Master of the Daleks

Dark Eyes #4.3

Released: 2 March 2015

Listened: 11/25/21

And we’re back to John Dorney, as the action and chaos heat up. The Doctor spends most of this one dazed and confused from the explosions at the end of the previous story, so Liv carries much of the plot. Which works out fine, because she’s quite willing to snark at both the Master and the Daleks. The Master and the Dalek Time Controller have worked together to create a divergent timeline where the Daleks conquered Earth in the mid-20th Century, then used it as a base to take over the rest of the universe. Which is fine as far as it goes, but this is the Master and the Daleks, so of course neither one trusts the other, with good reason. And there’s Sontarans in the mix too, because why not? Actually, they don’t really do a whole lot, but they’re all played by Dan Starkey, which is always a pleasure. And Molly O’Sullivan returns as well, a much older version, played by Sorcha Cusack because Ruth Bradley was unavailable. She does a decent job of imitating Molly’s accent, and she hasn’t lost any of her sass in the intervening decades, so she and Liv together are quite a team, although they spend most of their time captured. This is the last we’re going to see of the Alex Macqueen Master for quite some time, and this is his chronologically latest appearance (which is a shame, because I like him a lot). So it’s a good thing that he gets to ham it up completely in this one, with some of his dialog veering pretty close to Missy’s style (who had been created by the time this was recorded). This makes a nice part 3 to head into the finale.