Doctor Who overview: Bernice Summerfield: Series 1 is a fascinating early glimpse of Big Finish

The first series of Bernice Summerfield features a wide variety of stories and showed off exactly what Big Finish was capable of, even before they started releasing Doctor Who audios. But how well does it work overall?

At the very end of August earlier this year, Big Finish made an exciting announcement: the first four series of Bernice Summerfield were finally available on download. For fans of the adventuring archaeologist like myself, this was huge news. Especially since some of Big Finish’s earliest releases – before they had even started making Doctor Who audios – had become more widely available.

I’ve become a big fan of the character in recent years, particularly her own range of Doctor Who box sets The New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield. So I had been eager to listen to her earliest series for a while. But, as a fan living in North America, the higher costs of both CDs and international shipping proved to be rather off-putting. So the new download option is definitely a huge relief.

But how was the first series of Bernice Summerfield overall? Does it still hold up over two decades later? And was the idea of beginning with novel adaptations rather than original stories a good one? Especially since some of the novels used were originally Doctor Who stories? Let’s take a look.

Just War stands out as the highlight of the series.

Image courtesy Big Finish Productions

Casting and writing

The first thing that stands out about Benny’s first series: Lisa Bowerman. The casting there is absolutely fantastic. She doesn’t take time to settle into the role – from the very beginning, she is Benny. She portrays the character with not just the intelligence and the authority that her role requires, but also the vulnerability and humanity that made the character so relatable in the first place.

I also need to give a lot of credit to Jacqueline Rayner, who had the real challenge of adapting five out of the six stories to audio. (Original author Matt Jones adapted his novel Beyond the Sun.) Rayner’s great at getting across the key plot points while still leaving plenty of room for character focus and development. (The only exception to this was Dragons’ Wrath, and that’s the only story in this series with a single disc release instead of two, so she was never going to be successful l with that one.)

The first series has a great mix of stories that work extremely well at introducing Bernice and the different kinds of adventures she has. Oh No It Isn’t! is just amazing simply for how completely and utterly bonkers it is. (Doctor Who veteran Nicholas Courtney plays Benny’s cat, which should give you a good idea.) Beyond the Sun explores some interesting themes and questions of what it means to be free. Walking to Babylon is a decent pseudo-historical that sets up the Time Ring trilogy. Birthright tells a large-scale story across time zones that works well, even if it is a little standard.

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Highlight

But the best story of the series – and one of the most challenging stories I’ve listened to from Big Finish – is easily Just War. A story that explores the Nazi occupation of Guernsey in 1941, this is a story that puts Bernice through hell, particularly when she finds herself a prisoner of the Nazis. It’s a tough listen, but in all the right ways, and shows exactly how professional Big Finish was even at the beginning.

So it’s such a shame that the final story of the series, Dragons’ Wrath, almost shows the opposite of that. It’s not necessarily a bad story, but it does suffer from having so much of its plot removed, far more than the rest of the adaptations. Even worse is that the post-production on this release fails to live up to the high standard set by the earlier releases. Overall, it’s a disappointing way for Bernice’s first series to end.

Still, that doesn’t take away from the fact that the first series is rather impressive overall. Particularly when you consider the first four stories were released before Big Finish’s first-ever Doctor Who audios. Getting to hear some of the company’s earliest work has been truly fascinating to discover. More than that – it’s been a lot of fun getting to hear the earliest audio adventures of Bernice herself – particularly when Lisa Bowerman was completely excellent in the role from the very beginning.

Have you listened to Bernice’s earliest adventures? Were you there at the beginning of both the series and Big Finish? Do you think her earliest stories still hold up over two decades later? Let us know in the comments below.