The Monthly Adventures #009 - "The Spectre of Lanyon Moor" by Nicholas Pegg

My journey with Big Finish started a while ago. A good few years back, I can't remember when exactly, I was gifted The Sirens of Time for my birthday. Since then, I’ve gotten a total four more audios physically and listened to none of them before discovering the first fifty free on apple music about three years ago; and then, 18 months later, I got hooked on them and never really stopped. The Spectre of Lanyon Moor is the first audio I listened to completely recreationally- before it was just the odd one on a train ride or a long car journey - and I remember, ever since sitting down to listen to it, becoming obsessed with getting more and more of these eclectic audio dramas. But, being the start of my obsession, does The Spectre of Lanyon Moor hold up on a relisten?

After finding themselves investigating a Celtic archeological site in Cornwall, the Doctor and Evelyn team up with old ally Brigadier Lethbridge-Stuart to thwart a deadly revenge plot 18,000 years in the making.

(CONTAINS SPOILERS)

When I think of a great Doctor Who story I think of innovative and bold new ideas, a creative sandbox of great concepts building a tightly written narrative that introduces me to new forms of storytelling, of world building, of imagination, all whilst giving me some brilliant, strong character drama along the way. Then there are stories like The Spectre of Lanyon Moor. It’s a fun story, an incredibly fun story, no doubt, but I’d be lying if I said there was anything of substance here. Its main positive, in my opinion, is that it nails the feel of a classic story. I can imagine this being aired sometime in the 70s, it’s got the exact right balance of dark and serious moments and the Doctor prancing around a Fogou looking at funny rocks. Not only that, but the setting helps as well, being rural Cornwall littered with archeological oddities such as the “fogou” I mentioned before, a sort of underground fort the Celts made. I love this aspect of the story as not only is it a unique, interesting place to set your story that reflects some of the locales seen in Classic Who, but it also taught me something new, so all around a good setting. The story is mainly where The Spectre of Lanyon Moor drags and I’ll get to that, but there are a number of diamonds in the rough, such as Mrs Moynihan, our - tertiary, I think - antagonist who completely outperforms her two fellow foes, being a genuinely interesting and tragic character as well as a great late story reveal and her death is probably the most disturbing part of the whole audio - eaten alive by her own dogs, the only things that hadn’t abandoned her by this point. Another, quite obvious quality of this audio is one of two inclusions of Nicholas Courtney as the Brigadier in the Main Range, which is a supremely wonderful addition to an already incredibly fun story. Courtney’s deep baritone is honestly just nice to listen to and, whilst I wish he had more to do, I’m never going to complain about the Brigadier being in a story.

However, despite how inoffensive it is or how many little sparks of life are present, The Spectre of Lanyon Moor still fails to impress me. It is far longer than it ought to be and it contains an obscene amount of padding. There’s a whole subplot with Evelyn getting kidnapped by a local aristocrat trying to harness the telepathic powers of the earth fallen alien - Sancreda - but not only does it just end in the fourth part, when the plot needs to move on from it, it barely contributes to the rest of the story, it’s just something for Evelyn to do whilst the rest of the narrative gets on with itself. Speaking of Sancreda, what an annoying villain. It sounds awful, I really cannot get behind that cartoonish performance, even if the whole audio’s going for this B-movie vibe, it’s just painful on the ears and it means I really can’t take Sancreda seriously.

Overall, The Spectre of Lanyon Moor is a corny, unsubtle outing for the Sixth Doctor that really reflects some of the cheesier outputs of the Classic Era, with a welcome return for the Brigadier but a drawn out plot and the sidelining of it’s companion that makes The Spectre of Lanyon Moor, for me, fall just shy of good.

6/10

Pros:

+ Particularly fun runaround, completely inoffensive

+ Mrs Moynihan was a more interesting and compelling antagonist than the two real antagonists

+ The Brigadier’s always a welcome addition to the plot and Nicholas Courtney’s a delight

+ Nice, atmospheric setting and nice inclusion is some unknown historical oddities

Cons:

- Sancreda was an incredibly annoying and underwhelming villain

- The entire plot with Sir Archibald was complete and utter padding

- Evelyn is massively sidelined, especially for her second outing