Can an elderly scientist really hold the key to preventing climate change? The Doctor isn’t at all sure…

In the summer of 1973, the Doctor Who team knew that it was likely that they’d be asked to prepare an omnibus version of one of the previous adventures for broadcast over the Christmas period, prior to the broadcast of The Time Warrior’s opening episode. But someone had a bright idea – what if, instead of simply repeating The Green Death, a new special Christmas episode could be prepared? A longer story than usual, designed to be aired either in one go, or split into three parts for later broadcast? And so was born Terror of the Master – a tale that saw Jon Pertwee’s Doctor and UNIT face off against Roger Delgado’s renegade Time Lord, at a time when it was clear that the Doctor’s reasons for staying on Earth were diminishing. After all, he had his freedom restored by the Time Lords, and Jo had left… And now, Big Finish have produced an audio version of Trevor Baxendale’s novelisation of that story.

Of course, we all know that the above is nonsense – Roger Delgado’s death meant that Frontier in Space provided an untimely full stop to his appearances, and the idea of a Doctor Who Christmas Special wasn’t anywhere near a high priority for the BBC1 Controllers. But that’s what this feels like – Jon Culshaw reading the Target book, just as he’s done for BBC Audio over the past few years, rendering all the characters with their distinctive tones, and with Steve Foxon providing a soundscape that’s both very familiar and yet different from that which would have been on TV.

Baxendale hits all the required notes (I almost cheered when some extremely recognisable phrases appeared), and gives us a story that uses some of the Master-ly tropes that became all too familiar in Season 8, combined with some fresh ideas (and a couple of visual images that would have been… interesting to see in 1973!). Combine that with Culshaw’s often spine-chillingly accurate vocals and you have a story that I really wish I’d seen (and weirdly, now feel that I have).

Verdict: If it had been broadcast in 1973, 10 year old me would have adored it – and the rather older 2021 version does too. 9/10

Paul Simpson

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