Ferril's Folly

Companion Chronicles #5.11

Released: 12 May 2011

Listened: 6/4/22

The first appearance of Romana in this project is a Companion Chronicle, which means lots of Mary Tamm. It doesn’t have the usual form of a companion telling a story later in their life, because that’s not possible for Romana I. Instead, it takes place in “real time” as it were, which means in the middle of the hunt for the Key to Time, which is a little odd, but doesn’t take too much handwaving to fix. The action takes place in Norfolk in 2011, which is a bit odd right after “The Stones of Blood,” but oh well. The baddy is played by Madeleine Potter, with a fairly strong American accent. She also does half the narration, which means sometimes Lady Ferril’s point of view conflicts with Romana’s, which is kind of amusing. Her impersonation of Tom Baker is fairly dire, but she doesn’t get to do it that often. Mary Tamm’s, while not really an impression, has a nice cadence to it that’s very effective in evoking the Doctor. The story itself, about a former NASA astronaut badly injured on a mission, and now possessed of numerous prosthetic parts, and the ability to control metal, is a bit far-fetched, even by Doctor Who standards. There’s rather a lot of sciency bafflegab, mostly to prove how clever Romana is, but it does threaten to overwhelm the story at times. Still, it’s a nice start to this section.