Once the Sara Kingdom
trilogy was completed Simon Guerrier moved on to a second trilogy of Companion
Chronicles for the First Doctor, but with a twist. Set in between The Daleks’ Master Plan and The
Massacre of St. Bartholomew’s Eve, this trilogy would concern the new
companion Oliver Harper, a stockbroker from 1960s London who has committed a
terrible crime and is escaping the law with the Doctor. The story establishes who Oliver is and his
discovery of the alien Fulgurites making business on Earth and rushing away
from his job as his friends are arrested.
He’s going to go on the run and hopes he can get away which hooks the
listener into the character of Oliver Harper, but a lot of the problem of the
story comes with the fact that Oliver is a bit of a one dimensional character
on the whole. Tom Allen gives a great
performance and he interacts well with Peter Purves, trying to explain 1960s
culture to a man from the future, and his outrage at what the Fulgurites are
dealing in is genuine. The problem is
that we don’t know much about who Oliver is outside of playing companion to
Steven Taylor and being on the run which is unforgivable, especially after
Guerrier gave us Robert in the Sara Kingdom trilogy as a wholly defined
character from the start.
Steven Taylor for this
story actually gets development as at the beginning we get his reaction to Sara
Kingdom’s death on Kembel so we go straight into The Perpetual Bond with the character at that point in his
life. Steven does want to see justice
done, but is willing to go with the Doctor on vacation when they land in
London. They want to meet up with Ian
and Barbara immediately just to get a sense that everything is going to be
alright in the universe which is a great angle to play the story at. Steven also has to interact with the London
of the 1960s and it completely out of his depth. He has no idea what the difference is between
the bowler hat or the top hat and why either are significant to 1960s culture. The people there seem extremely primitive to
what he’s used to and when it is revealed what the Fulgurites deal in he takes
humanity as even more despicable. The
First Doctor however actually shows his anarchist side when he is trying to
find ways around the legal dealings of the Fulgurites, which just makes him
seem alive. When he and Steven notice
one on the bus they decide forget Ian and Barbara, there’s an adventure to be
had, which gets their minds off the loss of Sara Kingdom. It seems a little tasteless, but on the whole
it doesn’t cause too much bother. Peter
Purves does an excellent job as Steven and the First Doctor, but excels in this
story as the narrator of the events.
It’s a job that suits Purves’ British voice.
The Fulgurites make
excellent villains as what they are doing is according to them the moral
decision. They find one adult human as
good as any other adult human, which is an interesting commentary of having
complete equality as it destroys uniqueness of character. Indeed I’d rather have a younger man as my
slave than an older one as it would work more.
It’s a concept that just doesn’t make sense in the thought processes of
the villain. NOTE: I do not promote
slavery and anyone who has slaves in areas where it is illegal should be
reported to the government. Also Lisa
Bowerman is in the director’s chair which is a great direction overall even if
the story has quite a few flaws.
To summarize, The Perpetual Bond is by no means a
story to rival Home Truths but it
sets up the Oliver Harper trilogy with intrigue from an excellent cast and some
foes for the Doctor to face with aplomb overall. There ae some logical problems
with the plans of the villains and Oliver really isn’t that developed as a
character outside of the secret he is keeping that Guerrier hides from the
audience. 75/100.
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