The Monthly Adventures #062 - “The Last" by Gary Hopkins

The word “boring” gets thrown around a lot with the audios. With only one sense carrying them, it is incredibly easy to leave little for the audience and end up with something dull and repetitive, especially if the listener is the one having to introduce visuals to keep a story interesting. It is also a word I have used often and have seen given to The Last. However, I find myself disagreeing heavily with the last point despite this audio’s 150 minute runtime. So what is it about The Last that keeps me so thoroughly engaged?

The world of Bortresoye is a barren ruin, wasted by war with its leader ignorant and slowly going insane a mile underground. When our travellers arrive, tragedy soon befalls them and they find themselves faced by survivors, ghosts and the planet itself.

(CONTAINS SPOILERS)

I find that even in a very long story, there is something that can carry me through: atmosphere. A good atmosphere can elevate a story from a bog-standard sci-fi caper to an enrapturing epic and The Last especially relies heavily on its tone. This story is capital-B Bleak, it is a never ending torrent of lonely misery in one of the best executed end-of-days stories I’ve seen out of Doctor Who. From the sound design recreating a nuclear winter to the believable whittling down of our main cast, this story by the end makes you feel like the last person left alive in the world. And speaking of the world, the ruined, empty planet of Bortresoye is fantastically realised and contributes greatly to the aforementioned atmosphere. Everything from the remnants of society, to the buildings turned to glass by nuclear warfare to the mile deep bunker full of disturbed and nasty politicians is wonderful worldbuilding and by far my favourite part of this audio as just existing in it and basking in the melancholia of it all.

As for the story, I find it can be a little too long in places - especially in the first part - but it doesn’t drag too much. Still, thirty minutes could have easily been cut out. And despite this, it still manages to be incredibly tense at points. Whilst it may only be temporary, Charley’s paralysis lends a lot to this tension and the focus on C’rizz makes for some nice character work, as he’s paired with ghost of former Bortresoye citizen Requiem and is forced to confront the horrors that have befallen the planet. Westmaas also has some of his best moments here, including a standout one when he discovers Charley’s been murdered by the insane Excelsior and cries out in painfully believable anguish; the bond between our two companions is really cemented here in a brilliantly intimate way. And as we’ve spoken of our main antagonist, played delightfully by Carolyn Jones, let me just say she is easily the best character here. A genuinely chilling performance that effectively sells the cold cruelty of a thoroughly deranged person, she is one of the scariest villains I’ve seen in a Doctor Who story in a while and Jones chews the scenery of every moment she’s in, from her opening speech to her harrowing death scene.

As for the rest of our cast - it wavers. The couple politicians we get lumped with are pretty bare in character and mostly just serve as plot devices to bounce off the other characters before getting killed off and, whilst ghostly soul of the planet Landscar is more interesting of a character, he unfortunately gets little screen time. And as for our main character, boy oh boy is it obvious McGann did not like this script. This is the most bored I have seen a man whose friends have all just died. McGann is, unfortunately, not giving it 100% here and sleepwalking through a lot of his lines, especially at the climax, which is a shame but not unforgivable.

And speaking of the climax, this is where things get complicated. I’m in two minds about the final reveal: one, I love the concept of an intelligent planet looping its history until its population finally decide not to cause Armageddon out of stupidity but on the other hand it is a big friendly button resetting the whole adventure and downplaying pretty much all the emotional beats of the past two and a half hours. Plus, it’s all conveyed pretty poorly and ends up convoluted. However, that final “oh, what the hell” as the Doctor sets off a nuclear warhead was a fun final moment to leave the story on (if you ignore that kind of hokey “it was all okay in the end” bit afterwards).

Seeped in a bleak and desperate atmosphere, The Last is a suitably lonely story that really sits with you after having finished it and leaves you thinking. It could be cut down a little here and there and I think it was probably a couple drafts off perfection but as it stands, this is an underrated little gem with a couple amazing performances, a fantastic villain and a palpable atmosphere.

8/10

Pros:

+ Incredibly bleak and effective tone

+ Carolyn Jones dominates every scene she’s in

+ The ruined world of Bortresoye was a stunningly evocative setting

+ The concept of a planet looping its destruction until its saved is great

+ Gives C’rizz some excellent character work

Cons:

- Most of sidecast is filler

- McGann is so clearly bored by the story

- The story’s a little bloated in places

- The ending was mostly a copout