Doctor Who Review: Sixth Doctor audio ‘Return of the Krotons’
By James Aggas
The Sixth Doctor and Charley face an old enemy in Doctor Who: ‘Return of the Krotons’!
Following on from my review of The Red House, Return of the Krotons is another unusual story. Originally released exclusively as a bonus story for subscribers of the regular CDs, the story is approximately an hour long. As such, it’s half the length of your standard Classic Who release from Big Finish.
It does pack in a lot during that time. Unsurprising, considering how much of an incentive it needed to have to attract regular listeners into purchasing it.
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The most obvious incentive, for fans of the Classic Series, was the title itself. Originally appearing in 1968 in Second Doctor story The Krotons, the titular monsters hadn’t made an appearance since. So it was interesting to bring them back in 2008 with a different Doctor and companion, forty years later. How well does it work as a sequel story?
Quite well, overall. What helps is that it avoids the mistake that many sequels make and it doesn’t just repeat the original story. It takes a good long while for the Krotons to show up, but this actually helps the story, in some ways. One reason is that it allows for a lot of build-up, as the Doctor starts to work out more and more of what’s going on.
The other reason is that, as villains themselves, there’s very little that helps the Krotons to stand out. They come across as a rather basic Doctor Who monster, out to enslave and conquer humanity. They’re not a weak monster, but they’re not a particularly strong one, either. Listening to them, it becomes slowly obvious why they didn’t make a return appearance in the series.
Fortunately, writer Nicholas Briggs helps to balance this out by including a good mix of high stakes and rather personal drama. Particularly for the Sixth Doctor and Charley.
Six and Charley
I’ve mentioned before how much I’ve enjoyed listening to this pairing, and that continues to be the case in Return of the Krotons. After several adventures together, the two have very clearly established a strong bond. It’s a bond that the Sixth Doctor seems keen to deny, especially as he still can’t fully trust her. But there’s a lot of great dialogue between them throughout the story, and it’s a joy to hear.
Of course, it wouldn’t be a Sixth Doctor and Charley story without the former being given another reason to be suspicious of the latter. Return of the Krotons is no exception. There are a few moments when Charley makes a few small slips and reveals more knowledge than she should be aware of.
But the real highlight of the story comes from a great moral conversation that the two share. There’s a moment when the Doctor seems to be ready to surrender to the Krotons. Charley, on the other hand, strongly suggests that the Doctor should allow not just herself but many other humans to die, so that far more could live.
It’s a wonderful conversation that highlights a lot about both characters. In particular, how pragmatic Charley has grown to be over her many travels with the Doctor. And how strongly moral and even idealistic the Sixth Doctor is. This latter reason is something I’m rather fond of, as it’s one of my favorite character traits of the Sixth Doctor, particularly.
Veteran actor
One more reason I enjoyed this story? Philip Madoc. A veteran actor from the Classic Series, he played two rather memorable roles. The first was the War Lord in The War Games (which I reviewed last year). The second was Dr. Solon in The Brain of Morbius (one that I shall be reviewing very soon for Halloween). In both stories, he gave fantastic performances, and that’s very true in Return of the Krotons. It was great to hear him play another interesting villain with his wonderfully deep voice for Big Finish.
Return of the Krotons is not without its problems. This is partly due to the fact that the Krotons are arguably not a very strong monster. But on the whole, it’s an enjoyable story that avoids simply retelling the original, and has some excellent performances with great drama.
It also very nicely leads into the next story for the Sixth Doctor and Charley, and that’s when things really start to shake up…
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