Part One

3.5/5

This part felt fairly inconsequential as most of the time is spent simply trying to reach the Star Destroyer, which I assume will be the main setting for the rest of the story. I still enjoyed this part though as it does spend a lot of time on properly establishing the Doctor and Charley’s dynamics.

Part Two

3.5/5

This part felt like it was dragging its feet until the Cyberman reveal. Especially because of the murder mystery that wasn’t really a mystery as it was obviously the Cybermen that did it.

Part Three

3.5/5

The early parts with the Doctor and Deeva exploring the Star Destroyer and gradually finding more and more about what the Cybermen were doing was cool. It’s nice to see the Cybermen’s main goal being converting humans as well. There is definitely something suspect about Deeva as well, my guess is she is a military commander sent specifically to eliminate the Cybermen.

Part Four

3.5/5

Having both sides of the war be willing to use a moral tactics invoking Cyber-conversion felt like a good way of showing the lack of morality in war even if one side may have a more moral reason for fighting the war.

The Monthly Adventures #017 - "Sword of Orion" by Nicholas Briggs

Nicholas Briggs seems to have a brand of story. Good ideas using established things from the show (Gallifrey, Daleks, Cybermen) and then writing a story void of any substance to include these ideas. There is so unbelievably little in Sword of Orion to talk about it’s genuinely impressive. I am surprised this story lasts two hours. It is fine, I don’t dislike pretty much anything here, but I also do not care about one bit of it. Not sure what I can talk about, let’s just get into it.

Exploring the grungier side of space travel, the Doctor and Charley are pulled into a fated expedition into a derelict, where the remnants of a far off war and an old enemy prepare to collide.

(CONTAINS SPOILERS)

This is going to be a really short one, so we’ll just begin. Nicholas Briggs is a writer whose actual writing, what’s physically on the page, is fine. The narrative is simple but works (most of the time), the dialogue sounds genuine, the characters are believable, his stories just lack substance. The one thing he seems to truly excel at is worldbuilding, his worlds all feel vast and real and it is easily my favourite thing about Sword of Orion. In the first part, we get a small section of Eight and Charley exploring a futuristic bazaar and it’s by far the best sequence. The sounds, the characters, the places we go to, the ideas we come across. It’s a world I can get invested in and once we get on the ship where we spend a majority of our time, we’re still getting bits and pieces of lore, like the war between Androids and Humans that incites the whole plot. It’s most interesting when it’s feeding us bits and pieces through characters like undercover-android Deeva, who I will mention as being the only interesting member of the cast. Usually I don’t just highlight one character but she is literally the only one I can remember the name of.

And that’s not a joke, there are about five more characters filling out the side cast, I am convinced they are all just the same person. I think one was called Ike, not sure about the rest. The elephant in the room I do have to mention is that this is the Cybermen’s first appearance in the Main Range. They do nothing. Absolutely nothing, they wander around a ship for four parts as the plot goes on around them. A lot more could’ve been done with them for their debut and we’ll have to wait until Spare Parts for a better story. Other than that, I really don’t know what to say. There have been a few stories like this, such as The Mutant Phase - also by Briggs - that just feel devoid of substance. There is nothing in the story I frankly want to talk about, it’s all fine or forgettable. And I can’t even bash that, I enjoyed it, simply because there was nothing for me to like or dislike.

Sword of Orion was about as fine as a story can get. Creating a pros and cons list for something like this story is especially hard because every element I’d usually highlight’s just in the middle somewhere. I can’t rate it that low because I didn’t dislike listening to it, but definitely not something you’d regret skipping.

5/10

Pros:

+ Great worldbuilding, loved the glimpses of future society

+ Deeva stood out as the one interesting member of the side cast

Cons:

- Sidecast made almost entirely of near identical characters

- The Cybermen are underutilised and a non-entity

- Void of any substance

If you're going to skip any of the Eighth Doctor's run, skip this one. It does basically nothing new with the Cyberman, and despite being fairly simple and boring, I still found it confusing at times. There are too many side characters, which appears to be a reoccurring theme in these early audios, and we don't spend enough time with any one of them to garner an emotional reaction when they inevitably die. Even the Doctor and Charlie seem completely unaffected by their deaths.

It has a nice message, but that's basically it's only redeeming quality, and other stories have done it better. It's not horrible and I didn't hate listening to it; it's just not really worth the time.

✅68%

😃Good!

👍🏼Recommended!

Thworping through time and space, one adventure at a time!

RETURN OF THE CYBERMEN!

The opening episode has a pretty tense atmosphere; you feel that you are in deep space. At the same time, it brings you to the heat of action with Eight and Charley in top form. They already support each other like old friends, and it's lovely to listen to!

The writing here and the soundscapes are so sharp that you get a great feel for the spaceship setting, the dangers inside, and the crew members.

The Sword of Orion creates an unsettling mystery with a wider connection to the War of Orion, a recurring event in the Main Range. This becomes something of a Wheel in Space of Tomb of the Cybermen for Eight, with a pretty good scope and an action-packed latter half. The plotting can be a bit confusing at times, and it's not very easy to keep track of the various guest actors.

I love the very quick Cyberman reveal at the end of Part 1. I also like the classic style Cybermen used here, with deep mechanical voices. Their presence is effectively felt throughout, even if they aren't actively involved until the latter half.

The last part keeps up the tension and action and throws in an intriguing final twist.

This was a fun and well-made take on the base under siege type of Doctor Who stories. I liked the characters and the danger that the Cybermen presented themselves without it relying on sheer numbers but rather just having their threat carefully built up over the course of the audio. Charley and the Doctor were both great here, but I enjoyed Deeva's character too. It really felt like they did a good job with giving her a bit of a redemption arc without dragging things out too much, either. Overall I think this is a nicely balanced Eighth Doctor entry, even if it isn't the most memorable story in the world, either.