Somewhere in a suburb of North London, there’s a crisis. More than a crisis, a positive disaster: Belinda and Ralph are expecting four for supper, and there’s no Marie Rose sauce for the Prawns Marie Rose. All in all, the evening couldn’t possibly get any worse…
Until the doorbell rings, bringing the Doctor and Leela to the dinner party. They’ve got a crisis, too – temporal ruckage has sent the TARDIS to another time zone entirely. Meaning they might have to endure a whole evening in Belinda’s company.
But the Doctor and Leela aren’t the only uninvited guests tonight. There’s a strange fog falling, out in the road. And in that fog: savage blue-skinned monsters, with dinner party plans of their own. Because it’s not Prawns Marie Rose on their menu – it’s people!
SUBURBAN HELL
To kick off the second half of the fourth series of Fourth Doctor Adventures, Big Finish turned to long-time contributor Alan Barnes for “Suburban Hell,” a story that places the Fourth Doctor and Leela into a very unusual setting. Unfortunately, this setting is not used to its full potential, but that should be thought of as par for the course for this range by now.
I suppose I shouldn’t complain. I’ve been begging this range to try something different for years, and this is certainly an example: setting the Doctor and Leela into a suburban neighborhood is very far from the traditional trappings of the Hinchcliffe era, or indeed Tom Baker’s era as a whole. And seeing the TARDIS crew in “ordinary” surroundings is a great opportunity to understand more about them. We saw this with Steven and Sara in “An Ordinary Life,” one of the better Early Adventures. And we’ve also seen Barnes tell a great Doctor Who domestic story with “Death in Blackpool.” The problem is that Barnes opts against the delicate touch necessary to make this story work, resulting in “Suburban Hell” being one of the nastiest pieces of work I’ve heard in quite some time. Thelma (Annette Badland) is the only supporting character that’s even remotely likable: the rest are spineless or domineering or brutish or cowardly or helpless or arrogant or any number of negative descriptors. Belinda (Katy Wix) in particular is a miserable human being that seems to exist only to nag her husband and guests and berate them whenever things don’t work out. At first, I wondered if there wasn’t some sexism on display – I mean really, your lead female character is a shrewish harpy? – but then I heard Pete (David Ricardo-Pierce) and realized Barnes was simply working with broad caricatures without a hint of depth. Even the humor comes at the expense of others, always punching down when it could be aiming its shots elsewhere. If this is truly how Alan Barnes views life in the suburbs, I hope he never leaves the city.
And once you get past the setting, the story is full of obvious clichés. The cast doubles up to play the Priest and the Acolytes, and they do so by adopting some of the least convincing OTT performances in recent memory. The plot is obvious, even predictable, and it provides little to no challenge to the Doctor and Leela, whose only difficulties involve ignoring the irritations of the suburbanites around them. There’s also a needless time travel element, something Barnes also deployed unnecessarily in “Last of the Cybermen,” that only serves to confuse the story without telling us anything interesting about anyone involved.
Which leads me to my final complaint about “Suburban Hell:” it’s incredibly slight. There’s nothing to take away from the story; there’s no thematic consistency and we learn nothing about the characters. Removing Doctor Who characters from fantastic settings is a great way to learn more about them, but all we do in this suburb is listen to a couple bicker as their marriage falls apart. We should at least see more of Leela in this setting – more so, anyway, than hearing her threaten to stab anyone that irritates her. The production is fine, I guess, from director Nicholas Briggs to sound designer Alistair Lock, but what’s it all in service of? Why are we taking one of the rare unique ideas in the history of this range and wasting it on material like this? We’re in the fourth series, for heaven sakes – and yes, it’s been better overall, but is it ever going to be consistently good? I thought we were starting to get there but, well, here we are again.
Not recommended.
4/10