A telepathic message prompts the Doctor to travel to the ‘Sector of Forgotten Souls’ where a legendary Time Lord vanished long ago.
A telepathic message prompts the Doctor to travel to the ‘Sector of Forgotten Souls’ where a legendary Time Lord vanished long ago.
OMEGA
For the fortieth anniversary of Doctor Who, Big Finish, in addition to its Unbound series and the upcoming Shada webcast, produced the so-called “villains trilogy” — a series of three plays designed to examine the characters of and motivations behind some of the series’ most dangerous villains. The first of these proved a surprising choice: Omega, the mostly one-dimensional baddie from The Three Doctors and Arc of Infinity, didn’t generate a great deal of belief that BF was out to reinvent characters. But Nev Fountain presents an intelligent, textured, and witty (but overlong) script that serves as a solid start to one of Big Finish’s greatest concepts.
Though many of them have been excellent, the more po-faced Doctor Who stories miss an important element of the original series: its humor. Rare was the story that lacked humor; even somber stories like Logopolis defused situations with occasional jokes. Fountain clearly understands this, and puts his comedy background to good use: this is one of the wittiest Doctor Who scripts ever written, filled as it is with sarcastic exchanges and humorous asides. This adds to the drama: horrific scenes are often more effective when they follow on the heels of humorous scenes and this tactic is employed throughout Omega.
The focal point of the play, of course, is the titular character. We learn of his background, but that merely serves to underscore his desire to preserve his place in history. Omega is a story about storytelling, both about the shifting content of stories and their importance to history. With these themes come the expected swipes at Doctor Who fans and their obsessions over continuity — but there’s more going on here, given the villain’s motivation. Fountain draws some fascinating parallels between Omega’s story and that of the Doctor, even if this gets a bit heavy-handed at the conclusion. There’s also some work with unreliable narrative — it’s not as immersive as that seen in Doctor Who and the Pirates, but it’s surprisingly effective nonetheless.
Unfortunately, Omega is too long. Fountain has several interesting things to say, but the plot within which he makes these statements is too thin to support 140 minutes of running time. The twist at the end of episode three is absolutely brilliant, making the entire thing worth a relisten just to pick up on the hints, but that doesn’t change the fact that episodes two and three could have been condensed into one without losing too much. The play’s humorous tone doesn’t support its slow, meditative pace — more severe script editing was required.
I’ve commented before that Peter Davison comes across as a very natural and talented comic actor, and he’s really allowed to come into his own with this script. His delivery is note-perfect and hilarious; he clearly understands and appreciates the humor in Fountain’s script while the script simultaneously understands exactly the type of humor natural to the fifth Doctor. I adore his resigned sarcasm; this is the sort of thing we should have seen more of on television.
The villains trilogy features no companions, but Ian Collier returns to the role of Omega and, much like Davison, betters his television performance. Of course, this is much easier for Collier, given that the Arc of Infinity Omega was a cliched megalomaniac. He has a guttural, threatening voice that makes Omega quite frightening — I can’t believe it’s a coincidence that all three of the villains trilogy actors have some of the most evil voices ever heard in the original series. Collier and Davison have great chemistry, and Collier gives his character a surprising degree of sympathy given his actions.
The supporting cast is strong. Caroline Munro turns in a stellar performance as Sentia; like Collier, she’s remarkably sympathetic and utterly convincing as she slowly lapses into insanity. Hugo Myatt is hilarious as Daland, as are the duo of Anita Elias and Faith Kent as the doddery old ladies Glinda and Maven. Patrick Duggan turns in a dignified performance as Ertikus and, though Conrad Westmaas goes a little over the top as Tarpov, he still lends credence to the atmosphere.
It’s yet another spaceship/station setting for Big Finish, and as usual the production does a great job of rendering a convincing environment. Some of Gareth Jenkins’ sound design is unexpected — the sounds of the weapons, for example — but overall it’s quite effective. This is probably Russell Stone’s most subdued Big Finish score yet, but when it crops up it lends a light, ghostly quality to the proceedings. As mentioned above, Gary Russell needed to cut down the script even more than he already did, but his direction keeps the pace up as best he can and, as usual, gets great performances from his actors.
Overall, Omega is a very strong opener to the villains trilogy. It has a flaw or two, but the characterization, dialogue, and themes are strong enough to overcome a relatively weak plot. Coupled with one of the best shock twists in Doctor Who history, this is well worth owning and well worth hearing a second and third time.
Highly recommended.
8/10