Scherzo

Main Range #52

Released: 14 December 2003

Listened: 8/15/21

The divergent universe was meant to be different than anything listeners had experienced before, and although that idea fell apart quickly, it’s pretty accurate here. Early Big Finish stories also liked to play with ideas that emphasized the audio medium, and this is probably the most successful of those. The Doctor and Charley are trapped in an unknown location, unable to use any sense except hearing, as they’re confronted by some entity composed of sound. The Doctor is being rather cold and distant, as he didn’t expect to survive this experience, and therefore really didn’t want Charley along. For Charley’s part, she confessed her love for the Doctor in the last story, and now she’s dealing with the fallout of that. There’s some evolution on both their parts during the story, along with a major dose of body horror, so watch out for that. You’ll also want to be careful of where you have the volume set, as there’s a background whine for large parts of the story, and periodic bursts of noise that are quite startling. It’s definitely a disturbing story. Whether it’s a favorite or not is up for debate, but it’s definitely memorable.