Review by Doctor Squee (Host of Gallifrey Stands Podcast)
After the success of the Tenth Doctor Chronicles, Jacob Dudman is back as the Doctor. Just this time as the Eleventh.
We have tales of missing people no one remembers but one woman, of the Doctor and Kazran Sardick (Danny Horn) on one of their Christmas trips landing in a tree populated by primitive humans who fear going too low on the tree, of Dorium Maldovar (Simon Fisher-Becker) being dragged into a world of mystery early on in his acquaintance with the Doctor involving the “Beacon people” who are disrupting things for Doriam business with their Lighthouse and finally of Jane Austin in the republic of Great Britain that never should have been.
Writers AK Benedict, Simon Guerrier, Roy Gill, Alice Cavender have each found some great areas of the Eleventh Doctor’s timeline to dive into with different companions and ongoing Doctor Who characters as well as new. The stories are all very original but feel in the style of The Eleventh Doctor. But as great as the writing is in this set, the performances shine brightest for me here.
Jacob Dudman is uncannily like the Eleventh Doctor. His Tenth Doctor is great, but this seems another level of good. The little touches and quirks of his voice show how much he’s studied Matt Smith as the Doctor and, as he mentions in the extras, what a fan he was growing up (that last bit makes me feel old!)
But it’s not just Dudman’s performance. Fisher-Becker is perhaps even better as Dorium having lived with the character so long. He also talks in the extras of putting everything in the voice when the visuals aren’t available. This really shows and the larger performance in the voice suits the ever larger personality of Dorium. When we are met again with Kazran Sardick played by Danny Horn they explore a bit more of how his fathers treatment of him effects him and how he is fighting to be better than him which is a perfect mix of writing and performance. Everyone acting in this is at their best under direction of Big Finish polymath Helen Goldwyn.
I really look forward to more from Dudman as either of the Doctors he has currently done and any more he might care to take on. I wonder how his 12 sounds? If it’s as good as the high standard of this set I hope we get to hear it. 8/10.
Buy this set now on CD or download… https://www.bigfinish.com/releases/v/the-eleventh-doctor-chronicles-1630
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