The Brink of Death

The Last Adventure #4

Released: 17 August 2015

Listened: 9/18/20

One of the more awkward parts of Colin Baker’s tenure is that he never filmed his regeneration scene, ending his time with the conclusion of the Trial instead. Big Finish rectified a lot of things about the Sixth Doctor’s time, and providing a proper regeneration is one of them. The other three parts of “The Last Adventure” have been scattered throughout the Sixth Doctor’s timeline, not necessarily in order, but in order for the Valeyard (and for the listeners, if they go straight through the boxed set). So it’s interesting that the Doctor thwarts the Valeyard’s plans by meddling with his own timeline, and forcing the events of “Time and the Rani” to come to pass. Although this story features Mel as the companion, she spends most of the story believing that the Valeyard is the Doctor (hints of the Unbound story “He Jests at Scars”), whereas the Doctor is accompanied by the Time Lady engineer Genesta, who for strange reasons has a pronounced Yorkshire accent. Michael Jayston, as always, is brilliantly menacing as the Valeyard, unafraid to go over the top as a baddie. Naturally, the story has to end with self-sacrifice, and a speech on the Doctor’s part as he regenerates (two, actually). They’re pretty good, if not quite up to Moffat-level speeches. Nick Briggs gets the job done, and with that, brings the Sixth Doctor’s era to a satisfying close.