The Lady of Mercia

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

Previous Story: Eldrad Must Die!

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A fun spin on the traditional historical with a great historical character. Tegan gets a great role in this, even though I'm starting to feel bad for all the stuff she has to go through. Still, the idea of two characters "swapping" in time is a fun one (though it's technically three but who's counting?). Queen Æthelfrid is a really cool character and I like how she doesn't completely dismiss the idea of time-travel, making this story flow a lot smoother than if Tegan got locked up or something. Turlough was also pretty good in this getting into a fight with someone who dislikes him because he's posh.

It's not a remarkable story and there were some very strange elements (the Doctor doesn't question the fact that an 80s (I think) scientist just invented a time machine). I think it's such an intriguing part of history being explored here. I'm really struggling to write this review because it's such a simple story. A simple story executed perfectly.

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Next Story: Prisoners of Fate

Doctor Who – The Monthly Adventures

#173. The Lady of Mercia ~ 10/10

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◆ An Introduction

One of the things I adore about the Fifth Doctor’s audio adventures is how unburdened they are by story arcs – you can very easily just pick any CD featuring him and dive straight in (which is a welcome change from the McGann space operas and the intricate weaving arcs of the McCoy plays).

Paul Magrs is one of my favourite writers for this franchise and someone I have come to associate with laugh out loud comedies, which shouldn’t be surprising since he created the character of Iris Wildthyme, but don’t for one minute think that he is a “one-trick pony”. He has penned a beautifully sombre adventure about a city sinking into the sea (‘The Stones of Venice’) and a genuinely harrowing pure historical piece (‘The Peterloo Massacre’).

I always used to think of this as the weakest script Magrs had written for BigFinish, because it is a lot more subtle with its comedy, and it is more conventional than what we have come to expect from the audio adventures. I am so happy I took the advice of someone in the BigFinish Audio Facebook group to give this one another go, because it is delightful.

Enough rambling, this is only meant to be the introduction after all, let’s dive into ‘The Lady of Mercia’.

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◆ Publisher’s Summary

The TARDIS brings the Doctor, Tegan, Turlough and Nyssa to the University of Frodsham, close to where the warrior queen Æthelfrid fought a desperate and bloody rearguard action against the savage Danes. Over a thousand years later, in 1983, battle is still being raged, with student activists taking on savage funding cuts… and disrupting a conference about Æthelfrid convened by history professor John Bleak.

Meanwhile, over in the Physics Department, Dr Philippa Stone is working night and day on a top-secret project – but can her theoretical time machine really be the solution to the university's problems?

Present and past are about to collide – and the results, as the TARDIS crew is about to discover, will be far from academic!

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◆ The Fifth Doctor

We’re drawing ever closer to the final adventure with this team of regulars, so I just want to say how much fun I have had writing these reviews. This TARDIS crew clearly have an affinity with each other, and it results in some utterly glorious performances. That sentiment still stands for ‘The Lady of Mercia’, as Peter Davison does a splendid job with the material.

The Doctor is only a student in the sense that one never stops learning. He carries out most of his research in the field, getting his hands dirty.

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◆ Tegan Jovanka

‘The Lady of Mercia’ is an absolute gold mine of material for Janet Fielding, who gets to showcase a lot of range here. It’s an absolutely spectacular performance from beginning to end – she’s easily the star performer of the adventure.

Tegan was at college for a bit and claims that it wasn’t all that different to Frodsham Uni. She doesn’t give a damn about the Doctor’s history lesson, so decides to take advantage of the conference’s complimentary sherry! She thinks that riding is easy, something she learnt on her dad’s sheep farm.

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◆ Vislor Turlough

‘The Lady of Mercia’ honestly showcases Mark Strickson at his glorious best, with his character getting to be brilliantly sarcastic throughout.

Turlough turns his nose up at the University of Frodsham, because it’s not exactly Oxbridge, is it? His first reaction to seeing Æthelfrid's sword is to comment on how much money it would be worth! If the TARDIS was his, he would charge all the university professors a whopping great fee, so they could find out the truth to history’s mysteries.

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◆ “Older” Nyssa

‘The Lady of Mercia’ doesn’t give much material to Sarah Sutton, but she still excels with what is there.

Nyssa thinks the university is a curious environment to study in, finding the whole thing rather unwelcoming.

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◆ Story Recap

The Doctor and his friends arrive at the University of Frodsham, where they end up gatecrashing a conference about the warrior queen Æthelfrid convened by history professor John Bleak. Elsewhere on campus, Dr Philippa Stone has been working tirelessly on her experimental time machine – and it’s ready for a trial run. It works by probing a historical artefact and analysing its past.

It soon transpires that Bleak and Stone are actually married, and it isn’t long before Tegan spots the former stealing Æthelfrid’s sword! The trial run of the time machine quickly goes wrong, flinging Tegan ten centuries into the past with the neurotic history professor… and right into the path of history. If that wasn’t enough to worry about, Æthelfrid’s daughter has been transported to 1983!

Until Princess Ælfwynn can be returned to her own time… it is up to Tegan Jovanka to act as the temporary heir to the throne of Mercia.

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◆ The Dark Ages

‘The Lady of Mercia’ instantly scores brownie points from me simply because it is a historical adventure, and those have always been my favourites. My criteria for what makes a good historical adventure is pretty simple; educate me on the chosen historical figure or era, without coming across as either patronising or boring. Paul Magrs more than meets the criteria with this adventure, he absolutely smashes it!

Secondary school history classes only went as far back as the Anglo-Saxons when I was doing my GCSEs, so the Dark Ages were a complete blank for me. The Kingdom of Mercia was one of the largest in the British Isles, besieged on all sides by southerners from Wessex and the approaching Danes from Northumbria. The most well known monarch of this era was Alfred the Great, due to the fact children are often taught the story where he is on the run from the Vikings, taking refuge in the home of a peasant woman. She asks him to watch her cakes – small loaves of bread – baking by the fire, but distracted by his own problems, he allows the cakes the burn and is roundly scolded by the woman. Unfortunately, this story is likely untrue.

The Dark Ages are an era which are still surrounded by much mystery, because there simply aren’t a huge amount of records or artefacts to examine compared to say Tudor times or the Edwardian era. What we do know is that Alfred the Great’s daughter became known as the Lady of Mercia. Æthelflæd (whose name has been altered in this story to Æthelfrid) was a warrior queen and a great ruler, one who is most well known for her vital role in the conquest of the Danelaw. Her reputation clearly proceeded her, because after her army captured Derby in 917 from the Danes, the city of Leicester surrendered without a fight the next year.

A few months after the relatively peaceful takeover of Leicester, the leading men of the Danish-ruled York offered to pledge their loyalty to Æthelflæd, likely to secure her support against Norse raiding parties from Ireland, but she never got to take advantage of the offer. Æthelflæd’s reign came to an end after seven years, following her passing on June 12th 918. Her daughter Ælfwynn was all set to become the “Second Lady of Mercia”, but her reign was cut incredibly short by her uncle, Edward the Elder, who made the decision to remove her from power and send her to Wessex in December 918.

It’s an incredibly interesting period of history, and I’m really glad Paul Magrs decided to shine a spotlight onto it.

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◆ Sound Design

From the trials and tribulations of a university campus, to the long forgotten battles of the Dark Ages. This is yet another really polished bit of sound design from Steve Foxon.

Student protestors chant outside of the physics department. Tweed-clad academics chat away in the university atrium, whilst a live band plays relaxing music in the background. The sound of clashing swords enters into Tegan’s mind as she stares at Æthelfrid's sword. Dr Stone’s time machine malfunctions and detonates in her lab… sending Tegan and Bleak back to Dark Ages Mercia! Ælfwynn begins swinging her sword, attempting to attack the student protestors in 1983. Æthelfrid, Tegan and Bleak ride towards York; horses galloping all the way from the castle in Derby. Bells ringing out in York Minster announce the arrival of the Lady of Mercia. Chaos erupts inside the Minster, swords clashing as the forces of Mercia, Wessex and the Danes begin fighting each other.

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◆ Music

Steve Foxon is also handling the score for ‘The Lady of Mercia’, and I once more find myself praising his work. The music here starts out with this brilliantly steady beat that helps to build up tension throughout the adventure, but later transitions into an absolutely gorgeous string arrangement that perfectly suits the corner of history Tegan gets flung to in this adventure.

https://soundcloud.com/stevefoxon/the-lady-of-mercia-music-suite

As with the majority of his work for BigFinish, the isolated score for ‘The Lady of Mercia’ is free to listen to on Foxon’s SoundCloud page.

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◆ Conclusion

“I am Ælfwynn, Princess of Mercia, and I am here to wreak havoc on you all!”

Paul Magrs is a writer you would often associate with laugh out loud comedies, but he tones down the absurdity for this adventure in favour of witty dialogue and an incredibly fun scenario. A princess from the Dark Ages has been spirited away to 1983, whilst Tegan has been sent back to the early tenth century… where she now has to pose as said Dark Ages princess!

‘The Lady of Mercia’ takes home the prize for the most overlooked and underrated Paul Magrs script I have ever listened to, but I hope all of you reading this review will give it a chance sometime in the future.

Each release in this trilogy sees a different companion taking the spotlight. Whilst Marc Platt completely wasted an opportunity to have some fun with Turlough in the last adventure, Magrs grabs the bull by the horns here and gives Tegan some of the best material she has ever gotten. Janet Fielding really takes full advantage of the excellent material being sent her way too, with her performance here being the best of the adventure.

It’s funny to think that ‘The Lady of Mercia’ used to be one of my least favourite stories from the “Older Nyssa” arc, so I would just like to thank Graham from the BigFinish Audio Facebook group for convincing me to give this story another chance. It’s now become one of my absolute favourites from this arc.

Despite the fact that the TARDIS is always drawn to the UK for 'some reason', it very rarely seems to travel North (and even less so to the North East, but that's a disappointment for another review. I promise the North East is interesting too... Geordie companion when...?). In recent years, we've been getting more and more North, heading to exciting places such as Sheffield and Liverpool, and this episode takes us to the Chester town of Frodsham, where the gang arrive at a university that is having a rivalry between the Physics and History department.

Here we meet Dr Stone and Bleak of Physics and History respectively, both married and both cheating on each other in secret. Dr Bleak is hosting conference about the Lady of Mercia, Queen Æthelfrid, based on the real Queen Æthelflæd, a historical figure famous for fighting the Danes. Dr Stone, meanwhile, is inventing a time machine in secret.

And you can see immediately how things go wrong. Bleak steals Æthelfrid's sword for the machine and is chased by Tegan, and they both get sent to the past, while Æthelfrid's daughter, Æthelwynn, gets sent forward to the future. Which means, obviously, Tegan must impersonate Æthelwynn and try to stay out of trouble.

Janet Fielding's impersonation of a Mancunian accent is... something, but overall I found the accents to be very decent (something that BF famously can be dodgy for). Generally, this is a very fun episode - it's not particularly difficult to follow, there's a decent amount of action between protesting students and warring figures but not so much that it becomes tiresome to listen to, and Tegan and Turlough get some really good character beats. I particularly enjoyed Turlough being called out for being a posh schoolboy, but some of the comments towards the North being a land of savages were a little uncalled for. We're nice really, I promise.