1.1 Escape From New New York by Roy Gill
Devon Pryce has lived all his life in the high rises of New New York. A child of the Elevator Guild, he now receives a new calling – from a cat.
Senator Hame is trying to rebuild society, to make it stronger for future generations, but there are those who would stand in her way.
There is a new danger on New Earth, and Devon’s work is only just beginning…
1.2 Death in the New Forest by Roland Moore
On his first mission for Senator Hame, Devon crosses continents to arrive in the New Forest and meet its people.
Trees are dying of unnatural causes. Sapling Vale, a cutting of the noble Jabe of the Forest of Cheem, will help Devon investigate the threat to her people.
So too will an alien, an old friend of New Earth… a time traveller known as the Doctor!
1.3 The Skies of New Earth by Paul Morris
Devon’s work takes him into the skies of New Earth and the great floating city of New Caelum.
Here, a new energy project is exploited by alien powers, and a terrible catastrophe looms. Helped once again by the Doctor, Devon calls on the Bird People of Nest City, as well as the great Solar Bears on their Ice Clouds to stop disaster.
But can the people of the skies put aside their rivalries long enough to make a difference?
1.4 The Cats of New Cairo by Matt Fitton
Senator Hame is summoned to New Cairo by the spiritual leader of Catkind: the Most Exalted High Persian – a personage of great power and wisdom – to report on her investigations.
Here, the camel-like Dromedans still worship Catkind, in the shadows of vast Octahedrons and temples of light. But Hame and Devon have uncovered a conspiracy that threatens the future of everyone on the planet.
The battle for control of New Earth is about to begin…
TALES FROM NEW EARTH: ESCAPE FROM NEW NEW YORK
I often wonder if Big Finish actually planned out this new series material or if most of it is just a panicked reaction to the realization that none of the regular actors are available or interested. Either way, we’re definitely reaching the bottom of the barrel with Tales from New Earth, a box set of stories whose only defining feature is that they take place on the titular planet. (Oddly, the ad copy describes “The End of the World” as being part of “the New Earth setting.” This is akin to describing “Frontier in Space” as being set on Spiridon.) With only Novice (now Senator) Hame (Anna Hope) along as a recognizable character, Tales from New Earth presents a compelling challenge: create new characters in a largely unexplored world without the benefit of the audience’s familiarity or sympathy. Unfortunately, and yet entirely predictably, the challenge itself is much more interesting than the results.
The first story is “Escape from New New York” by Roy Gill, a title inspired by the classic John Carpenter film. But if you’re expecting a pulse-pounding, action-filled adventure from the title, think again, because the title has practically no relevance whatsoever. Instead, we have a glacially slow adventure starring Hame and Devon Pryce (Kieran Hodgson), an elevator repairman in training, and a story featuring an alien race trying to convert the population in part by using the elevator control panels. If that sounds monumentally uninteresting, you’re right. Hame was an unmemorable character on TV, and that largely continues here – she’s principled and heroic and that’s about it. Devon is the main character for the set, and there’s nothing interesting about him. This story establishes that Devon has a tree boyfriend named Thorn (Matthew Jacobs-Morgan) but promptly kills him off to drive the plot, which kills off an entire thread that could have been used to develop the main character. “Escape from New New York” is in many ways a test: can Big Finish craft a science fiction world with original characters and make it compelling? Evidently the answer is no.
3/10
TALES FROM NEW EARTH: DEATH IN THE NEW FOREST
The second story, “Death in the New Forest” by Roland Moore, takes Devon on a trip to the New Forest, home to Trees from the Forest of Cheem, for two reasons: to investigate mysterious deaths for Hame and to pay his respects to his late boyfriend’s family. That second reason is ripe for drama: we can expect to learn quite a bit about Devon from how he interacts with the family and vice versa. Naturally, those expectations are immediately quashed as Devon discovers the entire family has been murdered. So instead of any character development, we get a rather routine murder mystery that pairs Devon up with Sapling Vale (Yasmin Bannerman), a descendant of Jabe because of course she is. We meet the ancient enemies of the Trees, the Termitons, giant termites that want to devour the Trees. It’s the sort of thing that Russell T. Davies might have come up with, except it’s lacking in any sense of irony, instead played perfectly straight. Even that wouldn’t be so bad if the Termitons weren’t generic cackling villains, but they are, and so their relationship with the Trees isn’t at all interesting. Lastly, the tenth Doctor shows up, and immediately takes over the entire story. Kieran Hodgson voices the Doctor as well as Devon, and while his Tennant impression is actually rather good, it once again draws a line under how desperate Big Finish is for new series-related content. There was a chance here to tell original, interesting stories, but no – it’s the second story in the box and we’re already back to generic Doctor Who tales. Moore really writes the Doctor well, which is actually something of a disadvantage – he’s such a dynamic, interesting character that you immediately lose interest in the one you’re supposed to be following.
Dreary.
4/10
TALES FROM NEW EARTH: THE SKIES OF NEW EARTH
“The Skies of New Earth,” by Paul Morris,” is the best of the four stories in the set, mainly because it’s the only one that tries to be about something. It seems like it’s going to follow a routine path, with an evil corporation trying to achieve monopoly control over energy production, but things take an abrupt right turn when a corporate officer is shown the dangers of his plan… and repents! Of course, this is just in service of bringing the Lux to the forefront once again as the cackling villains of the piece, but it’s genuinely surprising to see a character like that show some moral independence. There are also some fascinating ideas on display: the Bird People of Nest City are fairly generic, but the ice clouds overhead, inhabited by jetpack-flying Solar Bears, are another matter entirely. Toby Hadoke is great as Oscar McLeod, too, a genuinely fun character who actually feels unique. The Doctor turns up in this one as well, and while he’s not as disruptive as he was in the New Forest, it still immediately becomes his story whenever he’s in a scene. I’m wondering about the editing, though: at one point, Devon remarks that he’s never felt as out of place as he does in the Bird society, where everyone is suspicious of him because of his human heritage. It’s an interesting idea to explore – but in the story immediately prior to this, he’s the only human among the Trees and Termitons and they’re all immediately suspicious of him as well! I can understand a continuity error like this between stories separated by significant production time, but two adjacent stories in the same box? Still, that’s a minor complaint that doesn’t detract from a generally interesting story.
7/10
TALES FROM NEW EARTH: THE CATS OF NEW CAIRO
And so we come to the end of the prolonged tale of Devon, Hame, and the Lux in “The Cats of New Cairo” by Matt Fitton. Right when it starts, there’s a strong implication that Devon will either be killed or otherwise removed from the action… and then nothing like that happens. We finally get a small glimpse into what distinguishes Devon as a New Human when we see how the Cats can control him, but we don’t really learn much about the Cats or their society despite spending most of the story there, apart from meeting the camel-like Dromedans who worship them and getting a brief glimpse into their religious hierarchy. Ultimately, one of the largest problems with the set is that the various alien races don’t sound or act particularly alien. There are exceptions – the one Solar Bear we spend time with is unique and memorable – but all the Cats here blend together, even James Dreyfus as the Most Exalted High Persian. This is a reasonable conclusion to the story of the attempted Lux invasion, although even with the Doctor largely absent from the action it’s still up to him to save the day at the end. I’m left with this question about “Tales from New Earth:” why was this box set produced? It doesn’t tell us anything particularly new or interesting about any characters or settings we know, it doesn’t introduce any compelling characters that we could see again in the future, it doesn’t offer any sort of thematic depth or complexity, and its storytelling is uninspiring and straightforward. It’s generic, competent, middlebrow science fiction with a few Doctor Who trappings slapped on the front. If that’s what you want, pick it up; if you want something you’ll remember for more than a day or two, look somewhere else.
5/10