I’m going to have an
attempt at describing the main plot of Simon A. Forward’s sequel to The Sandman, Dreamtime. The Doctor, Ace
and newcomer Hex arrive on an asteroid which is basically Starship UK from The Beast Below, but for Australia where
the Galyari and some humans want to set up a trading system between species but
all is not well. The city has become
fossilized and it isn’t long before the Doctor gets himself trapped in the
dreamtime which is a sort of alternative reality for everything surrounding
Uluru which has been uprooted from its spot in Australia and placed on the
floating asteroid. Secrets are revealed
that basically say it is the Doctor who caused this mess and through a deus ex
machina everything is fixed and the Doctor, Ace and Hex depart from this
adventure. This is really a story that
is forgettable in almost every aspect as the plot is thinly spread across four
episodes and is one of those plots trying its hardest to be somehow deep even
if there isn’t anything deep or insightful about it. It just serves to waste two hours of your
time with subplots that go nowhere and boring characters.
Sylvester McCoy gives
perhaps his worst performance in Doctor Who history as none of his lines sound
natural. We seem to be back at the dreadful
performance of Time and the Rani
where the Doctor doesn’t have any real motivations apart from space traveler. I don’t know who to blame for this if it is
McCoy not trying, the script just giving him nothing to do or Gary Russell
giving incompetent direction. I think
the script being bad is the most likely culprit as McCoy is a good actor and
Russell can direct McCoy rather well.
Sophie Aldred as Ace doesn’t give a bad performance on the other hand,
but there just isn’t enough for Ace to do except to be extremely in your
face. Ace spends most of the story just
sort of being there and going along with the Galyari with more of that
pseudo-deep storyline about racism but the message is muddled in the idea and
nothing really makes much sense.
This story serves as the
second story for Hex played by Philip Olivier who is really the only good thing
about this audio. The material for Hex
is much like for the rest of the main cast extremely dull and uninteresting,
but Olivier is just a really good actor and knows this is where he has to make
his best impression. The impression he
makes is of an extremely caring person in general as he is a nurse and I don’t
mind it that Hex is sticking around for a while. The supporting cast is honestly nonexistent
but I do have to mention that the soundtrack is brilliant with a lot of tribal
woodwinds.
To summarize, Dreamtime may never be as bad as Nekromanteia, but it still isn’t a very
good story. The acting feels extremely
stilted from most of the actors with characters who don’t make an impact. This is a rare lapse in acting quality from
Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred leaving new boy Philip Olivier to pick up the
slack which he attempts to do and succeeds in some small regards. The best thing about this story is its
relaxing score which can just put you to sleep with ease. 15/100
No comments:
Post a Comment