Doctor Who - Blue Forgotten Planet - Review

And so, the end. It's been, on the whole, a succesful season. It created a great deal of anticipation which would probably have been even stronger if I weren't listening after the fact. But I do think it peaked early and slowly weakened. Now I come to the final story, and it has got its flaws.

One of the great things about Patient Zero was the way that all the aspects of the plot had a bearing on each other, and I think this story really needed that coherency, but lacked it. The Blue Forgotten Planet Project strand had very little to do with Charley's departure, either plotwise or thematically. Similarly, Mila's story didn't really feed into the departure in the end. On top of that, some of the interesting aspects set up by the season just disappear. Mila, we are told, has spent so long with the Doctor she's become an ersatz-Charley, rather than the creepy stalker she was in Patient Zero. Far better it would have been to see the transformation, rather than just hear that it happened during off-screen adventures (and indeed, the change does not ring true as presented, her seeming absolution and acceptance at the end feels off as a result). Likewise, Charley's infection has been cleared up by the Viyrans, when more mileage could have been gained from that (why not have THAT be the virus the Viyrans are dealing with on Earth, for instance?).
A prime example of the disparate nature of the plot strands: the Doctor and Mila only run up against Charley and the Viyrans by sheer coincidence, rather than due to any of the various things that link them which could have provided a stronger tie.

There's also a disappointing tendency to set up all sorts of potentially interesting things and then make nothing of them. I already noted that Mila doesn't get much mileage, and there's various other examples in the plot. The humans are suffering from a condition where they regress to a mad savagery if they don't get the drugs they depend of the Viyrans for. But the specifics of the condition aren't really relevant - the degeneration into savages serves to provide a secondary threat for some action sequences, but otherwise doesn't drive the plot at all. It could have been anything really, a wasting disease, a disease that turned you into daleks (Oh, right), a disease that caused incredible pain, and it would have worked pretty much as well in the plot (except for the base siege action sequence, but that was largely ephemeral anyway). Slightly more is made of the dependency of the humans on the Viyrans, but even then it doesn't figure much. There's really rich ground for thematic exploration here; losing your mind is a horrible but morbidly fascinating concept, it could have been a major theme, but instead it's not really discussed. Likewise blind dependency on a higher power. Or the fact that the humans have lost all memory of the planet's past. Plenty of ripe ideas there. Ignoring the human situation, there's Charley and Mila - loads of questions about the nature of identity spring up, but the plot isn't concerned. Perhaps the one that bothered me the most was Charley's relationship to the Viyrans. She's been doing errands for them in between centures in cryofreeze, popped out to do their dirty work then returned to oblivion. And the Viyran's mission is not exactly palatable. Charley is complicit in five genocides. Why doesn't the story explore that at all? It's rushed past, as, similarly, is the Doctor's breaking the web of time at the end of the story. There's a hint that the Doctor is actually repairing the web from damage somehow related to Charley's time-twisting in the first place, but it's gone before you know it. There a big consequences here, with great dramatic potential, but the play does not acknowledge them.

It seems Nick Briggs didn't want to do a story that did 'issues' though, but more of an action romp. Fair play, that worked great guns in Patient Zero, and for the first half of BFP it does here, too. Unfortunately, the second half seems to require a bit too much technobabble and coincidence to dig itself out of it. (Most clonkingly, the fact that time travel just so happens to be the cure for the disease they've stumbled upon. I mean, really, couldn't it have been worked in any better at all?)

I'll quickly mention one last weakness, then I'll get on to the good stuff. The guest cast are pretty good for the most part, but the characters they're playing are not particularly interesting. They're distinct enough people - sometimes I've found supporting casts in stories like this blur together - but largely uncompelling. Part of the problem is that they're just bland. They could be anyone. This is a group of people who've lived every day with only a weak lifeline linking them to their sanity, and surrounded by exemplars of what they could so easily become. But none of this really seems to have shaped them, they're generic 'crisis survivor' types - the specifics of their situation don't come through in their actions and thoughts. They start out promisingly, though, and get some decent interplay early on which gives them a realism, but as the story progresses the disparity between their situation and their flat behaviour grows. In the second half they're mostly relegated to giving one sentence reactions to each plot point as it passes. Even a fairly significant death doesn't register much.

Still, as I said, this is mostly down to writing and direction, not performance. The acting in the play is pretty tight; nobody is letting the side down, and there are a fair few strong moments from multiple characters. What it really lacks, though, is interplay between Colin and India. As they're seperated for much of the story we don't really get to see them sparking off each other, and it feels missing. Their parting is imminent, so it feels like they should be playing off each other, but they're not, and the absence is noticeable. Colin and India are both on good form, but there is a feeling when, say, the Doctor is talking to Ellen and Ed that, no matter how good Colin is being, he'd be even better if it was a scene with Charley.

That said, I felt India was very good here. She plays Charley more muted than we are used to, somewhat less ebullient due to her new existence as a worker for the Viyrans. She comes off as knowing, a bit jaded, but still Charley - not cynical and depressed. And she contrasts it well against Mila, who's still bouncy and happy as ever. The only time it goes out the window is when the pair meet, and again this might be more down to the writing and direction. Unfortunately all the potential of the Charley-Mila scenes is reduced to the tedious 'No, *I'm* the real one' type bickering that's become very much the cliché in such stories.

A nod should also be made to Michael Maloney. The Viyrans are still misappropriating poor Fratalin's voice, so Maloney is back to play them, and he's very good. He makes them sound almost melancholic - they don't want to make any enemies, but they really do need to blow up this planet, and they're faintly sad about it.

Backing up the performances is some great sound design. It's a very rich soundscape that prevents the story ever becoming stagey. The music is superb, although sometimes it seems to swell up during moments when the drama is not similarly coming to a head. The voice modulation on the Viyrans adds to Maloney's already fantastic performance and complements it perfectly.

Ah, the Viyrans! The other real success of the story. They've lost a slight layer of mystery and creepiness in coming to the forefront, but in exchange they've gained the tinge of melancholy mentioned above. Their motivations, now we have a decent grasp of them, are very much alien and interesting to think about. This is one area of the play where the concepts are finally given some examination. They've maintained their intimidating qualities well. Perhaps because they don't gloat or show it off, it's very easy to believe the Viyrans really do possess some pretty phenomenal power. You can totally buy that they would, and do, scan every face of a planets population to locate a disease. Wisely, Briggs has still kept them a step removed from things though - they never have a feel of immediacy - so they still have plenty of mystique to trade on in a potential (and hopefully likely) return.

Finally, the send off itself. First of all: Charley tells the Doctor the truth, at last, and... We get NO reaction at all? The Doctor says nothing as she explains, and then the scene is interrupted by Ed and Ellen. This felt like a resoundingly missed moment. As for the actual departure, I don't know quite what I think of it. I suspect I'll need a relisten to really decide. I do think the understated ending was the way to go, though. It would have been easy to do something really big, but that has all the more chance to fall flat. When I saw the chapter title R101 I wondered if she was ultimately going to die on the airship after all! That would have been quite the twist, but it, or a similar grand exit, could easily have come off feeling overblown. I also like the way it's kept possible that it's actually Mila that has survived, which casts things in a much darker slant. I was hoping that the solution to the tangled timelines would be something clever than a memroy wipe, though, because that was always the obvious and rather predictable way out. My other issue is with the final words between them - I feel they should have been something more personal. As it was, they're something about Mila, who has only just recently become part of the arc, and I would have liked last words which felt like they addressed all of the pair's history. I don't know WHAT I think of the open endedness... It is left very loose.

Ultimately it's a story that feels like too many missed opportunities. It rides on a very strong and exciting build-up, and so it really needs to tie the various strands together satisfactorily, but it doesn't. Instead it adds new and unnecesary aspects which then pull the story apart and leave it feeling under explored. But it's well performed, it sounds great, the Viyrans are undeniably brilliant, and the first two parts are pretty exciting, so it's not a total wash. Provisionally I'd give it around a high 6 or low 7, but I haven't really made my mind up yet.