We have a very special release, one that marked the return of a long forgotten range in Big Finish after over seven years, the Novel Adaptations. As the name suggests this was Big Finish giving full cast adaptations from Doctor Who’s vast library of novels. You’d think this would be a successful long lasting series given Doctor Who’s goldmine of novels just waiting for a full cast adaptation, but surprisingly the series only managed 11 releases and was discontinued in 2016. The main issue cited was poor sales, I also think licensing played a factor as some of the releases had to make drastic changes and omissions with certain characters due to rights issues. But as far as the poor sales argument goes, I think the reason behind that was for one thing most of the novels adapted just weren’t the interesting ones that people were just clamouring for, and another was there wasn’t enough variety. You have the whole Doctor Who literary library to choose from and yet the vast amount of releases focused on the Seventh Doctor, you just don’t really have that much excitement towards future releases and the unpredictability of which Doctor’s gonna be next when the series kind of falls into a holding pattern with one Doctor. So after seven years, Big Finish announced a one off return with the Fifth Doctor’s Goth Opera. I’ve not read the original so I can’t speak for how much is faithfully adapted and what’s changed but regardless of how the novel is, this was an outstanding release.

You know you’re in for something special when the story opens with a disclaimer that it features adult content not suitable for younger listeners, that’s always what they use for their Torchwood releases. Though having said that, it’s really not that inappropriate, nothing that’s any worse than early 2000s Big Finish, it’s just more violent compared to most recent Big Finish audios and as you can guess from the monsters featured, very bloody. The Doctor, Nyssa and Tegan are pulled into a nightmarish plot concocted by the ancient enemy of the Doctor’s people, the vampires who have begun to mass following the resurrection of their great leader, all thanks to the assistance of a Time Lord from the Doctor’s past who plans to build an army. But this ordeal grows darker yet as Nyssa has fallen victim to the vampire’s terrible bite and will soon be joining their ranks.

This is a real treat of a story that dives deep into the lore behind the Vampires and their connection to Time Lord history, including a prologue from Rassilon himself voiced by Richard Armitage (Thorin Oakenshield from The Hobbit trilogy) and the inner fanboy in me gave a little squee at the mention of the Other, one of the three founding fathers of Time Lord society alongside Rassilon and Omega and the Time Lord the Doctor’s a reincarnation of (it’s a long story….literally). Goth Opera, however much it adapts or changes from the original novel, embraces the novel canon rather than tiptoeing around it like previous novel adaptations. People always think of Doctor Who as being that show that died in 1989, had a quick comeback in 1996, then properly came back in 2005 and nothing significant happened in all the years in between, when you couldn’t be further from the truth. What Doctor Who lost onscreen it gained tenfold in books, audio and even comics, with the novels completely rewriting everything we thought we knew about the Doctor’s history creating such a rich and interesting lore that this adaptation offers a little taste of, even down to mentioning the names of the Doctor’s childhood friends from his group the Deca; Ushas, Mortimus and Koschei aka the Rani, the Monk and the Master!

But this is more than just giving fan service to the novel canon fanboys, this is just a thrilling story with some fantastic performances and really brings out some of Sarah Sutton’s best work as Nyssa.

I really hope this isn’t a “one off” release as Big Finish insisted on, especially given how well received it’s been since release. If Big Finish revive this series with more variety in which Doctors to use, especially now with access to the Modern Who Doctors, and also go with novels that would really get people excited, I think there’s a lot of mileage they can get out of this series.