Jeez, I was not ready for Corpse Day. What I initially mistook as a fun little team-up between Owen and Andy, on an annual day where Torchwood basically indulges the police as a sort of courtesy, gives way to one of the darkest Torchwood stories that might outright exist. And can you blame me? This story starts out really fun and I like the dynamic between a dead Owen and a still new to all this Andy. Then the story takes that nightmare turn and I really struggled with this content.

It's not necessarily a bad story, although it had a lot of bad parts. It is a deeply unpleasant listen about a bunch of traumatized, raped, and brainwashed women. It's so bleak and depressing I really can't give it much of a whole-hearted recommendation. I can't say it is a story without value or anything like that, but the performances were a little underwhelming given the seriousness of the situation from pretty much the entire cast, and I don't really know what the point of the story is, either, other than just kind of going for a lot of shock value. I guess I was shocked, certainly, but not in a way that left me clamouring for anything more. Beyond that though, it's not like this audio is going to change anyone's opinions on kidnapping and torturing women, right? I don't really want to hear about that and I especially don't need to hear about that from a production that appears to be entirely centred around and created by a male perspective. It feels exploitative more than fun.

And this is the story that brought Burn Gorman to Big Finish. Yikes. At least he didn't seem to mind and seemed enthusiastic about the whole affair in the behind the scenes audio.  There were some details around his character that even I, who is most certainly not a fan of Owen, could appreciate, as Owen's in his dead phase here and that adds something to the story, even if that is just a clumsy sort of take on his motivations and opinions around abortion during the story because I guess Corpse Day wasn't edgy enough, it had to uselessly inject a bunch of pro-life buzzwords in, again, I can only surmise for the sake of sounding controversial and provocative.

This is already more than I would like to revisit Corpse Day. I did not feel good listening to this audio, and while it did have my attention, I would struggle to call it entertaining. At least it was well put together in terms of the recording quality.

f**k me. i knew it was going to be upsetting (i'd read a synopsis ofc) but jesus christ. keeping spoilers to a minimum; but EXTREME trigger warning for rape, sexual abuse, so on- loosely based on the IRL fritzl case. good enough story, does what it sets out to do, but god.

If it wasn't Clyde, it might well be Owen. It's profoundly moving seeing his dead self living vicariously through others - stuffing PC Andy with food, preserving life in the most unlikely of circumstances. Properly visceral stuff. This is a fantastic story; a sharp premise, proficient character work, and a good infusion of horror after a wave of audios that were perhaps losing their bite.

Just wow.

This was not what i was expecting at all.

Yet very compelling despise the messed up nature of this.

Really good stuff.

wtf? not sure what I was expecting? bit of a hard listen. trigger warning I guess.