4.1 Call to Arms by Matt Fitton
Mike Yates braves a stormy night in the Lakes to help celebrate a milestone for John Benton. An evening of fond reminiscences of old glories and friends awaits. But a long-buried past is about to catch up with them. Meanwhile, on the rain-lashed moors, what begins as a routine mission for modern-day UNIT quickly becomes a fight for survival.
4.2 Tidal Wave by Guy Adams
When an experimental tidal power generator needs its eco-friendly credentials checked, Kate Stewart calls in an expert. Soon, Jo Jones is bound for ‘Project Charybdis’ in the South Atlantic, along with an awestruck Osgood. But out at sea, a treacherous plan is set in motion to awake an ancient race. Beneath the seabed an army is sleeping – an army of Sea Devils!
4.3 Retrieval by Guy Adams
As the Earth’s primeval rulers reclaim their birthright, UNIT must stand against them. Kate Stewart and Osgood venture into a Mediterranean stronghold to retrieve a means to fight back. But a Silurian warrior is on their trail. Once she has the humans’ scent, Commander Tryska will never give up the hunt.
4.4 United by Matt Fitton
The Silurians hold Great Britain under siege. Grand Marshal Jastrok rules the seas and the skies with reptile forces. On the ground, Commander Kalana crushes all ape resistance. With Kate Stewart trapped, defence of the realm falls to UNIT’s old guard. Jo Jones, Mike Yates and John Benton are ready to do their duty and stand united.
UNIT: ASSEMBLED
I’ve criticized the new UNIT range for being rather empty: everything has been solidly written and produced to Big Finish’s usual high standards, but the first two volumes amounted to little more than soldiers running around shooting things for four hours. The third set, “Silenced,” surpassed its predecessors – but now, with “Assembled,” from Matt Fitton and Guy Adams, we’re right back to soldiers running around shooting things. The only difference is that some of the soldiers were on TV in the 1970s.
“Assembled” is about a Silurian invasion of Earth and UNIT’s attempts to stop it. A series of coincidences gets Mike Yates, John Benton, and Jo Jones (née Grant) involved, and they team up with the modern UNIT team to save the day. Cool idea, though we’ll have to ignore that none of them appeared in “Doctor Who and the Silurians” and only Jo made it into “The Sea Devils,” so their alleged experience in these matters is questionable at best. The problem is the same problem with every other Silurian story: they’re all the same. Some Silurians have woken up, and while some of them are peaceful scientists happy to coexist with humanity, the rest are deranged, genocidal maniacs. Eventually, the murderous ones are defeated, the peaceful ones end up dead, and everyone sighs regretfully that peace could not be achieved. Fitton and Adams try to shake up this formula by getting rid of the peaceful Silurians and making them all violent killers – but I don’t think making the story less complicated is a stop on the road to higher quality.
Jastrok (Richard Hope), leader of this faction of Silurians, plans to conquer the island of Great Britain, fortify it, achieve recognition from the other human countries, then slowly take over the planet while threatening to destroy everything with the UK’s nuclear arsenal if anyone fights back. He’s a violent fanatic, in other words. Near the end, he is told that his people will deal with him if and when they are all awakened, for his genocidal ways are contrary to Silurian law. I’m not sure about that, given that they promoted him this far up the chain of command! The lack of subtlety really hurts the story, too, because there’s absolutely nothing interesting about the main villain. What does he want? To murder all humans! Why? Because he’s a racist, I guess? What does he plan to do when all the humans are dead? Who knows? Do any of his soldiers break with his desire to wipe out all of humanity? No, they’re all as fanatical as he is! Jo spends the last episode of “Assembled” insisting that they try to find a diplomatic solution to the conflict, and teleports herself right into the middle of the Silurian seat of power. After about five minutes of conversation, she realizes that these Silurians are fanatics and that diplomacy is hopeless. Not only is this utterly unrewarding, it also undercuts the message we normally get from these stories, teaching us that sometimes diplomacy really is worthless and there isn’t a better way.
I’m not usually one to complain about realism, but some of the events of “Assembled” defy belief. The story takes pains to point out that only about 100-200 Silurians are awake, and they’re using dinosaur enforcers alongside fear-inducing technology to keep humanity subdued. For example, they have genetically-engineered pterosaurs patrolling the skies and destroying any military aircraft that attempt to breach the perimeter. I know the authors hand-wave all this away every time the Silurians dismiss the humans as “primitive,” but really, we’re just expected to accept that pterosaurs can easily and casually destroy jet-powered fighter aircraft traveling hundreds of miles per hour and loaded down with ordnance? The story also uses the ridiculous device that *only* UNIT soldiers are involved in stopping the Silurians, despite the Silurians residing in Westminster – but it has to, because the UK standing army has tens upon tens of thousands of active-duty personnel and would wipe the Silurians off the map in about eight seconds.
Fortunately, if you’re planning to pick this up because of the classic series characters, you’re in luck. The entire first episode is devoted to Benton and Yates helping Kate Stewart and the UNIT crew fight off a Silurian attack, and everything about it is great, from the initial childish bickering in the pub to the violence and heroism later on. This is only John Levene’s second Big Finish appearance, and he sounds absolutely thrilled to be performing alongside Richard Franklin again. The second episode is a tour de force for Jo, who proves her “diplomacy matters” philosophy by peacefully negotiating with a scientific faction of Sea Devils to help stop Jastrok and agreeing in return to keep them protected. And in the final episode, everyone is brought together – though it’s a little disappointing because Jo’s role is to look useless and Benton and Yates don’t get a lot to do. Still, it’s wonderful to hear these characters together again – and it’s fun to hear Osgood freak out just like any other good Doctor Who fan.
This is also the best UNIT set yet for Jemma Redgrave, as Kate takes an active role in the proceedings from start to finish and is forced to acknowledge the difficulties of following in her father’s footsteps. She doesn’t read all her lines in the same tone, either, which marks a massive improvement. Osgood is also very important, as she devises almost every step of the plans that ultimately save the day. Unfortunately, Josh and Sam continue their tradition of being utterly superfluous, though at least there’s a moment when a Silurian is baffled at her inability to snap Josh’s plastic bones. (But wouldn’t his joints still be susceptible? Oh, never mind.)
The production is excellent, from director Ken Bentley to sound designer Howard Carter. Nicholas Briggs provides fantastic Sea Devil voices. But “UNIT: Assembled” is an average story throughout – it’s basically four hours of various action sequences with nothing in the way of subtlety, character development, or theme. The heavy (and effective) nostalgia factor earns it an extra point, but it’s disappointing for this series to go right back to its unambitious ways. I was excited for the future after “Silenced;” now, I’m not so sure.
6/10