Beachhead

Doom Coalition #2.1

Released: 3 March 2016

Listened: 12/6/21

After the events of the last story, the Doctor decides they could all use a holiday, and heads to Stegmoor, 2017, much to the disappointment of Helen, who hasn’t left the solar system yet. However, she does get the idea of looking up family and friends 50+ years after she left. This is totally a bad idea, and although she doesn’t have time to try it in this story, it will come back to bite her later on. This story is by Nick Briggs, and features the Voord for no particular reason other than Briggs likes them. In addition, this area was investigated by the Third Doctor and UNIT years before, but they found nothing. Which means the Doctor knows the local owner of a handful of vacation cottages, although the timeline really doesn’t make sense, but hey, UNIT dating. Helen tries her best to bluff her way through the whole alien, time-travel thing, and fails utterly, not least because the Doctor and Liv just start out with the truth this time. Liv gets to use her medical skills, but otherwise, this is a fairly small, contained story. The Voord are simply nasty, and the Doctor doesn’t seem to feel much guilt over what happens to them. However, he does want to investigate their claim that their planet has died, because that’s not what history says. It’s a serviceable story, mostly separate from the ongoing plot, but providing a single hook.