The Headless Ones

The Sixth Doctor and Peri #1

Released: 13 August 2020

Listened: 8/23/20

In 2020, Big Finish decided to end their Main Range, and replace it with a series of boxed sets for each Doctor. At the time of this writing, this is the first such boxed set, and it remains to be seen how they’ll be organized or numbered. However, it picks up the story of the older Peri’s time with the Doctor. They end up on a late 1800s African expedition, with some English folks who are looking for the legendary “headless men,” the B’lemyae. The actual nature of the B’lemyae and what they need form the core of the story. Even though it’s an hour-long story, it drags a little bit before the title monsters show up. The real enemy here is colonization, which is brought home fairly hard, as the traditional Englishman character has little in the way of redeeming qualities. As such stories tend to go, there’s also a rather high body count. It’s OK as far as it goes, but the themes could have been executed with more subtlety.