Big Finish Monthly Ranked 5-1

Good afternoon lady and gentle readers, we've done it - as all ranking lists must end we've reached the top! After 95 releases its time for the top 5 of the first 100 releases, I hope you enjoy the final entry and as usual beware spoilers and enjoy!

5. The Chimes of Midnight, we're back in the second 8th Doctor and Charley season with what is my highlight of the season and a highlight of the range. The audio medium is arguably a better fit for horror than TV and this is a case in point. We've gone down the horror route a few times during this ranking and as we reach the top there was always going to be a good horror up here. Right from the start the atmosphere is full of menace and then we're thrown a curve ball and given a mystery to solve. Time is repeating, a murder keeps happening and rehappening all inside an Edwardian mansion. The location alone pays homage to Sapphire & Steel with the added characters to Upstairs Downstairs. This is a very cruel play as time after time the lowest ranking servant of the house Edith is killed and killed again. Paul McGann is on fine form as the 8th Doctor becomes more and more frustrated as his attempts to solve the murder keep failing. India Fisher as Charley gives arguably my favourite of her performances in particular a scene where she is briefly taken over that even freaks me out a little. Also a sure fire way that this play is a hit is that it gave us a catchphrase "Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without Mrs Baddeleys plum pudding..."

4. The Shadow of the Scourge, is the first the range took to other areas of Doctor Who. Over the years we've had the number of ranges expand, welcomed new Doctors, adapted novels and ventured outside of Doctor Who but this is the first time the range experimented with other aspects of the cannon. We're in Virgin New Adventures territory as we have the TARDIS team of the 7th Doctor, 'Space' Ace and Professor Bernice Summerfield. I have to say I wasn't an avid reader of the range - when it came out I was 11 - 17 and wasn't interested in reading a monthly series. I'd read one when I was in the mood for a 7th Doctor read and was reading the missing adventures due to the variations of Doctor. Up to this point in life I've read about twenty of them and am rather fond of them. This is the first time that I've heard Lisa Bowerman play Bernice and she absolutely nails her, 'Space' Ace is fun and we get a good presentation of the NA Doctor. Sylvester McCoy himself noticed differences in character, this shows the fun aspect of The Doctor that the NAs sometimes forgot, he's The Doctor, he has everything planned and mapped out and of course its about to go wrong. This is such a human story in that the listener cares about characters we have only just been introduced to which is a must as the titular Scourge have such an affect on humans. We also get a rare look inside The Doctors head - much like we did in the NAs with a woderful collection of scenes including a memorable moment where Bernice gets a look at a future incarnation and the scene with the lost memory is a highlight of the range. The strength of this story is that it takes the all powerful all knowing NA Doctor and makes him vulnerable. This is everything I wanted from an NA on audio including the depth, emotion and able to go deep on original one off characters.

3. Spare Parts, I'm going to tell a story at this point about how I listened to this story. Neverland - the preceding story in the range came out the month I left University and obviously I had a lot going on at the time meaning I stopped buying the releases as they came out as I looked to see where I was going to in life. This meant I became slightly easier to buy for at Christmas as my sister looked up what release I was up to and bought me one for Christmas. After a bit of a break and ending on a cliff hanger I played this story blind without seeing the cover or knowing anything about it and was promptly blown away. Big Finish has never been afraid of continuity weather starting afresh, ignoring it or embracing it - this story is steeped in lore from the series. Essentially this story is 'Genesis of The Cybermen' something the series hadn't got around to doing at the time and now including this story its done three times. With this being a 5th Doctor story the shadow of Adric hangs over the story and adds an extra element to proceedings. This is a tragedy where the majority of listeners going in know how the story will end and it still works. The play even manages to throw in a few surprises - at one point it looks like The Doctor has been converted! The main strength of this story is seeing how world changing events happen through the eyes of the Hartley family, a route that TV Doctor Who would go down years later.    Without doubt this play is a bleak triumph.

2. Bang-Bang-a-Boom, yes a story set during season 24 is the second in this ranking! This is the odd one out of my top five, its a comedy, Deep Space Nine / Babylon 5 pastiche, murder mystery set during the future version of the Eurovision Song Contest. The jokes are fantastic, the mystery is brilliant and theres even a nice nod to Terry Wogan. A lot of the entries near the top end are along the darker aspects of Doctor Who but this is high camp fun at its best. I'm going to refrain from going into a deep dive on this one though due to the fact its a mystery and that its become a troublesome release as its co-written by a transphobe. There are plenty of other entries on this blog where I tackle transphobia and I'd like to keep these entries in the fun category.

1. The Holy Terror, in life you reach a moment where your fandom is there for you - and this was the time Doctor Who was there for me. We've taken another sidestep here, not into the books but into the comics as we get the team up of the 6th Doctor and the shape changing penguin Frobisher. Its not a part of cannon I'm familiar with and cards on the table I was considering skipping this release until I heard the trailer at the end of the previous release and thought it sounded fun - which it is. This play is without doubt the funniest Big Finish have released however as we've seen in this ranking as with a lot of other plays in my top ten it has a dual nature. What starts out as a camp comedy in an isolated castle takes a turn as The Doctor realises something isn't right and starts investigating. Of all places for the plot to go we venture into child violation - typing this out twenty years later its still an uneasy thing to admit to. The play turns on its head we've set up a lovely bunch of stereotypical characters - one of the things that sets The Doctor off on his investigations - who are ripped to bits following this. Its a melancholic version of a family who try to keep going after a tragedy but are unable to, something else that echoes this is that somewhere along the play the jokes stop and when you realise its a sledgehammer to the heart moment. This play is not only the top of Big Finishes first 100 main range releases, sometimes its my favourite Doctor Who story battling it out my favourite TV stories and books.

Heroes - Parasite

 After last weeks intimate episode we have an all encompassing spiralling episode we're most if not all of the characters are in action. The good thing about spending an episode concentrating on a character is when you bring all of the others out they feel fresh and thats the best way to describe this episode fresh. We are able to pick up where we left some characters and for some its a case of "oh I forgot THAT was happening!"

Bennet feels different after last episode, he's gone from being a peripheral figure seen from other characters point of view to being more dynamic and intriguing now we know he has a stake in the events. 

Mohinder and Sylers plot is unsatisfying, the detective work has been done off screen. What we see is good but we needed to see the road that got them here. Very good cliff hanger though.

Hiro reaches the end of his mini arc, hooks back up with Ando in a punch the air moment and looks like he's being thrust into his next arc. All good and he's still the headline character for me.

Nathan has a lot to do, hooking up with a number of characters and he finally gets to confront Linderman in a memorable scene. Malcolm McDowell can command a scene from inside a sack under sea and he's a wonderful addition to the cast.

Isaac goes back to the heroin after shooting Simone and paints his fate which we've known since episode one. After getting to know him it feels different this time - it matters.

There is so much going on in this episode, a number of revelations, a number of characters in intriguing situations and still new characters being added to the mix. A full busy episode that gets a 9/10 from me due to a combination of well placed plots setting different characters up for future episodes.

Big Finish Monthly Ranked 10-6

Good afternoon lady and gentle readers, recently it was Big Finishes 21st anniversary of releasing Doctor Who output. Blimey 21 years, what better way to celebrate than with a list and for your pleasure I have ranked the first 100 releases of The Big Finish monthly range. This is the second round of the rankings taking from 10-6. As usual beware spoilers and enjoy!

10. The Fearmonger, we go into the top ten with the first proper 7th Doctor story in which he is accompanied by Ace. So much of why this story is so high is due to the feel of this story, in which we had to wait an agonising six months for after Sirens of Time came out. I haven't mentioned it very much in these blogs but so much of what Big Finish does best is the sound design - making a story sound like it came from the era its set in. If you were to ask me what release in this ranking list sounded the most like a TV story from the era I say "The Fearmonger" every time. It genuinely sounds like it could have come from season 27 while also having the feel of a very early NA. Its moody and atmospheric in a way the TV show could never be. Added to this we have an engaging political plot, a good guest turn by Jacqueline Pearce off of Blakes Seven and is doing interesting things with the audio medium.

9. The Church and the Crown, without doubt this story if the best romp in this list. The 5th Doctor, Peri and Erimem land in 1626 and its essentially Doctor Who does the Musketeers. It is utter fun, full of witty lines, fun characters and a few eyebrow raising moments. The mission statement for this story must have been "FUN" as its so high in my list due to the enjoyment level. Peter in particular sounds like he's having a whale of a time, even when the plot kicks in theres an element of fun and Peter remains as breathy as he did during season 19. I refuse to put it any lower and sometimes being a good straightforward is enough to score high.

8. Arrangements For War, we're back in wandering into unexpected areas territory as we get an intimate love story nestled inside a war story. Its the 6th Doctor and Evelyn in a story that is pivotal to Evelyns overall story. Its both one of the smallest scale stories as well as feeling like an epic. This is a proper weepy, one for valentines day a story that will take your hart rip it to shreds and then put it back together again. Both The Doctor and Evelyn go on an emotional journey during this story with neither exiting the same as they entered. Going back to how I said it was pivotal to Evelyns overall arc neither character exit this story the same way they entered it. 

7. The Pirates, this is going to be one of the hardest stories to sum up - on one hand its Doctor Who doing Mills & Boon with pirates and on the other hand its Doctor Who ripping your heart to pieces. This is one of the most emotional stories Big Finish have done while at the same time it has a singing Bill Oddie in it. This is a deep dive of emotions while being disguised as a romp, I love it when stories are working on multiple levels and the first time I heard this story it absolutely ruined me. An amazing story but a hard one to revisit.

6. The Kingmaker, its the 5th Doctor, Peri and Erimem in a witty romp that is also a whodunnit a whatdunnit, a history lesson and a morality lesson. Again this story is utter fun and packed with witty gun dialogue. However there is a lot going on, as opposed to a contract being taken out on The Doctor instead he has a writing deadline looming and what should be a fact finding trip to finish his book turns into four episodes of shenanigans and silly buggers that are a joy. There is twist after twist, revelation after revelation and a string of unexpected (off screen and on screen) cameos. Again we're working on multiple levels as when the jokes and revelations hit the stories asking the listener questions that linger long after the disc ends.

Thank you for reading and the top five will be published in the coming weeks.

Heroes - Company Man

After a Christmas break its back to season one of Heroes picking up exactly where we left off as Matt Parkman and Ted Sprague break into the Bennet household in search of answers. We see the scene we ended on last time from the opposing characters point of view. From this point onwards we get a tight intricate character study of Noah Bennet. Its astounding that I have no memory of this episode as its quite simply one of the best. Also I'm wandering into "bad fan" territory as I'd forgotten that Eric Roberts made an appearance - sharing two scenes with Christopher Eccleston giving us a mini Doctor Who and the Master confrontation.

The meat and bones of this story is the writing team singling out one character and doing a deep dive on them. In this case its Noah Bennet, we are told his back story in flashbacks and the episode sends him on a journey with a hart breaking ending. Even before the end of this episode I was looking at Noah differently and considering he's a major player on the show the ending has far reaching consequences for everyone. Everyone involved in this episode is on their A game and I hope somebody won something from this episode be it director or cast. 10/10 and without doubt this was a classic.

Big Finish Monthly Ranked 15-11

Good afternoon lady and gentle readers, recently it was Big Finishes 21st anniversary of releasing Doctor Who output. Blimey 21 years, what better way to celebrate than with a list and for your pleasure I have ranked the first 100 releases of The Big Finish monthly range. This is the second round of the rankings taking from 15-11. As usual beware spoilers and enjoy!

15. Thicker Than Water, we're wondering into areas that I never expected Big Finish to go into here. Its an emotional story as Sixy decides to take Mel to see Evelyn and we see how and what she got up to after leaving The Doctor. Its an emotional story and an integral part of a story line throughout the main range. We get a cameo from a character who should be year and its in character that they are here. This feels like a loving bow out from Maggie Stables and at the time of writing I am reaching release number 120 and have no idea if I'll ever hear her again. Cudos to Big Finish for making me care about her.

14. Minuet in Hell, the final story in the 8th Doctors first season. Many people find this story annoying and stupid where I find it daft as a brush and bonkers. The Brigadier gets to meet the 8th Doctor and the crazyness with Gideon Crane is my kind of dark psychological horror. Daft and silly but I like it.

13. The Genocide Machine, the first appearance by the Daleks taking on the 7th Doctor and Ace in the opening part of The Dalek Empire arc. Its a lovely romp that starts with the Doctor returning some library books and escalates to the Daleks trying to take over one of the biggest repositories of knowledge in the universe. The Daleks appearing is just magic and this is the story I think of (ahead of the TV stories) when I imagine the sound design.

12. Loups-Garoux, as I said earlier in this list Mark Strickson turns up so infrequently as Turlough it still feels like a novelty when he does. Big Finish get Turlough, he's a fantastic character but a rubbish companion. Here we have a story featuring werewolves and having a companion whose first instinct is to run and lock themselves away in the TARDIS adds so much to the story. Rather than horror this release scores high because of its presentation of Brazil, the werewolf community and Peter Davison who after taking a while to get into the swing of things is in fine form.

11. The Marian Conspiracy, here we have it the origin story of Evelyn. What a fantastic character and what a fantastic performance by Maggie Stables. Those early scenes where she meets the 6th Doctor are pure magical and this is the first step of Colin Baker taking the Sixth Doctor in the direction he didn't get to go on TV. The initial mystery of what is happening to Evelyn and the journey back to the time of Queen Mary are intriguing. More importantly this is Big Finishes first deep dive into the past, they'd tip toed around historical stories before but this is the first time they flex their muscles. Without this story the range becomes more limited and we don't get a number of my favourite stories as well as at least one yet to come in this list.

Big Finish Monthly Range Ranked: 20-16

 Good afternoon lady and gentle readers, recently it was Big Finishes 21st anniversary of releasing Doctor Who output. Blimey 21 years, what better way to celebrate than with a list and for your pleasure I have ranked the first 100 releases of The Big Finish monthly range. This is the second round of the rankings taking from 20-16. As usual beware spoilers and enjoy!

20. Omega, its the 5th Doctors entry into the villain trilogy in the build up to Zagreus with this being my favourite entry in the trilogy. Omega is one of those characters that have a lot of story in them and hasn't  been used much over the years so its quite the treat when he does come up. Apart from his two televised stories this is the first time I've come across him and I'm happy to say there is a trend of leaving Omega in a more interesting place than when we found him. I love this story, its playing games with the listener - bait and switch on multiple occasions. We're constantly on the back foot, where are we, how did we get here, is this really the right time to be referencing Talking Heads? Certain information we get during this story is wrong, which we work out fairly early on but the crux of the story is why its wrong. Up until the end of episode three nothing makes sense and then something happens that changes the nature of this play. On top of that we still have a quarter of the action to go and the story is still developing. There is a lot going on in this entry, I'd recommend watching the two Omega TV stories before listening. If you don't you'll get nothing from this story, if you do you get a heck of a play with very good re-listen value.

19. Colditz, Nazis the old Doctor Who metaphor, until we get to the seventh Doctor era where they started popping up on a regular basis. Its the 7th Doctor and Ace going up against Nazis but this time on their own territory in their own time in Colditz ****ing Castle! Full of references to the TV series and board game this part of the story is at times ripping yarns and harrowing. But wait theres more! Theres a timey wimey plot as well! We get the introduction of Elizabeth Klein and she's got about as many secrets as the 7th Doctor usually has. We have a multi layered play full of novelty value for an early appearance of David Tenant, of interest for introducing Klein and a tight intriguing play in its own right.

18. Flip-Flop, if you asked me to name one writer I've encountered in Doctor Who spinoff that I'd like to see go on to bigger and better things (who hasn't all ready) it would be Jonathan Morris. I first came across him with the book Festival of Death and since then his stuff has a high hit rate with me. This story is from the experimental stage that Big Finish went through in 2003 and sees the 7th Doctor and Mel in a story where the two discs can be listened to in either order. The play is absolutely nailed to the plot with no moment to breathe but personally I love this aspect. I've heard this story on multiple occasions in both orders and the story still works. Its a proper bonkers timey wimey comedy as opposed to the timey wimey serious story that was the previous entry. The story doesn't come with first or second discs it comes with black and white discs. Amazingly if you listen to the black disc first its a much darker story. recommended Highly!

17. Creatures of Beauty, its another 2003 experimental story this time with the 5th Doctor and Nyssa. Its also slightly timey wimey as the story is told out of order offering more multi listen value. We start the story about two thirds through and spend the majority of the play filling in the gaps and seeing events from multiple angles. Its very interesting and a play that feels like its developing more as we go through. The reason this play is so high in my personal rankings is because of the ending, let me clarify that when I say the ending I don't mean the final act or episode I mean the final few seconds of the play. Up until those moments on the first listen I had this down as a good decent story but the final seconds hold a twist that I didn't see coming and caused this play to sky rocket in my estimations.

16. Zagreus, the 50th story in the range and the 40th anniversary (along with the preceding Villains trilogy) story! After a wait of eighteen months since the last 8th Doctor story (eight years for me due to falling behind) and that cliff hanger that it ended on we finally made it! This is a proper epic story, three discs long and strap yourselves in its going to be a long ride. I know there are aspects that fandom doesn't like but I love it. Its one of my most re-listened to stories, Jon Pertwees unexpected appearance is so emotional, Nicholas Courtneys role is lovely and I love the assorted regulars from previous eras playing different parts. Theres a good slab of continuity as series regulars & unexpected friends turn up as spin offs are launched and we're plunged into the divergent arc. A story that looks backwards as well as forwards, a story with an eight year build that for me was ultimately worth it.

Heroes - Unexpected

 Blimey when did Matt Parkman become an engaging character? I know it was in the previous episode but does anybody have the timestamp down to the mini-second? After a rut we are in the thrust of some dynamic episodes, there is no wasted space and every scene is jam packed - just when you think things can't can any better Stan Lee turns up.

This is what the series does best, taking characters with different motivations and throwing them into situations then going with whatever sticks. We have the full range of emotions crammed into 40 minutes of TV. The only downside of this episodes is there are a few characters put in jeopardy that its hard to care about as they haven't been fleshed out enough, namely Simone and Sandra. In particular this episode I enjoyed Mohinder and Sylers mission - and screaming at Mohinder to start noticing the blatant signs about Syler.

We have a new character added to the mix this week in the shape of Hana Gitelman who appears to be based on the X-man Sage. She essentially puts together a mini field team for a mission in a nice homage to the X-men, setting up the cliffhanger and the promise of another intriguing episode next week. On another note I hope Ando hasn't been written out as his double act with Hiro is one of the best things in the series, 9/10.