Doctor Who Review: ‘Classic Doctors, New Monsters Volume 2: Night of the Vashta Nerada’
By James Aggas
In the first story of new box set ‘Classic Doctors, New Monsters Volume 2’, the Fourth Doctor encounters an old enemy for the first time, in ‘Night of the Vashta Nerada’.
Volume 2 of Classic Doctors, New Monsters has finally been released! Volume 1 was a popular mixture of Classic Series Doctors encountering monsters from the New Series. Each Doctor would encounter a different monster separately in four stand-alone stories. Unlike other audio box sets that Big Finish usually make, there was no real “arc”, only the titular theme linking the stories. Volume 2 mostly continues that approach, although the first and last episodes are linked.
Because the stories are all so different, I’ll be reviewing them individually. Starting with the first episode, Night of the Vashta Nerada, featuring Tom Baker as the Fourth Doctor.
The Vashta Nerada originally appeared on-screen in Tenth Doctor two-part story, Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead. As a predator of darkness and shadow, they’re a particularly visual monster. So it was interesting to discover just how well they worked on audio. How was their first audio episode?
Overall, I’d say it worked really well. There’s a lot that I really liked about Night of the Vashta Nerada. One thing I particularly enjoyed was how well the story seemed to suit Tom Baker’s Doctor. Particularly during his first three seasons of the show, as produced by Philip Hinchcliffe.
Considered to be something of a golden age for the show, the stories of this period were very dark and horrific with a lot of violence. (It has to be said, along with Hinchcliffe, we also have script editor Robert Holmes to thank for that.) So a monster that can eat someone alive in mere seconds is perfect for this Doctor.
A strong team of characters
Another thing the era could be noted for was how memorable the characters/victims could be. And you get that with the team that arrives on the planet Funworld. Sent down on the planet to look for the missing crew to the world’s new theme park, all of the members have very distinct personalities.
There’s the leader of the group, Amanda Steele, who always enjoys a great hunt. There’s the owner of the planet, Georgia Donnelly, who’s only interest is to get her fun fair planet open and running for business. And then there’s Phelan, the psychic of the group. She comes the closest to acting like a companion to Baker’s Doctor, who at this point is travelling alone. All distinctive characters were written and performed in a way that matched the Hinchcliffe era, so I really appreciated that.
First encounters
What I also really appreciated about Night of the Vashta Nerada however is how clearly it establishes that the Doctor has never really encountered anything like this before. As much as I enjoyed the first volume of Classic Doctors, New Monsters, one slight problem that I had with it was that none of that box set’s stories felt like first meetings. The Weeping Angels, the Judoon, the Sycorax – the Doctor seemed to be very familiar and knowledgeable about all of them already.
It wasn’t like when I originally started watching the Classic Series, when the Doctor would encounter dangerous enemies for the first time. The Cybermen in The Tenth Planet. Davros in Genesis of the Daleks. The Daleks in, well, The Daleks. All of these stories gave me a little thrill when the Doctor encountered old enemies for the very first time. Especially when he was far less familiar with them, and as a result was in arguably more danger than in later stories, when he would at least have some idea of what to expect.
What’s great about this story is seeing the Doctor trying to work out what’s going on. In Silence in the Library, it takes Ten a while to have his suspicions or fears confirmed, but he knows enough to be afraid of the darkness and the shadows very, very quickly. He also knows about little tricks the Vashta Nerada use, like attaching themselves to someone as a second shadow. However, that didn’t stop him from finding out about some of their new tricks along the way.
Less is more
And that was something else I enjoyed about this Classic Doctors, New Monsters story – it avoids using too much from their original TV appearance. Some of the most memorable parts about the Vashta Nerada on TV were the walking skeletons and “Hey, who turned out the lights?!”. And I can imagine it being all too tempting for some writers to try to repeat the exact same success, even if takes really contrived writing to do it.
Thankfully, writer John Dorney avoids all of that. There are no walking skeletons that repeat sentences over and over again in Night of the Vashta Nerada. Instead, it’s a relatively straightforward horror that focuses on the Doctor learning about the Vashta Nerada for the first time, at least, as a very dangerous monster. At its best, it feels like Night of the Vashta Nerada is the original story, and Silence in the Library is the sequel that builds on it, and that’s exactly what you want from a box set like Classic Doctors, New Monsters.
Night of the Vashta Nerada is a magnificent start to Classic Doctors, New Monsters Volume 2. By keeping it straightforward, Dorney is able to tell us a story that focuses on the characters and the horror. For fans of the Hinchcliffe era, this is worth the price of the box set alone.
Next: Review: Eighth Doctor audio ‘The Girl Who Never Was’