BIG FINISH’s THE TOMORROW PEOPLE audio 10 THE WARLOCK’S DANCE

 

BIG FINISH’s THE TOMORROW PEOPLE audio 10

THE WARLOCK’S DANCE

3 episodes

 

“Great. I get the creepy graveyard on the day that we’re looking for a pan dimensional monster. Lucky me.”

 

The original audio overran by twenty minutes and had to be cut. Nigel Fairs and Cavan Scott are the only two that have the full version on two dicks. A track of this score was re-used on a Dark Shadows audio. Sharon’s had a party Elena went to. Elena is trying to teach Paul to focus his powers beyond the Earth and use them at great distances.

 

Clare Jones goes missing from a circle in Coal’s Wood, 20 years before the present day. So that’s possibly release date for these audios. For this it is Oct 2004. THE NEW GODS was March or April 2003; THE DEADLIEST SPECIES July 2001 or Sept 2001; THE GHOST OF MENDEZ would be Sept 2001; THE SIGN OF THE DIOLYX is recorded in Jan 2001 but as that’s winter the date of the story might be May 2002. A NEW ATLANTIS is either May 2002 or April 2003. THE POWER OF FEAR is Sept 2002 or June 2003. THE CURSE OF KAAVEN is April 2003 or August 2003. ALONE is May or June 2004. THE SLARVIAN MENACE is August 2004. So the first ten audios seem to be from 2001 to 2004!

 

TIM is fixed and now wonderfully voiced by Trevor Littledale. He sounds a lot like the great Phillip Gilbert. John is having nightmares about voices that taunt him in a running storyline.

 

During Paul’s training, there is a psychic attack and Paul cries out about devils. Here we go again. Can a small village, a stone circle, pseudo break outs and possible TPs, mysterious disappearances, and maybe even deaths be far behind? Something was trying to enter our realm from another dimension. The Tp will go to the West Country Somerset to a village called Walter Oakley.

 

Reminded by his summer vacations, Paul talks of summer vacation with mom and dad. He talks of dad dragging them to book stores to find a book on tanks (?). Rain hammering on a caravan while they ate boiled potatoes and baked beans and corned beef every day while wandering around sleepy villages dragging them from one second hand book shop to another just in case they had the one book on tanks that he’s poured over 20 times before.

 

Rex Weir (perhaps named after Peter Weir of PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK, THE LAST WAVE, WITNESS, and others) is Clare’s godfather. His dog is called Scoutie. He talks to a Miss Maggie Ledge, a post mistress.  The Fairy Trees is the local pub. She talks to Hilda. Clare is daughter of Colin and Nicola (Sixth Doctor and Peri much?).

 

Once again, John lies about who he is, pretending to be a relative of Clare’s parents and Clare. Clare’s boyfriend was Phil Jared, who said angels took Clare away when she vanished 20 years ago to this day. Clare’s parents left town.

 

Elena mentions, “This is very Christopher Lee,” when Maggie tells her about witches and warlocks, devils and goblins.

 

In the woods, Rex, Scoutie, John, and a mind attacked Paul encounter angels trying to open a gateway. Maggie tells a creepy story to Elena in an effective sequence and a well-acted one at that. The cliffhanger at the end of ep1 is also effective as Rex tells John that the girl in the middle of the circle is Clare. A girl says, “Hello, Uncle Rex.” 

 

Clare vanished in 1984, 20 years ago. Paul notes that she hasn’t aged a bit in all that time.

 

The bird crashing into the door is reminiscent of THE BIRDS. More come into a window. Later, Maggie mentions a Sam who will come fix the window.

 

“Everywhere we go we encounter the same narrow minded idiots who refuse to believe what’s sitting in front of their stupid noses,” Paul complains.  Actually that’s not totally true: in the last audio, Ms. Patterson believed Elena right away and was a huge help to the TP and in fact was the first one to figure out they were in a dream.

 

Rex mentions a Dr. Pegg who is away at conference but who left a number for surgery at Ragstock.

 

The attack on Maggie and her death are quite unnecessary and ghastly but I guess that’s the point. A night goes by.

 

Rex mentions a Sargent Taylor. Rex was once Phil Jared’s teacher. Phil’s doctor was Dr. Tobey. Phil is better after a breakdown. Mr. Barlow at the big house who gave Phil a gardening job. 

 

Elena mentions moisturizing cream which is something Liz might have said about Peter in A RIFT IN TIME.

 

The last reported event was by a Reverend Sein Wright on April 18th, 1814. TIM found barren circles in Namibia in South Africa. 

 

Paul says, “Oh my head,” at least once in ep 2 and once in ep3. He thinks he might be getting old and will be staying in and reading computer manuals with John next. Paul being lured to the woods is also quite creepy with a sing song voice luring him interspersed with laughter. It’s quite effective, more so than any of the “scary” stories we’ve already had before this one.

 

“Join us, Paul. Join the dance,” the voice tells him. Something attacks Elena, John, Phil, and Rex at his place. Clare wakes up. Is the voice the voice of a male or a female? Paul calls it a buddy. He can’t jaunt and can’t escape in the cliffhanger at the end of ep2, the voice telling him, “There’s no escape at all.” He screams and is drawn through the gate.

 

I am glad the writer resisted the idea of killing Rex’s dog Scoutie although at one point it sounds like it whimpers in pain but we hear him after that. On the other hand, in ep 3 we don’t hear a lot of Scoutie barking so…BUT Eureka! Scoutie is alive by ep3’s end, like most of the animals, a bit afraid from the leftover energy.

 

There are also references to Columbo, Hades, Neverland, and the Wizard of Oz. Paul also mentions home consultant Laurence Roderick Llewelyn-Bowen. In the start of ep3, the voice tells Paul he is there for all eternity. On the other side, the fairies or whatever they are, are most perverse.

 

This also feels like an X FILES with an abducted girl returning without aging, aliens that pretend to be something else, science supernatural stuff, and a living thing containing other living things (also a bit like DOCTOR WHO’s THE CLAWS OF AXOS). Also very X FILES is no sense of closure with the “shock” ending. BTW FAMOUS MONSTER OF FILMLAND did a great article about shock endings (issue 99 maybe?).

 

The Halcolan are mentioned. The second in command is the creepy Procurer is the angel thing and she provides for the first in command, the Matriarch, who absorbs them in death (which makes this a bit like BLAKE’S 7 episode DUEL).

 

 

 

Clare, seemingly possessed---it’s not the real Clare, tells Phil that John is not even human. Elena tracks Rex who is lured; John tracks Phil. Paul found a being, a male trapped in the Matriarch, a being he is inside. When the whole village comes out toward the ring and then dance, I’m reminded of THE QUARTERMASS CONCLUSION. Paul also finds the real Clare inside the thing. He convinces her to revolt against the aliens. It’s a bit muddled as to which Clare is which and where she is and/or was. She closes the gap between the worlds. The villagers forget everything that happened. Clare is gone. Phil may never recover. John hopes the link is permanently broken.

 

In true BF (and grim DOCTOR WHO NEW ADVENTURES—recall once a nice old couple and their dogs die horribly in a 7^th Doctor/Ace novel) fashion, Rex hears the voices calling to him to start the dance once more. Scoutie takes tea? The voices tell Rex the animal doesn’t need him. What? Why did they have to end with that?

 

There’s also a strange promo for a DW spinoff with Romana, something calling out her full name AND another Sapphire and Steel promo, which is exactly the same as the last audio promo on audio 9.

 

So the verdict is that this was sufficiently creepy and effective, yet VERY unoriginal, cliché and even predictable. The main cast handles it well though Paul seems VERY unafraid when he’s in a living creature’s body in a wall with (if I can hear his mumbling well enough) maggots and tripe? Entertaining enough an audio adventure but rather grim and nothing we haven’t seen before elsewhere and probably better done there. It’s also VERY DOCTOR WHO in the end as well as all the other references I gave (QUARTERMASS CONCLUSION, X FILES, BLAKE’S 7) and Davidson, in his book JAUNT, mentions HELLRAISER, so it’s like that, too.

 

I can’t help but feel, almost half way through the audios, and they still haven’t found their way in THE TP universe, but making up their own and sort of lost their way, looking for story material. It’s sort of sad.

 

The other thing is: Paul (and maybe Elena, too?) are hung over from Sharon’s party the night before this adventure starts…I had the strong impression from the original series that the TP DO NOT DRINK!!!