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TARDIS Guide

Overview

Released

Wednesday, March 17, 2021

Written by

John Lloyd

Runtime

146 minutes

Time Travel

Unclear

Location (Potential Spoilers!)

Coelare Coelum, Earth

Synopsis

Earth - a small, insignificant planet. Entirely devoid of intelligent life.

At least that's according to the legal documents. The Doctor, Romana and K9 find themselves at the centre of a most unusual trial.

An intergalactic corporation wants to bulldoze the planet for a development project. Only a previous court's preservation document is standing in their way. The Doctor has been summoned as an expert witness. If he can prove Earth contains intelligent life, the whole world will be saved.

But with a fortune at stake, it was never going to be that simple.

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2 reviews

This review contains spoilers!

This is part of a series of reviews of Doctor Who in chronological timeline order.

Previous Story: Casualties of Time

This is a lost story that I would have loved to see make it to screen. It's got that Douglas Adams wit that I absolutely love. The Doctor and co having to go through all sorts of legal loopholes to protect the planet is such a refreshing format for a story. The way it all ties together at the end with the parking ticket is brilliant. All the cast here are great and the story is full of plenty of fascinating concepts. I'd gladly have taken this over The Horns of Nimon.

Who knew bureaucracy was the Doctor's greatest enemy.

Next Story: The Well-Mannered War (Audio Adaptation)


This review contains spoilers!

This audio, that never made it past the scripting stage, is absolutely wonderful. It absolutely reeks of that Hitchhiker's charm mainly because of the, albeit little, input that the late great Douglas Adams had on the original idea and how closely he and John Lloyd worked together on other projects. The main plot of this audio is that Earth is about to be demolished (sounds familiar right?) and the Doctor is the star witness chosen to defend it. The main cast all play the audio very well and give convincing performances laced with subtle humour and acerbic wit. It's good to hear Baker, Ward and Leeson on audio together (as this is my first experience of them) as they bounce off of each other very well. I found myself laughing out loud on many an occasion during this audio. Nev Fountain had done a very good job adapting this audio and it makes me curious to experience his other audios.

Overall, I have found The Doomsday Contract to be a thoroughly enjoyable listen throughout, full of nice references to the rest of the Whoniverse. I will almost certainly be checking out Fountain's other work and the other story in this series of the Lost Stories


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