The Marian Conspiracy

Main Range #6

Released: 12 March 2000

Listened: 6/5/20

Welcome, Evelyn! The Doctor manages to meet her through that old stand-by, the causal nexus. Something isn’t quite right in Elizabethan England, and Evelyn is at the core of it. Naturally, if the Doctor wants to go help out Evelyn’s ancestor, Evelyn is going to go along; she is a history teacher after all. And she gets her wish, more or less, although she’s got some things to learn about how time travel and interference work in these stories. She also clearly has some strong opinions about Queen Mary’s and Elizabeth’s relative positions in history. She’s definitely not willing to put up with the Doctor’s nonsense, pretty much railroading him into letting her come along with him. For his part, the Doctor is still fairly pushy, and given to name-dropping and emphasizing his own importance, but he’s somewhat less shouty than he has been in the past. He’s clearly still fond of his coat, and Evelyn is definitely not. As for the plot, like a lot of early Big Finish, it’s quite talky, with not a lot of action. Writer Jac Rayner specializes in historical stories, and in portraying historical characters, like Mary here, as different than their traditional depictions. Evelyn makes it clear that she’s not up for running, and has a heart condition as well. The minor characters have a tendency to address one another by their full names, rather more than you would expect, as if the creators were concerned we couldn’t tell the voices apart. On the whole, though, it’s a good introduction for Evelyn.