Going into this 4 hour epic was pretty intimidating, especially since I was only familiar with the Eighth Doctor stories and not the other lines that led into this. I’m glad to say this didn’t pose much of a problem at all. There wasn’t anything I noticed that required more context from other stories. As for the length it zipped by, managing to feel half the length of ‘Time of the Daleks’ despite being twice as long.

The biggest surprise for me was Colin Baker. Having not listened to any of his audio stories yet I was unfamiliar with his performance, but here he was delightfully nefarious, clearly enjoying himself in villainous mode, and give such a great performance I’m excited to check out his audios in the future (if I ever get through the Eighth back catalogue). McCoy is also extremely entertaining, and McGann gets a lot of meat to work with, really displaying his range. Unfortunately this means that Peter Davison gets lost in the wash as he’s left with possibly the most uninteresting and least fun of the characters to work with.

The story, whilst a bit all over the place is surprisingly easy to follow, at least until towards the end. There’s plenty of times in Doctor Who were I will lose the thread of a story or it will cease to make sense, and I’ll simply switch off, enjoy the ride, and trust that there is some kind of internal logic ongoing if I had the mental acuity to piece it all together. However whilst I managed to keep up with everything for the majority of the runtime, the denouement in the Foundry lost me. Maybe it was fatigue but I couldn’t really make sense of what was happening or how. Still this didn’t diminish my enjoyment of the overall story.

Overall a fun, chapter heightened by great performances, although Charley kissing Sylvester McCoy’s character whilst shouting “Uncle Winky!” like a little girl is something I don’t think I need to hear.

absolutely insane and maybe one of the best anniversary specials we’ve ever gotten for the show, I think I’ve finally “clicked” with Eight & Charley I understand them more and their dynamic and the fan service is plentiful with so many little niche references oh it’s wonderful.

zagreus is ridiculously high concept, full of fan service, and is a very pretentious length. and god, i absolutely adore it

The thing is that this is not a middling story. I just can’t decide if I love it or hate it.

The plot itself is all over the place and hard to follow. I don’t care much for Alice in Wonderland themes, or some of the implications of the story, or its treatment of Leela. Charley is cool but I have a few issues with her. And it relies heavily on recognizing voices, which is not my strong suit.

But oh my Rassilon, the lore. There is SO much here about Gallifrey’s history, and Rassilon, and that bit is great. It also has some fantastic Doctor moments and did give us Romana writing fanfiction.

So basically, this three stars is me giving it both 1 and 5 stars simultaneously.

I've had acid trips less weird than this.

I usually listen to these lying in bed with the lights off. I had to listen to this one twice in one day to make certain I hadn't dreamt it.

This audio has everything: in no particular order:

Vampires

Creatures from another plane of existence.

The old religion of Gallifrey.

The chesire cat from Alice in Wonderland.

Rassilon

Chopping wood

WW2

A priest

Creepy nursery rhymes

Charley's Mum

Carrots

Talking animatronics at war with each other.

Evil TARDIS

Multiple doctors only they're not playing The Doctor.

The Eighth Doctor trying to sacrifice himself yet again.