The Gentlemen Thieves

The audible 'no!!' I no-ed at the cliffhanger end of this one...

I tend to find the Paternoster Gang stories generally average to enjoyable, but this whole boxset was delightful. Unlike the first two stories in the set, this one is strong throughout, and the clones provided good mystery without being overly confusing using the same voices over and over. As far as a plot goes, it's not vastly complex, but that's not important to me because I often like to get swept up in things without overthinking it.

Big Finish writers tend to have a few themes that they really love to pull on over and over, including pandemic disease, amnesia, and - as is true of this one - criticism of Empire. It's something well suited to a Victorian-era story, and manages to feel relevant to the story in a way that isn't always achieved by some more heavy-handed attempts to decry the idea that Britain should return to its glorious, colonising ways. Here, the key antagonist, Lord Ives, is attempting to create a clone army in order to revitalise the good, British stock of the country and consolidate his power, which of course is not viewed positively in the narrative.

However, one thing that comes from the clone army is some good character work with Strax. Lord Ives is using a Sontaran cloning machine in order to achieve his goal and at one point, melts a batch of his own clones like they are 'disposable'. Too often in Paternoster Gang stories, Strax is treated as the comic relief to the point where his stupidity becomes tiresome, but here he and Jenny share a moment where he is disgusted and almost distraught by the cavalier attitude of Ives towards his clones - he tells Jenny that the clones of Sontar are many things, but that they are not disposable, that they have worth. This is the kind of character beat I wish we got out of Strax more; rather than just shouting and playing with guns, his principles of honour are allowed to shine here.

And, of course, we resolve the cliffhanger of the last boxset by Vastra finally - after just a handful of days - realising that the Jenny in the house is not the true one. I'm glad that they didn't choose to go with a story of Vastra falling for the deception, but rather her putting together the pieces quickly and choosing to act and shoot the false Jenny. However, the real Jenny manages to escape her prison and so the cliffhanger we are left with here is, against which Jenny did Vastra act against?

Naturally, all will turn out to be well as I cannot really believe that they would choose to kill Jenny permanently, but nevertheless, it was - perhaps not a satisfying end to the boxset, but certainly not a poor one.