In her search to acquire some of the rarest books in the Universe, Benny finds herself being pursued by an insane killer cyborg.
In her search to acquire some of the rarest books in the Universe, Benny finds herself being pursued by an insane killer cyborg.
Timeless Passages
Compared to some of the earlier stories Timeless Passages is actually quite simple on the surface. The threat, as applied early on, is the wanton destruction of a priceless collection of artefacts from a faceless bureaucratic company of penpushers. That, and the very real possibility of being diced by an axe/sword/sabre wielding maniac with a fetish for violence… I have to say this is a real breath of fresh air with a very real, very human runaround with some genuine zingers from Daniel O’Mahony. Best bit of all? Right at the start where Bernice declares she’s leaving her diary for good for another book, a great subversion of her old diary cliché that hasn’t been trotted out in a while.
And although the actual story itself is simple there’s real complexity going on behind the scenes. The labyrinth that is actually a time machine, the villain from the future here to kill the lawyers, the lost baby, the way everything actually revolves around a technicality in intergalactic contract negotiation. Key hints, such as that, which are casually mentioned before being thrown aside. Then there are some magnificent Red Herring’s, such as constant references to the ‘Technocult’ which pays of marvellously with simply outstanding sound design. After a few brief whirrs and clicks early on I thought there was a robot in the bedroom waiting for Bernice, only to discover that the constant throbbing noise in the corner of my ear was actually dripping blood. To put it bluntly this is really good use of the audio medium, the imagery as described is simple but bold and there’s more than enough supplied to bring it to life around the actors, not that they themselves aren’t all on top form today.
Half way through I was guessing what was going on. I was sure the baby was infected by the Technicult and then she had killed her father, then when the truth dawned on me just before the revelations. Miranda, the girl who used to need a walking stick but now doesn’t, who used to be a lot less healthy than she is, and the baby born already dying. The whole script is like a delightful puzzle, masked beneath a wonderfully verbose sequence of chases as Bernice dashes from one impossible scenario to the next, working it out as she goes along.
In fact, just to balance this gush of praise out, the weaker moments of the script are when Bernice occasionally gives into paranoia. Although it makes sense for a woman who’se seen it all to be naturally suspicious of everything, (wouldn’t you be?) these little moments of melodrama detract from an otherwise entirely solid production. Lisa is on best form and there’s not a single bad performance in the play so I can’t actually single one out, they all need praise for bringing to life the dialogue so effortlessly.
Although it lacks the gravitas of a season closer that previous hard hitters have employed, Timeless Passages is something much rarer, a stock ‘standard’ story that knows its bounds and simply excels at what it does best. Contained here is a wonderful self contained, intelligent and eye-catching story, with references to the larger Bernice universe sprinkled on top liberally, but with just enough thought to get you wondering.
10 / 10