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WITH THE ANGELS, PART 2 – THE DOCTOR, THE MECHANIC AND THE MILLIONAIRES

A game of chess, a sinking yacht, and a mechanic with nerves of steel.

Past Forward sails into its final act with the second half of With the Angels, swapping bunkers and bases for yachts and the filthy rich. The setting may be different, but the stakes remain high, as the Seventh Doctor and new companion Ray find themselves infiltrating a lavish birthday bash hosted by the Bladukas family—corrupt billionaires with a curious obsession: collecting Weeping Angels.

The Angels, once again reduced to chess pieces carved from a single being, are here to be flaunted, traded, and eventually weaponised. And while the tension takes a while to reach the surface, there’s always that underlying dread: we know the Angels will be unleashed. The only question is when—and how badly it’ll go wrong.

RAY TAKES THE PLUNGE

Ray is thrown into the deep end, both figuratively and literally. In her first adventure as a full-fledged TARDIS traveller, she’s already infiltrating elite society while pretending to be a high-flying business magnate. Sara Griffths plays her with unshakeable charm, making her feel utterly at home in the world of high-stakes infiltration despite Ray’s motorbike-riding, grease-smudged roots. She’s got a lovely chemistry with Sylvester McCoy’s Doctor, all teasing banter and rolled eyes—never afraid to challenge him on his logic or poke holes in his plans.

This Ray isn’t a sidekick. She’s a co-conspirator.

THE ANGELS IN THE GIFT WRAP

There’s a wonderful moment of creeping dread when guests at the party begin receiving “presents”—boxes containing a single chess piece, each one a dormant fragment of a Weeping Angel. One by one, people start vanishing, zapped through time as the pieces awaken. It’s a superb concept, brimming with gothic horror potential, and while it isn’t fully explored, it’s a reminder that the Angels don’t need jump scares to be terrifying—they just need the right setup.

Irving Bladukas, the party’s black sheep and self-appointed Angel wrangler, believes he can harness the creatures to show up his overbearing father. Naturally, it all goes disastrously wrong. The Doctor challenges him to a literal game of chess, mirroring the story’s wider themes of control, manipulation, and the illusion of power. It’s an elegant metaphor, though the slow tension of the game is balanced by Ray’s more action-packed attempts to evacuate the doomed guests.

THE LAKE THAT NEVER BLINKS

One of the most striking ideas is the concept that the Angels can be imprisoned under a Scottish loch—watched perpetually by fish. It’s such a classic Doctor Who bit of lateral thinking, turning natural biology into a containment strategy. It also ties in beautifully with the Doctor’s long game: the Angels can’t attack if they’re always being watched, and fish, famously, don’t blink.

There’s an eerie serenity to the image—one that lingers long after the chaos of the climax has passed.

THE DOCTOR CHECKMATES HIMSELF

The final moments are a whirlwind: the Doctor sacrifices himself (strategically, of course) to allow the Angels to gain enough temporal energy to turn on their supposed masters, the Bladukas family. The yacht sinks. The guests scatter. The Angels descend into the lake, watched by unblinking aquatic eyes.

But the most intriguing moment is yet another confrontation between the two Doctors. Present Seven meets his future self again, and this time it’s a reckoning. The Doctor scolds himself—not just for the manipulations we’ve seen in this boxset, but for a growing pattern of decisions that are clearly going to cost him something, or someone, down the line. It’s not just introspection—it’s foreshadowing.

Big Finish is teasing something with this, building toward a story of consequences. And that’s always fascinating with the Seventh Doctor, a man who’s always three moves ahead, but rarely stops to ask if he should be playing the game in the first place.

📝VERDICT: 8/10

The second half of With the Angels ends Past Forward on a high—both conceptually and emotionally. The chess motif is smartly integrated, the underwater Angel containment idea is inspired, and the yacht setting allows for a slow-burn thriller that erupts into catastrophe. Ray cements herself as a companion worthy of the TARDIS, matching the Doctor in courage and quick wit, while Sylvester McCoy balances the enigmatic trickster and weary conscience with quiet power.

If the story sometimes glides a little too gently before the action kicks off, it more than makes up for it with atmosphere and thematic resonance. This is Doctor Who at its most reflective—literally, in the mirror of its own timeline—and the sense that this all leads to something bigger makes the whole set feel more than the sum of its timey-wimey parts.

What a perfect end to this set honestly such a good ending and possibly a start to a 7 n ray arc I’m here for it