‘THE DYING LIGHT’
Please feel free to comment on my review.
Quadrigger Stoyn with the Second Doctor, Jamie and Zoe
It’s time for the second story in ‘The Quadrigger Stoyn Trilogy’ of ‘Doctor Who’! 🙂
Released in December 2013, ‘The Dying Light’ is a story that celebrates the 50th anniversary of ‘Doctor Who’ along with ‘The Beginning’, the first story of ‘The Quadrigger Stoyn Trilogy’. In my opinion, I found ‘The Dying Light’ a much better instalment than ‘The Beginning’ in the audio trilogy.
Now before I talk about ‘The Dying Light’, I want to stress that I know people will rate ‘The Beginning’ more highly than me. I wouldn’t want to take that enjoyment and praise from it. I’m sure a lot of people found something in ‘The Beginning’ that they liked which I couldn’t really find myself.
And to be fair, it is a decent entry, especially in terms of depicting the First Doctor and Susan’s escape from Gallifrey. With that said, I still don’t think it’s that great an audio adventure to listen to and I know people will argue that I’m misinterpreting some things in the story that I really shouldn’t.
This is particularly with ‘the Archaeons being involved with humanity’s development’ thing. If that’s not how it’s supposed to be in the story, then fair enough. But I still think it’s leaning towards that direction, particularly with the story taking place in Earth’s distant past and 450 million years later. 😐
Anyway, enough about ‘The Beginning’. Let’s talk about ‘The Dying Light’, which features the Second Doctor, Jamie and Zoe. This is one of my favourite TARDIS trios in ‘Doctor Who’ and it’s nice to have Frazer Hines and Wendy Padbury playing the Second Doctor, Jamie and Zoe throughout this story. 🙂
I’m glad they were chosen for this 50th anniversary celebration ‘Doctor Who’ audio story by Big Finish compared to say the Second Doctor, Polly, Ben and Jamie. It’s also nice that Terry Molloy continues to play Stoyn in the adventure and find out what became of him following ‘The Beginning’.
In the story, the TARDIS ends up on a dying world that is circling a dying sun. The Second Doctor, Jamie and Zoe are welcomed to Sanctuary – an entire monastery carved out of a mountain. It’s where Quadrigger Stoyn has ended up, being the Abbot of Sanctuary, and he has waited for the Doctor.
There are elements of ‘The Abominable Snowmen’ when you think about this story, especially when the Doctor and his friends are visiting a monastery. It’s also intriguing how Stoyn ended up on this dying world since he last met the Doctor on Earth’s moon, as it’s been thousands of years since then.
‘The Dying Light’ is a two-part adventure by Nick Wallace. I’ve come across Nick Wallace only once when he co-wrote ‘Second Sight’ with Justin Richards in ‘The Worlds of Doctor Who’ anthology released in 2015. It’s been quite a while since I’ve heard that anthology, but I enjoyed ‘Second Sight’.
The pacing of ‘The Dying Light’ is actually rather nice and this does feel like Second Doctor era adventure when the Doctor, Jamie and Zoe are visiting somewhere. It’s also very intriguing how Stoyn is unveiled to the Second Doctor team compared to how he was introduced in ‘The Beginning’.
Understandably, Stoyn wants to go back home, and he blames the Doctor for this situation he’s in. There are hints of this story dovetailing into ‘The War Games’ where the Second Doctor is eventually caught by the Time Lords. Stoyn almost risks the Second Doctor’s spatial-temporal location to the Time Lords.
Thankfully, the six squares that Stoyn uses for his beacon are left behind when he gets beaten and the Doctor takes and pockets the squares before he uses them again to form the hypercube to send a message to the Time Lords during ‘The War Games’. It’s so fascinating how these things tie together.
Frazer Hines is very good as Jamie in this ‘Doctor Who’ adventure. Jamie is the narrator of ‘The Dying Light’ in both episodes. I’m disappointed Wendy Padbury didn’t get a chance to narrate as Zoe in this audio adventure, but then again, I’m glad she appeared in this story anyway compared to ‘The Edge’.
Not that ‘The Edge’ is a bad story. Far from it. I just wish Wendy Padbury was in that story too as well as Frazer Hines. Anyway, it’s interesting how Jamie accounts events from his point of view during ‘The Dying Light’ and how he interacts with Stoyn and learns what he means to the Doctor. 🙂
I’m sure I’ve said this before many times, but Frazer Hines is very good playing Patrick Troughton’s Doctor in the Big Finish audios, particularly whether it’s a ‘Companion Chronicle’, a ‘Lost Story’ or an ‘Early Adventure’. I’ve yet to hear Michael Troughton playing his dad’s Doctor in a Big Finish audio story. 🙂
With that said, Frazer Hines captures the mannerisms of Patrick Troughton’s Doctor superbly on audio. It’s very easy to visualize the Second Doctor interacting with Stoyn. It carries forward the tense acquaintanceship that was in ‘The Beginning’ when the First Doctor interacted with Stoyn. 🙂
Wendy Padbury is equally very good as Zoe in this audio adventure. I must admit, Zoe doesn’t get a lot of character focus compared other ‘Companion Chronicles’ she’s been in like ‘Fear of the Daleks’. Then again, this is more Jamie’s story as he narrates it all. It’s a pity Zoe didn’t narrate one episode.
Then again, I appreciate Nick Wallace including moments where Zoe gets to use her technical expertise involving calculations, since she’s a clever girl with computers and such. There’s a moment when Zoe injures herself involving a cable at the TARDIS, and a stone hand smashing through a wall.
I couldn’t help think of stone giants from ‘The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey’ as well as ‘The Chronicles of Narnia: The Silver Chair’ (both book and BBC) when thinking about stone monsters that come out of nowhere here. Not sure I entirely understand the apparent stone monsters in this story.
As well Stoyn being the Abbot at the monastery, there are also characters like Ioan and Catherine, I believe, who appear in ‘The Dying Light’. I’m surprised director Lisa Bowerman or Wendy Padbury didn’t voice Catherine in the story. Lisa Bowerman did briefly voice a character in ‘The Beginning’. 😐
Terry Molloy continues to be excellent as Quadrigger Stoyn in this adventure. It’s a contrast to when he plays Davros in ‘Doctor Who’ as well as when he played Russell in ‘Attack of the Cybermen’. It’s fascinating how Stoyn has coped all this time since ‘The Beginning’ and that he has waited for the Doctor.
Stoyn has been monitoring the Second Doctor, Jamie and Zoe’s adventure before they came to Sanctuary on the dying world. He informs Jamie (or James as he calls him) that he knows he left Scotland to be with the Doctor in ‘The Highlanders’ and that he visited the Moon in the year 2070 in ‘The Moonbase’.
He also informs Zoe that he knows she left the Wheel space station to be with the Doctor in ‘The Wheel In Space’ and that she has visited Earth in ‘The Invasion’. Interestingly, Stoyn mentions that Zoe has also visited Null-Space. I’m sure that’s a reference to the first episode of ‘The Mind Robber’.
Mind you, I’ve always considered that to be the Void when Jamie and Zoe ended up with those White Robots before they and the Second Doctor visited the Land of Fiction in that story. Then again, it could be a reference to something else, as Null-Space is featured in ‘The Ghosts of N-Space’.
Interestingly, Stoyn doesn’t reveal to Jamie and Zoe that he and the Doctor are called ‘Time Lords’, but he does say that they come from a ‘race of gods’. He also states that Doctor committed ‘blasphemy’ by leaving their society. It’s fascinating Stoyn interprets this differently than the Doctor.
Then again, the Doctor has never probably revealed to Stoyn why he left Gallifrey in the first place in both ‘The Beginning’ and ‘The Dying Light’. That might be made up for in the next story of the trilogy called ‘Luna Romana’, but it’s fascinating that the Doctor hasn’t justified his actions to Stoyn so far.
After Stoyn is defeated and vanishes somewhere, ‘The Dying Light’ ends with the Second Doctor, Jamie and Zoe slipping away quietly in the TARDIS and not saying goodbye to people like Catherine at Sanctuary. It puts me in mind of the Doctor and his friends slipping away quietly in ‘The Moonbase’.
The CD extras are as follows. There’s a trailer for ‘Luna Romana’ with Lalla Ward and Juliet Landau as Romana and Terry Molloy as Quadrigger Stoyn. There are also behind-the-scenes interviews with Frazer Hines, Terry Molloy and director Lisa Bowerman, conducted by producer David Richardson. I’m disappointed Wendy Padbury wasn’t interviewed for this audio release, unless she recorded her scenes as Zoe on a different day compared to Frazer Hines.
‘The Dying Light’ is an enjoyable story to listen to in ‘The Quadrigger Stoyn Trilogy’ of ‘Doctor Who’ audios by Big Finish to celebrate 50 years of the TV show. Yes, I found this a better instalment in the trilogy compared to ‘The Beginning’. This felt like a proper Second Doctor era adventure to listen to.
That’s something I didn’t quite get with ‘The Beginning’, as I didn’t feel that was a proper First Doctor era adventure to listen to. Then again, Frazer Hines and Wendy Padbury are enjoyable to listen to as the Second Doctor, Jamie and Zoe as well as Terry Molloy playing Stoyn in this audio story. 🙂
Like ‘The Beginning’, this is the second time I’ve heard ‘The Dying Light’ for this review in 2023. I recall first hearing ‘The Dying Light’ in the car with my parents on our way home from a holiday in Bath in early 2014. I’m not sure if we listened to the entire story in the car, but I still enjoyed hearing it. 🙂
‘The Dying Light’ rating – 7.5/10
| The previous story
For ‘The Quadrigger Stoyn Trilogy’ was For the Second Doctor was
For Jamie was
For Zoe was
|
The next story
For ‘The Quadrigger Stoyn Trilogy’ is For the Second Doctor is For Jamie is For Zoe is |
| Return to The Second Doctor’s Timeline | |
| Return to Jamie’s Timeline | |
| Return to Zoe’s Timeline | |
| Return to The Doctors’ Timelines Index | |
| Return to The Companions’ Timelines Index | |
| Return to Doctor Who Timelines | |
| Return to Doctor Who | |
| Return to Sci-Fi |
Bradley's Basement 