Never meet your heroes – they may drag you into all sorts of adventures…

Last year, Big Finish produced one of their audio originals based around the life of Cicero – which has no genre connections, as far as I understand. But the cast, led by Samuel Barnett, very definitely wanted to have a genre connection, and when the idea of a crossover with the Fifth Doctor was mooted, they jumped at it. What we’ve got, thanks to David Llewellyn’s carefully structured script, is a story that puts two alpha males together without making either of them feel weaker as a result (something that a large number of scriptwriters on network shows in the US could do with lessons in pulling off!).

Unusually for the Davison era, this is told in two disc-long episodes (Resurrection of the Daleks was broadcast in that format by force majeure – it was never intended to be anything other than a four-parter). It pays off, allowing us to get to know the characters (if you’ve a fan of just one or other of the series), as well as the characters to go through the Black Orchid-esque introductions and re-introductions.

The place in which Cicero, his slave Marc, and the Doctor, Tegan and Nyssa find themselves draws on multiple sources, and makes a cohesive whole from them. The constant one-upmanship between the Doctor and Cicero gives plenty of ammunition for Nyssa and Tegan to use against them, and Marc sometimes finds himself in the middle of all of them. All the regulars, from both series, sound as if they’re having fun, and George Watkins makes his, er, mark as Marc.

Verdict: Enough to make you seek out the Cicero series if you’ve not heard it, and a well-paced tale for the Fifth Doctor and friends. 9/10

Paul Simpson

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