We have one of my earliest experiences with Big Finish in Master. As I mentioned previously with the Davros audio from the Sixth Doctor, Big Finish made a trilogy of audios to celebrate the 40^th anniversary where Doctors Five, Six and Seven were paired up with an individual villain in a story that focuses more being a character piece for said villain. In this case we have the Seventh Doctor facing the Master in a very unconventional story that draws a lot of influence from the famous Seventh Doctor novel Human Nature (though most fans will be more familiar with the Tenth Doctor episode of the same name).

Dr John Smith has been a resident of Perfugium for ten years after stumbling into a hostel with no memory of who he was and no indication of what once he had been other than his physical disfigurement. On the night he considers his birthday, exactly ten years after his arrival, he invites his two closest friends for dinner, to take their minds off his mysterious past and the fact the town is plagued by a wave of murders. But the night is about to become much darker as an old curse looms over the house, something evil stalks the corridors and from the storm comes a strange man who knows John Smith’s true identity and has come to kill him.

This story is sort of a mix between Human Nature (both novel and episode) and Utopia from Series 3 where the Master has spent a decade living as a kind and gentle person but is troubled by thoughts buried deep in his mind of what sort of person he used to be. Geoffrey Beevers puts in his finest work in what I can honestly say is my favourite Master story. It delves into the Master’s beginnings with his childhood and that first act to start him down his dark path. Or so it seems at first as the climax features a shocking twist that paints the Doctor in a grimmer light. Master is much more psychological and introspective than most Doctor Who stories, the vast majority of the story is less on plot and more on discussions between characters on what makes a killer who they are, what can drive someone to perform acts of evil, whether it is through their own choice or something else at work. It’s not a cheerful story and it has one massive downer of an ending but that’s sort of the point and what makes the Master such a tragic villain and how things could’ve been between him and the Doctor. If you’re a fan of the Master, then this is a must listen.