dwst0611_themanwhowasntthere_1417Charley learns a hard lesson about meeting your heroes…

Ian Atkins’ new story for the 8th Doctor and Charley Pollard is set during that time when the pair were wandering the universe having adventures. The Doctor knows that things aren’t right as far as Charley’s timeline goes but we’re long before the series of catastrophic events that result from her rescue from the R101. The Doctor’s enjoying help Charley see different times and places, and he’s happy to assist her to meet a hero. Except things don’t quite go according to plan.

India Fisher steps back into the younger – pre-Zagreus, pre-6th Doctor – version of Charley as if she’s never been away, with the story showing how the Edwardian adventuress copes with a situation that isn’t what she wants. Atkins captures the relationship between the Doctor and Charley well – setting aside there’s one anomaly that I’m surprised made it through the edit process (they meet someone that the Doctor doesn’t encounter till a later incarnation!), it slips neatly into the timeline, and has some well-judged foreshadowing (as well as a nice shout back to, of all things, Terror of the Autons!).

Verdict: A nicely twisting tale. 8/10

Paul Simpson