MR 006: The Marian Conspiracy

Oh wow, this is more like it. This is genuinely fantastic, the first I would call a classic. Jacqueline Rayner is the goat, as we all know. I don't think I've met a story from her that I disliked. It's amazing how the quality has jumped so dramatically from the first five. Is it any coincidence that the first really good one is the Sixth Doctor? No, no it isn't. The first halfway decent story was also a Sixth Doctor story: Whispers of Terror.

And what a companion Evelyn makes as well. I always considered her my favorite companion, and in her first story we immediately see why. A college professor with a no nonsense attitude: she's on top of everything the Sixth Doctor is doing. She doesn't let him go on ranting, she's just as belligerent and sarcastic as him, she can rant just as much as him when she gets on her history subject. She's great.

And what a great story to start her out on. There's apparently something wrong with time where Evelyn is starting to fade out because her distant ancestor, an advisor to Queen Elizabeth, doesn't exist. The Doctor figures out what's going on and then Evelyn insists on going with him, packing a bag before he even has a chance to say no.

The twist, though, is that this story is about Queen Mary and not Queen Elizabeth. Evelyn accidentally praises Elizabeth, which is treason in Mary's England and gets wrapped up in a potential plot. While the Doctor gets invested in the court of Mary and gets to know her.

The whole point of the story is that the protestants and the catholics both wanted to burn the heretics, but that we see Elizabeth as good and Mary as bad because England was never Catholic again after Elizabeth became queen.
It turns out that Evelyn's ancestors were involved in the plot to assassinate Mary and that the Doctor and Evelyn beg for the mother's life, thereby saving the child, Evelyn's ancestor.

The ending has a Fires of Pompeii feel to it where the Doctor says they can't save everyone, but Evelyn gets him to save just the two Protestants she met. And their families.

Just as before, Evelyn forces her way into the TARDIS as a proper companion as well. They have a good talk at the end where the Doctor says he's caused people to die, but not intentionally trying to kill them and he isn't sure if that's the same thing. Evelyn is glad to hear that he doesn't intentionally cause people to die or she wouldn't want to keep travelling with him. Which the Doctor is surprised to hear because he didn't invite her in, but Evelyn will not be moved. She is going with him. And she'll find a good place to get coco and make her chocolate cake.

This is definitely the first banger in the MR and the first I'd recommend to other people, even if they didn't know anything about Doctor Who. It's that good. And that's because Evelyn is that good. She's the first of the BF original companions, but certainly not the last. She started a fantastic trend and I can't wait to keep hearing her stories.