Post by David J Howe on Sept 27, 2010 20:35:32 GMT 1
I quite enjoyed the first Paul Magrs series on audio - It felt like Doctor Who, and Tom Baker was obviously having a ball playing with the ideas presented by Magrs - intelligent alien hornet-like creatures, and a chase through time and space ...
But with this first part of a new series, it all seems to have gone a little strange. Paul Magrs is a great writer - of this there is no doubt - but his forte is in presenting strange older people behaving oddly in familiar situations, and this is exactly what we get here. The Doctor and his housekeeper - Mrs Wibbsey - no doubt named so that Tom could get his vocal chords around her name as often as possible - embark on a quest through time. There's the Doctor visiting a jumble sale full of old grannies rooting through the clothing ... an elephant in the room ... something about a Roman mosaic of the Doctor ... and a plot-lite story which doesn't really seem to go anywhere.
Baker doesn't sound totally *right* as the Doctor - he sounds like Tom Baker playing the character of the Doctor as he remembers it, all eccentric and loopy, with mad ideas coming from every angle. I keep half expecting the talking cabbage to appear as a companion at any point.
It's enjoyable enough in its own way, but for me it feels more like Tom Baker appearing in some other Paul Magrs whimsy than a proper Doctor Who adventure. Maybe this will settle down a little as the episodes progress, and the story as a whole will enthral and entertain.
But with this first part of a new series, it all seems to have gone a little strange. Paul Magrs is a great writer - of this there is no doubt - but his forte is in presenting strange older people behaving oddly in familiar situations, and this is exactly what we get here. The Doctor and his housekeeper - Mrs Wibbsey - no doubt named so that Tom could get his vocal chords around her name as often as possible - embark on a quest through time. There's the Doctor visiting a jumble sale full of old grannies rooting through the clothing ... an elephant in the room ... something about a Roman mosaic of the Doctor ... and a plot-lite story which doesn't really seem to go anywhere.
Baker doesn't sound totally *right* as the Doctor - he sounds like Tom Baker playing the character of the Doctor as he remembers it, all eccentric and loopy, with mad ideas coming from every angle. I keep half expecting the talking cabbage to appear as a companion at any point.
It's enjoyable enough in its own way, but for me it feels more like Tom Baker appearing in some other Paul Magrs whimsy than a proper Doctor Who adventure. Maybe this will settle down a little as the episodes progress, and the story as a whole will enthral and entertain.
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