Bernice Summerfield and the Criminal Code

Companion Chronicles #4.6

Released: 24 January 2010

Listened: 2/14/21

This is the only Companion Chronicle to feature Benny, and Lisa Bowerman doesn’t direct this one. However, it means that Benny has to do a lot of narration, so it’s good that she’s separated from the Doctor for much of the story. The Doctor is trying to negotiate a peace treaty between a couple of planets, but it isn’t going well, and is taking longer than he anticipated. Benny is attending an archaeology conference on the planet where the talks are taking place, which appears to be unrelated, but of course turns out to have the key to the whole thing, and if only the Doctor had listened to his companion sooner, it might not have gone so far. The TARDIS translation circuits play an unusually prominent role in this story. You’d think that translation issues might come up more often, given Benny’s profession, as either a help or a hindrance, but it’s pretty unusual. If I have a complaint, it’s that the story builds nicely to a revelation, but then ends rather abruptly. I feel like it could have been a bit longer than it was. Charlie Hayes, Wendy Padbury’s daughter, plays the secondary character, and does a nice job providing contrast. It’s a good story that plays to Benny’s strengths, and a nice variation from the full-cast stories.