Bloodtide

Main Range #22

Released: 23 July 2001

Listened: 6/9/20

The Doctor takes Evelyn to go meet Charles Darwin, while he’s in the Galapagos Islands with the Beagle. But this isn’t a straight historical; there are Silurians around -- with a Myrka, but no Sea Devils, which is a bit odd. The story feels just a little too long, with the Doctor being captured, then Evelyn being captured. But it gives a certain amount of time for Darwin to work out the theory of evolution by talking with Evelyn. For her part, Evelyn seems to have gotten the message by now about not interfering in history, although she’s not above giving Darwin some encouragement. The story is pretty dark, as is typical for this era of Big Finish; pretty much everyone who’s not a main character or a historical figure ends up dead. The Silurian voices weren’t really intended for long speeches, but the actors try their best to imbue them with emotion. As usual in Silurian stories, the Doctor makes a game effort to get them to coexist with the humans, with shades of “The Hungry Earth,” but in 1835, that’s even less likely than in 2020. There’s also some nonsense about the origins of humanity which is really best left forgotten. It’s a reasonably good Evelyn story, after the hysterics of the last one, but otherwise pretty average.