Doctor Who: The Early Adventures – Recreating an era

For the past few years, we’ve been given many great stories from the Doctor Who audio range The Early Adventures. But what exactly is it that makes them so successful?

(Photo credit: Doctor Who/Big Finish Productions.

Image obtained from: Big Finish Productions.)

The Sixties era of Doctor Who comes alive once more in The Early Adventures. But what makes it such a special series, and how does it recapture that magic?

In 2014, after the established success of The Companion Chronicles, Big Finish began an exciting new range that more or less spun off from that. Doctor Who: The Early Adventures was a series designed to tell stories set during the eras of the first two Doctors.

But what made these stories stand out for fans of the Classic Series, especially when compared to The Companion Chronicles? After all, The Companion Chronicles had been giving fans plenty of great Doctor Who stories set during the First and Second Doctor’s eras for many years. So what made The Early Adventures stand out?

Well for one thing, there was the full-cast aspect. While The Companion Chronicles usually had just two or three cast members at most, The Early Adventures allowed for far more guest actors to feature in these stories. At four episodes told across two hours, stories in The Early Adventures are usually twice as long as those in The Companion Chronicles.

Unsurprisingly, this changed the way these stories were told. Like The Companion Chronicles, The Early Adventures also feature narration. However, this is used considerably less than in the earlier range, and is told in the third-person rather than in the first.

This also changes the perspective of when the story is told, too. For example, in many of The Companion Chronicles, the main story is told in a surrounding narrative that’s set much later, with the companion looking back on what happened and telling it to someone else.

In the case of The Early Adventures however, the perspective is always “present”. While these may be set in eras of the series originally made decades ago, there’s no one looking back on these stories, and the action and drama is made to feel as if it’s happening right now.

The Dalek Occupation of Winter is an excellent Dalek story, and just one of several strong stories from last year’s season of The Early Adventures.

(Image credit: Doctor Who/Big Finish Productions.

Image obtained from: Big Finish Productions.)

Authentic yet fresh

Well, I say “right now”. But one thing that The Early Adventures achieves very easily is a feeling of authenticity. The very style and the pacing of the stories fits the style of their eras perfectly.

It’s not that none of them are told from a more modern perspective. For example, companions might be explored in ways that perhaps wouldn’t have been done on television at the time. But the writers know how to get the balance between adding something fresh and telling stories that are true to these eras. They know what the fans want, and they make sure to give them that, while also offering something more.

And personally, that’s what I enjoy most about The Early Adventures – the authenticity. All the stories told feel authentic to their era, to the point where they almost sound like the surviving soundtracks of lost TV episodes. The writing, the music, the sound design – it all helps to make these stories feel true to the eras that they’re a tribute to.

And this has remained even more true as the series has gone on and grown more confidant. Initially, each season of the range featured stories that were spread out across a Doctor’s era. The same Doctor would feature in all of the season’s adventures, but different companions and teams would feature in each story, giving us a broad glimpse of that Doctor’s era.

However, last year, the fifth season of The Early Adventures did something just a little different by focusing on just one TARDIS team: the First Doctor, Vicki and Steven. Even better, the stories were consecutive not just in release order, but chronologically too, with each story ending on a cliffhanger that lead directly into the next one. This was something that many of the early Sixties stories did, so this was a nice touch.

One story that fans can look forward to later this month is Daughter of the Gods, where Peter Purves’s First Doctor meets Frazer Hines’s Second!

(Photo credit: Doctor Who/Big Finish Productions.

Image obtained from: Big Finish Productions.)

More to come

Of course, if there’s one thing that I really love about The Early Adventures, it’s the excellent performances of William Russell, Peter Purves and Frazer Hines. Not just as the companions that they originally played, but also as their Doctors, too. They all get the vocal mannerisms of William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton exactly right, and it’s always impressive to hear. I’ve mentioned this before when examining The Companion Chronicles, but The Early Adventures features it to an even greater extent, and it works brilliantly well.

More from Winter is Coming

• For All Mankind finally gives us information in Episode 405, “Goldilocks”
• Watch a stunning VFX breakdown of The Wheel of Time season 2
• Of course Steve Toussaint (Corlys Velaryon) thinks Eve Best (Rhaenys Targaryen) should rule Westeros
• Confirmed: The Last of Us season 2 will air in 2025
• Final season of Star Trek: Discovery will have “a lot of action, a lot of adventure, a lot of fun”

Later this month, we have two new Early Adventures to look forward to. Sadly, these will be the only stories in the range that we’ll be getting this year, but they’re both extremely exciting. In The Home Guard, the Second Doctor, Ben, Polly and Jamie face the First Master, as played by James Dreyfus (previously heard in The Destination Wars from The First Doctor Adventures). I’ve been eager to hear more of this particular incarnation and his early confrontations with the Doctor, so this should be a real treat.

The other story that we can look forward to is even bigger. Daughter of the Gods reveals what happens when the Second Doctor arrives during an adventure of his previous incarnation. With Peter Purves playing the First Doctor and Frazer Hines playing the Second – as well as their original roles, of course – this looks set to be an extremely exciting adventure. Especially as it features a companion who should be dead…

The Early Adventures aren’t exactly as experimental as The Companion Chronicles, but they’re certainly just as enjoyable. Giving us so many great stories and excellent performances, these are perfect for fans of the show’s monochrome years.

Are you a fan of The Early Adventures? Or even of the original Sixties era of Doctor Who? What did you enjoy most about it? Which Doctor do you prefer out of the first two? Let us know in the comments below.