Doctor Who did a musical
once in the 1960’s. That was The Gunfighters and it had only one
song, “The Ballad of the Last Chance Saloon”.
The Gunfighters received mixed
reception on initial airing and reviews post have stayed consistently mixed
over the years. The same cannot be said
for the second musical Doctor Who tried.
The year was 1989 and Jon Pertwee debuted on the stage in Terrance Dicks’
The Ultimate Adventure. The show had three songs, all diegetic and
all despised by Terrance Dicks. You
would think that he would have at least two of them cut as they really aren’t necessary
for the story, but his orders were clear that he wasn’t allowed to cut them for
the audio adaptation. Yes the infamous
Doctor Who stage plays were adapted by Big Finish in late 2008 as a precursor
to see how that type of story would fare before rolling out their Lost Stories
range beginning with what is the most famous, and most seen Doctor Who play.
The plot as Terrance
Dicks describes is a simple nostalgia filled romp throughout the galaxy in a
similar manner to The Chase while the
TARDIS crew are chased by Daleks and try to hunt down the American envoy for a
Peace Conference. Really that’s all
there is and as a spectacle for the stage it really works as a plot as it is
supposed to get us from one set piece to the next and to do it very
quickly. On audio however it is a very
lacking plot, even though there isn’t much wrong with it, the story falls into
a lot of the traps of show, don’t tell.
This is purely down to the adaption process forcing Terrance Dicks to
add in things like “look at that, Doctor” and “Who’s that coming out of the
doors?” which you really shouldn’t do when you’re doing an audio drama as it
takes the listener out of the story really easily. What makes this worse is that Terrance Dicks
was aware of the problems he was writing in and did very little to change them.
Dicks however is very
good at writing two of the three one off companions, Jason and Crystal. Jason is a Marquee from Revolutionary France
which is a great idea for a companion, even though he is a bit of a chauvinist and
Crystal is a nightclub singer who gets dragged along. They serve their purpose which is really all
you could do for a story like this. There
is a companion who is insufferable. Zog
is a fluffy creature that the Doctor picks up on the travels and drags along
with them for a bit of deus ex machina when it comes to the Daleks and the
Cybermen. The Doctor is also great in
this, as Colin Baker of course gives another one of his patented perfect
performances as the Doctor which is the standard for Colin Baker
performances. The same cannot be said
for the villains of the story who are the Daleks and the Cybermen voiced by
Nicholas Briggs. They both suffer from
you can’t have Doctor Who without them syndrome. The Cybermen in particular as they don’t do anything
even though David Banks is a part of the production.
To summarize, The Ultimate Adventure is a decent way
to spend a couple of hours on a dreary afternoon. You won’t have to know too much of what is
going on to get the story as it emulates stories such as The Keys of Marinus and The
Chase. 60/100
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