Revenge of the Swarm

Main Range #189

Released: 15 August 2014

Listened: 1/12/21

Following on immediately from last time, we’ve got “Hector Thomas,” still bereft of Hex’s memories, traveling semi-involuntarily with the Doctor and Ace, who’s hoping she can find a way to jog his memory. In this story, though, Hector doesn’t seem to have any of his criminal background; he’s just a less-useful version of Hex, without the experience or medical skills. He also spends over half the story under the influence of someone else. That’s because the story gives us a blast from the past in the form of the Swarm, from “The Invisible Enemy.” The Swarm uses the TARDIS to ensure its own creation, which doesn’t seem strictly necessary. The Doctor more or less stops the parts that are unrelated to established history, although a lot of people die in the process. Instead of abruptly stopping at the end of Part 2, the virus jumps forward into its future, to enact a more dastardly plan. There’s a lot of very dodgy science, not the least of which is the assumption that a biological virus and a computer virus are interchangeable. Johnny Morris, who also wrote the excellent “Protect and Survive,” seems to have concluded that “The Invisible Enemy” was pretty silly (and it was), so the sequel can be in the same vein. Even still, rather a lot of people die -- including ones who probably could’ve been saved -- and the Doctor is awfully cavalier about it, even while it’s happening, which is pretty poor for him; even Ace seems unaffected. John Leeson makes a return appearance as the Swarm and the Bi-Al Foundation computer. Probably not a necessary callback, but since he does a lot of Big Finish work anyway, he was likely around. Overall, I’d have to say this one is poor.