When the Doctor defeated the Dalek Time Controller and its Time Lord ally, the timelines shifted and events changed… but the danger is far from over. And new threats to the continued safety of the universe are emerging.
Molly O’Sullivan carried on with her life as a nursing assistant in World War One. She probably thought she would never see the Doctor in his ‘Tardy-box’ again…
From the Dalek occupied planet Nixyce VII through Earth’s history and to the very edge of the universe, the Doctor’s footprints across eternity are being tracked by foes old and new. But when did it all begin and when will it end? Living his life through the complexities of time travel, the Doctor can never be quite sure if he’s experiencing his life in the most helpful order. The only certainty appears to be the advance of the powers of evil and the oncoming threat of a fight to the death against forces that would destroy everything the Doctor holds dear.
01 – The Traitor
02 – The White Room
03 – Time’s Horizon
04 – Eyes of the Master
DARK EYES 2
When “Dark Eyes” was released, Big Finish’s Eighth Doctor Adventures had just reached a roaring climax in “To the Death,” a story that erased most of the regular characters – and “Dark Eyes” was a self-consciously epic follow-up designed to deal with that story’s emotional fallout. Unfortunately, the plot relied on Gallifreyan technobabble, the story barely touched on the emotional fallout, and the epic conclusion came and went with a whimper. Now, over a year later, the release of “Dark Eyes 2” sees many changes: Paul McGann hasn’t appeared at all for Big Finish in the interim, but he did make a surprise appearance in a television minisode presenting his long-awaited regeneration. With the door to the “ongoing stories” concept thus officially closed, it was left to “Dark Eyes 2” to continue the eighth Doctor’s adventures toward the known endpoint of the Time War. And while “Dark Eyes 2” certainly hints around the edges about that eventual future, it’s much more concerned with telling stories than with ongoing mythology, and as a result it’s much better than its predecessor.
This time, instead of writing the entire set, Nicholas Briggs writes only the first part, “The Traitor” – and overreacts by making it the most stereotypical Nicholas Briggs story ever written. It’s almost a straight retelling of Dalek Empire I, with Liv Chenka (Nicola Walker) substituted for Susan Mendes. Everything’s here: the Daleks conquering a planet, enslaving the population, using them to transform their own world into a weapon of war, and manipulating a charismatic individual into giving the population hope and, thus, a reason to work. There’s a palpable sense of misery and betrayal throughout; the Daleks are never too far away to swoop into a scene and inflict their ruthless order.
The biggest difference, of course, is that the Doctor is in this story. Briggs said around the time of the first Dalek Empire that he wanted to tell a Dalek story without the Doctor in it precisely to avoid the problem of the Doctor solving the Dalek occupation in 90 minutes – well, guess what happens here? By the end, of course, the occupation hasn’t been resolved, but that’s largely due to the Doctor’s hidden motives. The fact that he’s confronting the Dalek Time Controller by the conclusion just proves Briggs’ earlier point and makes the preceding story feel inconsequential. Then everything ends on a cliffhanger, and…
…at the start of the second part, Alan Barnes’ “The White Room,” we’re in a completely different place! It’s no surprise that they reintroduce Ruth Bradley as Molly O’Sullivan, the companion character from the first “Dark Eyes” set – thankfully her characterization here amounts to more than “I’m Irish!” We actually see some of her backstory, some of her family, and get to see how she operates domestically as opposed to within the brutality of World War I. Barnes also tones down the “tardy-box” and “the Doctor” affectations while Bradley does the rest – she’s very much a modern companion despite her origin, very aware of her place in the universe and able to keep that separate from her travels with the Doctor. Unfortunately, the other characters are all broad stereotypes, but what can you do? (And seriously, an evil German doctor named H. Göring?) I also appreciated the atmosphere of the early part of the story, as there are several time-travel-related scenes that almost have a Sapphire & Steel feeling: a window that breaks repeatedly, earlier and earlier in time? Fine stuff.
Naturally, this is all abandoned after a while in favor of more standard Doctor Who storytelling. I’m not going to criticize Big Finish for using its own original villains, but the Viyrans have never impressed me. Their entire reason for being is to track down the viruses released after “Patient Zero,” so any story featuring the Viyrans is going to involve this uninteresting plot, with the only variance being the nature of the virus itself. This virus sends people back through time, so a Viyran infected itself with the virus to travel back to investigate – care to guess how the virus got there in the first place? I admit it’s carried out rather elegantly, but it’s hardly interesting – there’s lots of running and shooting and yelling, then the revelation, then it’s over. The retrogenitor particles make another appearance, but thankfully the technobabble is kept to a minimum. “The White Room” is entertaining, then, but ultimately a bit hollow.
Things improve when Matt Fitton takes over with “Time’s Horizon,” a claustrophobic tale set at the edge of the known universe that brings Liv Chenka back into the plot. It’s a great story at first, with every character carrying secrets unknown to the others and the enclosed setting driving tensions to breaking point. I also like the decision to have the Doctor and Liv meet out of order, as it makes for easy drama involving the Doctor’s decision-making. Fitton also embraces classic sci-fi concepts – a mysterious cloud of energy just beyond the universal horizon is good, solid Doctor Who plot material. McGann gives his best performance of the set, Molly stops being a caricature, Liv as “traitor” is given a more effective airing… how could this go wrong?
Oh, by reintroducing the Eminence, of course! As above, I like that Big Finish is trying to create recurring villains, but the Eminence have been rather clumsily introduced. Almost a full year ago, they debuted in “The Seeds of War,” a story that convincingly showed the after-effects of a war with the Eminence but didn’t do much to make them scary. Here, the story does nothing but attempt to make the Eminence scary, having it possess people, stomp around the ship, and growl out unintelligible lines. The Doctor is still carrying part of the Eminence around in his mind, but nothing particularly important happens as a result of this. There’s also more talk of converting people into Infinite Warriors, but that doesn’t really go anywhere, either – hopefully the upcoming Tom Baker story will take the next step with the Eminence and make them into a truly worthy adversary.
Dark Eyes 2 concludes with “Eyes of the Master,” also by Fitton, which deals largely in nostalgia and wackiness. It’s set in 1970s London, and the Doctor and his companions drive around in a purple Volkswagen Beetle – either it’s an amazing coincidence or Matt Fitton was a fan of the EDA novels. The Master, meanwhile, in his Alex Macqueen incarnation, has adopted the guise of – seriously – Dr. Harcourt De’ath, an optician, and is stealing the eyes of people thought to be resistant to the influence of the Eminence. This story finally ties the preceding three together, and the Time Lords are revealed as manipulating events from behind the scenes. Thankfully, unlike the original Dark Eyes, this story does not get bogged down in Time Lord politics and technobabble about retrogenitor particles. Instead, it’s too busy putting McGann and Macqueen in the same room and having them make speeches at each other, which despite my flippant description is incredibly entertaining. The central concept – the Eminence as a threat even greater than the Daleks – will likely continue into future Dark Eyes sets, but nothing here makes it very compelling. Furthermore, the arc plot is not resolved in any way; at least the first Dark Eyes had some closure. “Eyes of the Master” is a lot of fun to listen to, but it’s paper-thin and falls apart under the slightest scrutiny.
I don’t really need to praise the production values, but they’re first-rate yet again in this set: Briggs directs all four stories, with sound design and music from Wilfredo Acosta. The acting is good-to-great across the board, too, which helps give the box set the epic feel Big Finish is so obviously trying to achieve. Overall, though, Dark Eyes 2 just isn’t very interesting. Each story features a returning villain; none of them do anything new with their additional screen time. There’s an arc running through all four stories that is never resolved. The individual stories, meanwhile, are far too slight for their running times, especially considering that there are no unnecessary mid-story cliffhangers. Dark Eyes made some dreadful mistakes in its characterization; Dark Eyes 2 avoids that problem by not having much characterization at all. After 300 minutes it still feels like a pilot episode for a new series – some drama, some hints at the underlying plot, but generally fairly bland. There’s absolutely nothing bad about this, but after a year with no Paul McGann, this is the best they can do? “The Night of the Doctor” was immeasurably more compelling and that was eight minutes long. But there’s at least two more of these, so at least they have some chances to get better.
Acceptable but disappointing.
6/10