Doctor Who Review - "The Seeds of War"
rating: 4
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Leave it to Big Finish. Only they would get so timey-wimey as to release a sequel to a story that wont be released until next year. Yes, theyre embracing the whole non-linear continuity idea pretty hard. This story is a sequel to a Fourth Doctor and Leela adventure thats to be released next year. This part of it features the Sixth Doctor (Colin Baker) and Mel (Bonnie Langford), doing that very 1980s Doctor Who sort of thing; arriving at a sinister tower. Naturally theres a reference to a swimming pool. The tower is one of the great accomplishments of the universe, and the Doctor and Mel hope to be there for the grand opening. Instead they arrive just prior to its demolition. It seems that the building has become a symbol for a hated foe; an evil being who uses zombies to fight for him, and the same foe the Doctor fought off in his earlier incarnation. To add to the problems, it turns out that crops are failing all over the various civilized worlds, so people are facing mass starvation. There are people working hard to fight this problem, and they realize that the solution might be back on Earth. The Doctor will need to go investigate that while at the same time trying to fight off the evil force boiling inside his mind In setup this at first felt very much like a 1980s Who story. The Doctor and his companion arrive at a mysterious building and things go a little nuts. Weve seen that in Paradise Towers and The Happiness Patrol. We even saw/heard that sort of idea fairly recently in Spaceport Fear. Thankfully this story was much more than that. The overall story of the Doctor trying to save everyone while at the same time trying to stop an evil entity that may, or may not, have possessed him is an interesting one. The acting is, of course, wonderful as always. Baker and Langford do make for a wonderful pairing and often wonder what their time together on the series would have been like had they done more than one episode together. Supporting actors, especially John Banks as Elkinar, also live up to the standard expectations one has for performers Big Finish hires. One would think that the story might suffer from the fact that its a sequel to something none of us have yet heard, but it doesnt. It actually works quite well as a stand-alone story, and if youre looking for something thats a good starting point for the Sixth Doctor era of audios, and you for some odd reason dont want to go with The Marian Conspiracy, then this is a pretty decent starting point. Overall, recommended. A good, solid story. NEXT TIME: ELDRAD! MUST! DIE! Apparently.