The Monthly Adventures #052 - “Scherzo" by Robert Shearman

Sometimes it annoys me how good of a writer Robert Shearman is. Sometimes it annoys me that he takes half of my top five Doctor Who stories ever. Sometimes it annoys me how, time and time again, he manages to do what other writers can not, and create some of the most unique, most exhilarating, most creatively rich, beautiful, scary and impactful stories ever, and all through the medium of a silly little sci-fi show that was more good than it theoretically should’ve been. And it annoys me because how could anybody else ever match up to him. I don’t know. The Chimes of Midnight sits comfortably at my number one favourite DW story ever, but the more I think about Scherzo, the more I consider it a tie. Scherzo is unlike any story I have ever had the pleasure to experience, and for that, I must praise it.

The Doctor and Charley have become lost. Trapped in a new universe, blinded by never-ending white, can they overcome their differences and survive? Or will they rip each other apart?

(CONTAINS SPOILERS)

I love a horror story. Not the sort of horror that’s all blood and guts without end, jumpscares and scary men in dirty masks, I like the horror that sits with you, like rocks in your gut, getting under your skin and into the folds of your brain. I like the horror that feasts on primal instinct and at just the right moment, just when you can’t take it anymore, it explodes, and you’re given something you never thought you’d see. Scherzo is much like that - 90 minutes of ravenous tension intercut with moments of rage and fear and some really good jumpscares (like seriously, oh my god the jumpscares). The whole thing is unnerving, and I think that’s the best word for it: unnerving. It’s psychological horror, through and through, it takes two characters and each of them sees the other as the scariest thing in the world. As for the viewer, Shearman drowns Scherzo in unmistakable atmosphere; a sense of dreamlike uncanniness, the feeling that nothing around you is quite right, reflecting our characters, stuck in a universe they are not made for, which, on its own, might just be the scariest idea Doctor Who has ever come up with; a place that is not meant for you. And past the atmosphere, I think the real pioneer of fear here is the sound design. Big Finish, as an audio-centric production company, has played a lot with the idea of sound. It is intrinsic to them, they are sound only and so must utilise that in any way. Scherzo is hands down their best usage of sound. Ever. It takes place in a realm where the Doctor and Charley have lost every sense, except hearing. And in this one simple premise, we are stuck with them. We can’t see, smell, touch or taste a single thing about the world of Scherzo, but we sure can hear it, and so can the characters. And with that simple idea, we’re as scared as they are. It helps that the sound designer, Gareth Jenkins, must hate you because hot damn does he make use of the format. From the everpresent hum of the void to the voice in the oblivion, Jenkins makes sure the sound is always discomforting you, you are never safe from it, ever there, ever piercing.

And then you actually get to the story and dear god is it good. First of all, the premise we’ve already touched on: perfect. Could not be done in any other format, the Doctor and Charley are alone, walking through a void, hunted by a creature made of sound; it might be the best idea I’ve ever seen, and I’m not joking, it’s a stroke of f**king genius that I still can’t get over. Rarely does an idea, just an idea, not even the execution, make me so inspired. But then you do get to the execution and things just get better. Ok, so, what do we actually have in Scherzo? The Doctor and Charley, mainly, who are both given some of, if not, their best material here. We get to see the dark facets of the Doctor’s character, what drives him when he’s scared, how he thinks about the humans who he is so innately superior to and it's fascinating. We’ve seen dark Doctors before but this is a Doctor who is spiteful and callous and it doesn’t feel out of character because the show makes it so abundantly clear that, no matter how many jokes he can share and smiles he can give, he’s still an alien and he is still not like a human. Charley, on the other hand, as one of the most sentimental and human companions we’ve ever had, makes a nice juxtaposition and a stable factor in a turbulent universe. It’s her balance to a slowly disintegrating Doctor that perfects Scherzo’s flawless dynamic and makes it such an impactful character piece. I’d actually say that past the premise and the horror and the ideas, Scherzo is about the Doctor and his companion, their relationship, what it means, why he even takes humans with him in the first place. And whilst the revival will tell you because he gets lonely, because he needs a hand to hold to keep him moving on and saving lives, Scherzo will tell you something much darker. They’re memento mori, reminders to the Doctor that he is mortal. The ideas are somewhat similar, in a way, the companions are there to keep the Doctor grounded, stop him abusing his power over time, but Scherzo goes one step further and says they’re there to keep him sane. And I think that is just the perfect explanation as to why this playful demigod would meddle with such ordinary creatures such as ourselves.

And then you get to our third character: the sound, or sound creature, or music, or whatever you want to call it. Wherever the Doctor and Charley are, evolution is being accelerated, and their introduction of sound into a void of nothingness has caused the very sense itself to mutate into a living creature that makes possibly the scariest antagonist in Doctor Who. Forget the Weeping Angels, who cares about the Vashta Nerada. Just fear itself in Listen? Peanuts. The Music is an uncaring entity that slowly and maliciously feasts on the Doctor and Charley and the only thing that even comes close to the cosmic terror it induces is the Midnight Entity and I am not saying that lightly. It is this unfathomable thing that we have no idea about that we get to slowly work out the mechanic of along with the Doctor as he realises more and more what it is and what it wants. And the one singular thing that makes the Music terrifying for me is the sound design. I mentioned before how well Scherzo uses audio and nowhere is this more prevalent than with this thing. Talking through chopped up, sped up or down, mixed and mangled mimicries of the Doctor and Charley’s voices, it’s very nature is unnerving to listen to. And then it screams. I mentioned the jumpscares were good, well this where they come from. Sometimes, this horrific creature straight from my nightmares will just scream and I don’t know if it's the pitch, or the volume or just however they made it, but that sound might be the scariest thing I’ve ever heard. Even on a relisten, knowing what was coming, this shit got me good. And whilst we’re on the subject, can we quickly go back to the horror because I have to ask how the hell this got made. Scherzo is horrific with a capital H: unnerving? Yes. Subtle psychological horror? In abundance. But is it also some of the most unsettling body horror you’ve ever experienced? Most definitely. Some of the imagery in this story is insane: you have the Doctor and Charley repeatedly eating the corpse of a clone of Charley, Charley cutting out the Doctor’s vocal cords, the Doctor and Charley holding hands so long that the skin on both their hands grow over each other. Robert Shearman is deranged and I am so glad for it. I could literally sit here all day and just list amazing moments. Like when the Doctor reveals that he and Charley had been walking non stop for the better part of a week, the Music’s introduction, mimicking Charley and tricking the audience, or maybe the horrific reveal that the pair had been walking in circles the entire time. I think the fact that Scherzo takes place in a giant glass tube going in a circle is the one hint of Shearman’s bizarre humour creeping into this horror story, because it’s a weird f**king image that somehow works completely naturally in the grounds of this story. And I haven’t even mentioned the tale of the king, oh christ, that is good. Every part opens with a short snippet of a story surrounding a tyrannical king slowly banishing every freedom from his kingdom, eventually ridding it of music, only to regret his decision when his empire comes to a standstill in the absence of expression. After begging the music to come back, the King watches as the music complies and returns, swiftly murdering everybody in the kingdom. It’s a glorious tone setter and also shows Shearman’s talent at writing short stories, it’s a brilliant idea, told magically that devolves into effective and wonderfully descriptive horror. It’s everything I love about Robert Shearman in the space of maybe seven minutes.

And I think that’s everything I liked covered, now onto the negatives.

I can’t think of any negatives. I’m sorry, I know I did the same thing with The Chimes of Midnight, but I truly see no wrong in Scherzo. I actually reviewed this story once before and gave it a couple criticisms that I know utterly disagree with. I said the story took a while to get going, but now I think it took the necessary amount of time to build the atmosphere and introduce the premise. I also said the Doctor acted out of character, but now I think he just expressed the parts of his character I pretended weren’t always there, hiding. Scherzo is unironically one of the greatest scripts I have ever seen and I can’t fault it. No matter how hard I try.

Long ago, when I decided to start listening to Big Finish, I listened to The Chimes of Midnight and declared it my favourite story. And it has stayed that way since then, even through my first listen of Scherzo. But now I’ve relistened to Shearman’s second outing with Eight, and I’m not so sure any more. Either way, Shearman takes the top spot in my ranking, no doubt, but I don’t know if the pitch perfect, emotional and genius murder mystery or the scary, innovative and immaculate character piece get the top spot. There is no story like Scherzo, it is incomparable to the rest of fiction, and that’s what makes it special. If I could wipe my memory of this story and listen to it for the first time again, I would in a heartbeat. Alas, I can not, so I must instead simply enjoy what time I had with it.

10/10 (easily)

Pros:

+ Unbelievably unnerving

+ Drowning in melancholic, strange atmosphere

+ World class sound design that brilliantly elevates the horror

+ Fantastic premise that could only have been done on audio

+ Writes the darker parts of the Doctor’s character flawlessly

+ Easily Charley’s best outing

+ Effortless deconstruction of the Doctor-Companion relationship

+ Terrifying antagonist

+ Brilliant use of jumpscares

+ Has an incredibly unique surreal, dream-like quality

+ The opening narration is a brilliant tone setter and a horrifying short story on its own

Cons:

~ Once again, Shearman creates a near perfect story and I can’t find true fault in it