Second Opinion Review: The Light at the End

On October 23rd, 2013 Big Finish released, a month ahead of the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary, their own story celebrating the Doctor: The Light at the End. This widely anticipated story was released earlier than expected and on a very important day to me: the birthday of my fellow Whovian and lovely wife, Jessica. Is there any other way to celebrate 50 years of Doctor Who than having a multi-Doctor story? The Light at the End does not disappoint our expectations at all. I would venture a guess that most fans, if not all, would want a multi-Doctor story as we have seen with fan commentary throughout social media regarding The Day of the Doctor. There has been much speculation about what classic Doctor would appear in The Day of The Doctor, but as of right now it appears the story will only feature 10th, 11th and Doctor 8.5 (John Hurt). The Light at The End offers not only a story with all of the living classic Doctors, Tom Baker, Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy & Paul McGann, but also manages to incorporate the 1st to the 3rd Doctors.

Readers of the Doctor Who Archive will already be familiar with my fellow contributor, Mark Perkins, thoroughly enlightening review of story of The Light at the End. Mr. Perkins eloquently states: The Light at the End uses the oft coined phrase ‘timey whimey’ to good effect,” which The Light at the End certainly does. The Light at the End is a chunky, meaty story with numerous in jokes and brilliant interactions between each Doctor. However, the story is not the only item offered by Big Finish to celebrate the 50th In my review, I will offer some additional thoughts concerning the story of The Light at the End, but the additional commentary material included in the package as a whole.

The plot of The Light at the End, as Mr. Perkins states, is simple. The Master obtains a weapon, from arms dealer the Vess, that will assist him in erasing the Doctor and all he has ever done since leaving Gallifrey. The Master is once again played by the devilishly charming Geoffrey Beavers. This plot in my opinion not only creates a timey, wimey, wibbley, wobbly situation that all of the Doctors contribute to solve, but also plays with the question: Doctor Who? In the 11th Doctor story, Asylum of the Daleks, the Doctor is erased from the Daleks computer archives. The Daleks all chant, Doctor Who?, which sets up the story arc that leads up to The Name of the Doctor. The televised Doctor Who is exploring more of the character and a secret the Doctor carries with him, which is an exploration upon who is the Doctor exactly? The Light at the End examines another facet of the question Doctor Who? If The Master succeeds in erasing the Doctor from history, the Doctor will be forgotten such as he is by the Daleks in the televised stories.

The story opens with Mr. Bob Dovie playing with his children outside of their 59a Barnsfield Crescent home. This address becomes a focal point for all of the Doctors, which their respective TARDIS’s land. However, it is not just the address the TARDIS is drawn toward, but the date, November 23rd 1963. It is the point in time in which The Master chose to lure the TARDIS and have all of its time streams fold in on itself. This date we know is significant to us as the 1st story transmitted to us of Doctor Who. The use of 11/23/63 as the Master’s focal point in time is a brilliant layer within the timey wimey-ness of the story. It implies the Doctor, if erased from history since leaving Gallifrey, would be erased from the lives of all he ever encountered, which is not only everyone the Doctor has ever encountered in the story but us the fans participating as viewers and listeners.

As Mr. Dovie plays with his children suddenly a police box, the TARDIS, crashes onto the roof of his home destroying the chimney. To sum the scene, the child asks his father, “Daddy, what is that?” Dovie replies to his son, “Was that an airplane?” and then the TARDIS crashes onto the roof, and the child asks: “Is it Father Christmas Daddy?” For some odd reason, for me, this scene is reminiscent to the opening of the Pink Floyd song, “Good Bye Blue Sky,” which has a child asking his mother, “Is that an airplane in the sky mummy?”

Our first Doctor to appear in the story is 8th and his companion Charlotte Pollard. The TARDIS lands and the Doctor expects to be at 59a Barnesfield Cresecent on November 23rd, 1963. However, the TARDIS goes awry and they open the door to find themselves amongst plant like beings, which has hints of the classic science fiction story, the Day of the Triffids. After a bit of trouble and being seperated from the Doctor, Charlotte finds the TARDIS again and upon entering she views images of the Doctor’s first three incarnations and suddenly finds herself within the console room of the 4th Doctor and his companion Leela. Once the 8th Doctor arrives this brings together my favorite incarnations, the 4th and 8th, which starts the pairing of the Doctor with his future and past selves leading to the story’s ultimate team up. In response to Charlotte’s inquiry about the images of his past selves it appears neither 4th or 8th at this point in their timelines have told their companions about regeneration. We are also informed by the 4th Doctor that his prior incarnations, in reporting it to the 8th, all appear rather ethereal. This is our first hint that the first three will not be appearing in the story as embodied as the 4th, 5th, 6th , 7th, and 8th Doctor.

The first three incarnations of the Doctor all do sound rather ethereal and echoey when they appear at varied points in the story. At first I was not aware how their dialogue for the story was provided. Did they take audio snippets from their eras that fit the script? The 1st Doctor was portrayed by William Russell, who also plays the character he is well know for in Doctor Who, Ian Chesterton. As he has done so well in the past, Frazier Hines, the unforgettable 2nd Doctor Companion Jamie McCrimmon, portrays the 2nd Doctor alongside Tim Treloar as the 3rd Doctor. The Light at the End convincingly brings 1st, 2nd, and 3rd into the storyline, but has snippets from their companions as well. The primary companions for the story of The Light at the End are Charlotte, Leela, Ace, Nyssa and Peri. If only for a few small scenes, The Light at the End is not short on prior companions returning for cameos, from Susan, Barbara, Ian, Polly, Vicki, Zoe, Turlough, Tegan and more.

The interaction between each Doctor is magnificently written. I especially love 4th’s comment to 8th about him having a “terrible sense of fashion,” after viewing the “ghosts of his future,” referring to the 6th Doctor. The 8th replies, “coming from the man with the impractical scarf,” which in turn 4th replies 8th is dressed in a Wild Bill Hickok costume. These interactions provide hysterical moments, especially when Ace sees the images of the past and future incarnations of the Doctor, which she has very funny descriptions of each Doctor, such as Beatles haircut for the 2nd, and Joseph and the technicolor dreamcoat for the 6th to name a few. In a scene where 5th and Nyssa arrive at 59a Barnesfield Crescent to investigate what is transpiring, Mr. Dovie mistakes them for police investigating the disappearance of his wife and children. In an effort to obtain more information on their predicament, Nyssa and 5th play along and sit with Mr. Dovie for tea and a chat about his absent family. In this scene Mr. Dovie believes 5th to be an police investigator and even wonders where he has seen 5th before, which 5th denies any recollection meeting Mr. Dovie previously. I took this scene to be an in joke toward Peter Davison’s involvement with Law and Order: UK where he plays the director of the CPS.

As the story unfolds we already have 4th and 8th working together, we get 6th and 7th pair up, and 5th investigating Mr. Dovie. Once they all get together they each have a vital piece of information to offer one another till they suss how to proceed in defeating the Master. They need to proceed on their own as each companion eventually is erased from the life of the Doctor, which Charlotte is the first to go. If you have been following the 8th Doctor adventures from Big Finish then you know Charlottes story, which The Light at the End is set in the earlier stages of 8th and Charlottes travels together. Therefore it would have been odd were she to meet 6th earlier than she should have.

The plot of The Light at the End may be simple but the story as whole, the journey of the first 8 Doctors, has a well wrought mix of drama & comedy for every fan. This story, disc 1 and 2, is a proper celebration of everything Doctor Who pre-2005. An advantage for listeners of Big Finish, to paraphrase Tom Baker, is that we can visualize each Doctor as they appeared on television not as the actors appear today.

The additional material accompanying the 5 CD set for The Light At The End is a 70 minute Behind the Scenes Making of The Light at the End documentary on Disc 3, another 70 minute documentary on Disc 4, This is Doctor Who at Big Finish and Disc 5 is a Companions Chronicle, The Revenants performed by William Russell as Ian Chesterton. As a long time fan of the Big Finish stories, I absolutely love the Behind the Scenes material that accompanies every story. For me I find them greatly more enjoyable than the past Doctor Who Confidentials for the televised program. Dont get me wrong, I did enjoy Confidential but I find the Big Finish material more enlightening on the whole. For the Behind the Scenes of The Light at the End, Big Finish interviews everyone involved, from the writers, producers and actors. I especially adore Louis Jameson’s comments, to paraphrase her, about Doctor Who being intellectually fashionable and it is what Being a Geek is all about. Fans will certainly “geek out” at the experiences everyone had recording the Light at the End. There is discussion about the scheduling made to accomodate Sylvester McCoy’s involvement with The Hobbit films and if your a fan of The Hobbit then you shall certainly enjoy these bits.

This is Doctor Who at Big Finish is an even larger exploration at the inner workings of the Doctor Who production at Big Finish. We hear from not only the actors involved with The Light at the End but writers who have made the transition from the televised Doctor Who to working with Big Finish. One fine example is the involvement of Philp Hinchcliffe who succeeded Barry Letts in 1974.

The final and fifth disc of The Light at the End is a Companion Chronicle performed by William Russell. If you are not familiar with this line of Doctor Who stories, these stories are further adventures of the Doctor as seen through the eyes of his companions. As my co-contributor Mr. Perkins is relatively new to Big Finish, as he states in his review, I am new to the Companion Chronicles. This Ian and Barbara, first Doctor story, The Revenants, has offered me new insight into the series and another way to absorb myself into the world of the Doctor.

If you have yet to listen to The Light at the End then I highly encourage you to do so. The Light at the End is a wonderfully brillant classic Doctor prelude to The Day of The Doctor on November 23rd.