The Sleeping Blood

Companion Chronicles #9.1

Released:

Listened: 12/29/19

In 2015, Big Finish semi-retired the Companion Chronicles series, by restricting it to First and Second Doctor stories only. It made sense, as the Third and Fourth Doctors had their own series by this point, so their companions (those whose actors are still living) could be featured in those stories. William Russell had retired from Big Finish, so any story featuring Carole Ann Ford would need to be a “Susan alone” story. Therefore, this was the first story of the inaugural First Doctor box set. The Doctor spends most of the story sidelined by illness, with Susan trying to find medicines that can cure him. She ends up on a world that uses nanomachines for medicine, and encounters a special ops group trying to take down a terrorist. Susan helps by using her advanced knowledge to reprogram some nanomachines, which she regards as interfering in another culture. The terrorist is killed, and Susan is left to wonder about the validity of his arguments. There’s a fairly obvious sermon about healthcare as a universal right, but also the Doctor has to evaluate Susan’s actions, and think about when interference is appropriate and when it’s not.