Monday, 5 August 2019

Big Finish Reviews+ The Monsters of Gokroth by Tony J Fyler



Tony does the monster mash.

There are characters studded throughout Doctor Who history who spark the imagination, who make you think ‘Oh, they’d have been good in more adventures than they got.’ Mags, the werewolf brought to the Psychic Circus in The Greatest Show In The Galaxy is certainly one such character, mostly, if we’re honest, because of her sympathetic portrayal by Jessica Martin.

Big Finish exists for many reasons, but one of them is the opportunity to fill in gaps, to open cracks in the canon and hear what might happen if we fleshed out events we’ve only dared imagine before. So, welcome back Mags, for three adventures with the Seventh Doctor as he’s getting on, putting things right, tidying away loose ends, rather than bringing down staggeringly powerful Elder Gods. He feels he has unfinished business with Mags, and goes to seek her out.

Mags, again played by Martin, is on a mission of her own, tramping across the planet Gokroth in this, the first of her three return stories, written by Matt Fitton. Gokroth has… monsters. It has frightened villagers. And it has a mad scientist in a tower. Do you really need to know any more?

We’re off to the races with a sci-fi take on some classic horror movies. Where are the monsters coming from? Are they being engineered by the mad scientist? Will the crowd ever take the plunge and storm the castle, pitchforks a-go-go? And what’s in it for Mags either way?

There’s a sub-story here about narratives, what they need, how they change and, especially at the mid-point in the story, how they can sometimes get pulled right out from under you. When Mags goes in search of the woman who might be able to help her regain control of her Vulpanan instinct to change with the phases of the moon, she instead runs into the Doctor, who sets himself up as a better authority, more able to help her achieve her goals. The nature of reality and truth is the prize up for grabs on Gokroth – but whether the terrified natives have either the gumption to seize it, or the guts to deal with what they discover, are entirely different questions. Meanwhile, Sylvester McCoy’s Seventh Doctor has his work cut out trying to get reason to prevail in a climate of binary contempt and fear, of secrets, lies, fake news, questionable history and the seductive notion of blaming the ‘other.’

McCoy is on top form in this story, delivering a Doctor closer to the version from the TV movie than to his early, busy, chess-playing, god-bating days. It’s a brave way to take his character development (and of course, it doesn’t stop anyone delivering more stories with a ‘younger’ Seventh Doctor in the future), and it helps to see this Seventh Doctor, while not exactly mellowing as such – he’d still be standing in the way of tyrants whenever it was necessary – but focusing more on the small stuff, the missteps, the paths not taken and the setting right of things unfinished. It speaks of a Doctor settling down to his life, all the most important elements on his to-do List of universal housekeeping ticked off, a Time Lord free to do individual good deeds for good people, rather than battling behemoths from the dawn of time.

Jessica Martin too fits back into the voice of Mags as though no years had passed since The Greatest Show. She has an interesting journey in this story – deciding whether to continue as planned and seek out the help of Dr Maleeva (she of the tower, and sounding too much like ‘Malevolent’ for it to be a coincidence that she’s portrayed as evil), or to put her trust in the funny little man with the strange blue box. The years between the Psychic Circus and Gokroth have not, we feel, been particularly kind to Mags, haunted as she is by the unpredictability of her own nature and the colossal potential for murder and mayhem that comes with it. There may well be monsters on Gokroth, but when we meet her again after all these years, Mags isn’t sure that she’s not one of them.

What we get through the course of this story’s ups and downs is a through-line where the Doctor is able to face the truth, no matter what it is, and when he offers to help her overcome her problems and get on with her life, Mags joins the Tardis and becomes a fully-fledged (or indeed fully-furred) companion. It’s been a long time coming, and The Monsters of Gokroth is a busy tale of truths, half-truths and nothing-like-the-truths from which Mags and the Doctor emerge surer of each other, ready both to trust and to travel, to find the answers to the outstanding questions of her life.

Pop along to Gokroth, and find the monster inside yourself.

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