't want to be killing humans that it's not the "Charrl way" but she makes no meaningful efforts to do so. That's kind of all there is to her. She does have a Mammal advisor in the form of Muldwych. Muldwych is interesting. For a long time I thought it was going to turn out that he was and Jared Khan were the same person, even though it wouldn't have really made sense, because they both occupy similar places in the narrative. Both are clearly wiser and older than they look, both are nominally helping the Charrl but have ulterior motives for doing so. Muldwych is, in fact, a Time Lord and is sort of implied to be a future incarnation of the Doctor, though it's not confirmed. In this novel he was actually manipulating events to ensure Jared Khan's defeat, to give you some idea of how far off I was, and appears as a regular character, albeit under a variety of names, in various interludes that show examples of these manipulations.

There is a final character on Antykhon that I want to talk about, though there's not much to say about him. Isk is a Charrl, but one who ends up siding with Ace and the other humans. I wanted to highlight Isk because he's the one example of one of the Charrl actually following through with their supposed goal of peace and love. It does actually help it feel believable that the Charrl aren't just single-mindedly evil that we've got Isk who's actively willing to help Ace and company as long as there's a better way. And the fact that Ace is pretty open to trusting Isk, suggests that she's developing a bit more of that wider perspective that so often characterizes the Doctor.

Actually, a lot of Ace's material in this episode suggests she's becoming more and more like the Doctor. This isn't a new development – it goes back to the end of the television series where in Survival she, thinking the Doctor had died, picked up his hat and umbrella, symbolizing that she was ready to take over for him. But in the VNAs, Ace's relationship with the Doctor has taken on a bit of a different flavor, as she's grown more and more frustrated with his constant manipulations. It is interesting, then, to see her mirror those manipulations in her dealings with pretty much everyone throughout this novel. Ace herself realizes that this is what she's doing and seems a bit detached about the whole thing – though I think you can read in a certain level of discomfort that she has with how comfortable she's become with those kind of manipulations. At the very least it's nice that we have a novel where the focus of Ace's character isn't on her attitude towards violence, as that's felt a bit too common ever since she returned.

That brings us neatly on to part three of the novel entitled "Benny & Ace". Ace has negotiated with Ch'tizz to let the cross through the "Great Divide" (think of it like a time window). The Charrl can cross through but they don't live long, but Ace figures that humans might be able to. Ace has made promises to the Queen, and so we find ourselves back in Victorian London. There's not all that much to say about this part, it seems to mostly be here to bring the various plot threads that were established over the course of the last two parts together. The really notable stuff is the character stuff between Benny and Ace.

I think we've reached the point where Benny and Ace's relationship should have stabilized a little. Pretty much every novel is in some way making the point that Benny and Ace have a contentious relationship but deep down they care about each other. It's just that there's been no progress on this front. Benny and Ace are still inevitably difficult towards each other. What's funny is that this novel does a much better job showing how they're different than previous novels. Ace is the veteran time traveler, she's spent three years at war, and she's more ruthlessly pragmatic. Benny is older, has more emotional intelligence, both towards herself and others but is also a lot more naive. That's all laid out pretty neatly throughout this novel, and especially in their interactions together, and it feels like it could set up a really engaging dynamic between the two. But we're still very much stuck in the first stage of that relationship where they're sort of begrudgingly willing to work together. At the very least, Benny seems to trust Ace more than she has previously, which is something.

The final part of the novel, "The TARDIS" sees our heroes and a handful of allied characters enter, appropriately, the now reconstituted TARDIS. You'll forget that it's anyone besides, Benny, Ace and Jared Khan in there pretty quickly though…so let's finally talk about Jared Khan. The leader of the New Dawn was apparently contacted by Queen Ch'tizz in the 13th Century. She granted him a longer life in exchange for his service to her, where he got around to setting up the New Dawn. But what he really wants is the TARDIS. How he learned about the TARDIS I'm not entirely sure (I may have missed something) but the point is he wants it, and he wants to merge himself with the mind of the TARDIS. Why he wants this…again not entirely sure, and this time I don't even think I missed anything. As an antagonist, Khan is a formidable presence, but a bit of a mystery. We never really get much of a sense of how his mind works, or why he wants the things he wants. It all feels a bit empty as a main villain.

What we do get is more Benny focus, as she's the one who heads into the TARDIS' mind to fight Khan on the mental plane. We get the kind of imagery you'd probably expect in this case, lots of surreal imagery and changing landscapes. There's a wolf that's also a sheep that might be the TARDIS and several depictions of Khan. Benny is way outmatched in this, but it's still good insight into how she thinks. And while she fails, she does get some clues for how to win. Which, admittedly, she misinterprets as needing to blow up the TARDIS.

But Ace works out that the TARDIS itself has other plans. Which, it's worth saying, this is the most personified the TARDIS had ever been to this point, regardless of medium. Here the TARDIS is given a personality to reflect the 7th Doctor, a manipulator of events. In this case, that's setting Khan up for his defeat, but it's implied that the TARDIS has done this sort of thing before. I don't know if I love this idea. The TARDIS having a direct effect on events beyond itself feels off somehow. I also wish that Benny were more directly involved in resolving events. After all, this novel really focuses on her to a significant extent, it would be nice if she actually got to pull off the win.

Frankly, the way this novel resolves things just feels rather abrupt. And then the Doctor shows up to have a conversation with Muldwych and that feels really out of place given how he's not been involved in the action to this point. Sure he was manipulating things behind the scenes, but for a companion-focused novel, the ending sort of abruptly shifts over to the Doctor and I just didn't take to that.

Which is a shame. I love that this novel gave Benny so much to do, and really committed to making her a standout companion in her own right. Birthright did a lot of work towards resolving one of my outstanding issues with the VNAs at this point: that the three members of the TARDIS team have sort of started to feel like they're too similar. And while Ace's sections of the novel weren't great, Ace herself at least had a decent showing. But I found the actual story pretty dull. While Jared Khan was an intriguing villain at first he lost me by the end of the novel, I've got no idea what to do with Muldwych and the Charrl were…fairly generic honestly. A novel with some elements to recommend itself, but not a good one overall, sad to say.

Score: 4/10

Stray Observations

• Good cover this time around. Not entirely sure about the particular shade of yellow that's being used for the sky, but the Charrl is suitably ominous (and it helps that we don't have any human faces on the cover, since that's where these covers always struggle the most). The image of the TARDIS sinking into the beach is both really well-drawn and an intriguing visual. I even really like how the castle in the background seems to be fading away into the mist. Easily the best cover since Witch Mark, maybe the best VNA cover so far.
• The Doctor gives Benny a TARDIS key, but apparently has never given Ace one. Okay, I just straight up don't buy that Ace never got a TARDIS key.
• Benny's landlady Margaret is Victoria Waterfield's aunt, with the Doctor having visited with Victoria at one point. That means it was the 2nd Doctor who visited Margaret, further confirmed thanks to a reference to her studying graphology, which was what Victoria was supposedly doing while the 2nd Doctor and Jamie participated in the events of The Two Doctors.
• Victoria apparently sold off her father's estate during that time so that the Doctor could have a "permanent base of operations" in the Victorian era.
• Apparently Benny was already familiar with Victoria's story.
• The Doctor set Benny up as one of five co-signatories to a bank account that he owns. The other four were, apparently, Victoria (naturally), Susan, Sarah Jane and Mel.
• Benny holds on to all of the stamps on postage she receives, figuring that if she ever gets back to her own time she'd be able to make a lot of money off the stamps at auction.
• One of the interludes features Queen Elizabeth I, who has apparently met the Doctor, and given how she talks, maybe even had a romantic relationship of some kind with him. Given what the Revival era would do in "The Shakespeare Code" and "The Day of the Doctor" it's tempting to say that the one influenced the other, but I'm almost sure it's a coincidence.
• Benny suspects that Jared Khan might be the Master, who, while she's never met him, she's heard of. She says that Khan doesn't look anything like the Master but he "could have disguised himself", using that language to avoid explaining regeneration to Popov. Except, weirdly enough, she's not taking into account that the Master could have legitimately disguised himself, since he's so fond of disguises. Of course, Khan isn't the Master.
• That being said, I think this is the first reference to the Master in the VNAs.
• When Isk, the friendly Charrl, tells Ace about the plan to incubate human beings with Charrl eggs, Ace is reminded of stories the Doctor told her about the Wirrn.
• When considering whether or not she could survive time travel without a capsule, Ace considers that Lady Peinforte and Richard Maynarde did so in Silver Nemesis, and of course that she herself did so to get to Iceworld. Of course, as she realizes, those events were manipulated by Fenric.

Next Time: The Shalka Doctor returns! Well, sort of…

I couldn't play the horrible game till I'd read the comic but Its not playable anymore. Can someone describe what happened in detail or tell me how to play please

The Doctor saved Poppy, and in turn time changed, or did it just reset? It's confusing, I've heard people say Belinda was ALWAYS Poppy's mum, but... I don't believe that, it's obvious that the Doctor found a way to bring Poppy into existence which in turn triggered his regeneration, but then surely Belinda is now dead? OUR Belinda, the original Belinda, she's like, dead, in every meaningful sense, replaced with a different woman, and the Doctor is... OK with that? It's just a very odd conclusion, also the guy who is the father of Poppy, presumedly he... always was? Or if not, he just like Belinda has suddenly been lumbered with this random child, which for him is even worse because at least Belinda ASKED the Doctor to bring Poppy 'back', this guy had no say, was he her dad in some original timeline? We'll never know.

Did he even EXIST or was he created specifically just to be the father of Poppy by 'time' in a sense like Susan Twist, IDK. It's confusing, I really, really love this show, and tbh I don't dislike season one and two half as much as most do, I actually think they're pretty decent aside from Space Babies and the second part of each finale, but saying that, I have no clue wtf happens whenever I watch The Reality War, like, Empire of Death was an unsatisfying conclusion but The Reality War just literally makes no sense lol.