BBC Sounds, September 18, 2023

A year after her encounter with the Doctor, Cleo hopes to see the Time Lord again – particularly given her current investigations.

This second – considerably shorter – series of Doctor Who Redacted has dropped, pretty much without fanfare, with an episode a week (or if you’re in the UK, the entire series on BBC Sounds now). The first run focused on the search for Jodie Whittaker’s Doctor, but obviously she’s now not the current incarnation, and I’m guessing that it’s unlikely we’re going to hear David Tennant over the next six weeks (although the trailer indicates that there are more characters from past Doctor Who and spin-offs on the way).

Juno Dawson is one of the few creatives from that first season to return – James Goss is now producing, with Bethany Weimers directing and Rob Harvey on sound design duties – and there’s definitely a different feel to this first episode. It’s perhaps summed up best by Cleo’s comment about the status of The Blue Box Files (the podcast within the podcast). This feels a little like it’s lost something of its earlier almost isolation from other spin-offs, with the crossovers with Big Finish more blatant, and a large Torchwood connection, and it needs to maintain its own separate identity.

However, many of the strengths of Redacted (which now seems a slightly odd title for the series!) continue – its portrayal of different lifestyles is central (an abortive date for Cleo rings horribly true), and the relationship between Cleo’s friends Shawna and Abby has moved on to a new level, which has left Cleo as something of a third wheel, putting herself in danger.

Verdict: A welcome return for this less well-known corner of the Doctor Who universe. 7/10

Paul Simpson