978-1-78575-425-8River Song is back – and this time she’s got two Doctors in tow…

The first series of The Diary of River Song was a highlight of Big Finish’s 2016 range. It gave context and depth to River, put her up against both the rulers of the universe and a woman in a very similar position to her and gave us a deeply creepy, very fun, sort of Doctor. It was ambitious, expansive compassionate storytelling.

Volume 2 is even better.

All four shows are directed by Ken Bentley but written by a different author. ‘The Unknown’ by Guy Adams opens with River as part of the crew of an Earth Survey vessel. The Saturnius has been sent to investigate a new planet that’s just appeared. But there’s a problem; they’ve been travelling towards it for days and it isn’t getting any closer…

Adams is handed one of the toughest jobs here; setting up the story arc, telling a coherent story and doing a Doctor team up story that erases itself as it finishes. That’s not a spoiler either, after all we know no incarnation of the Doctor prior to 10 actually knows who River is. Nonetheless, Adams manages to simultaneously explore their instinctive bond, tell a particularly great ‘Awfulness on a spaceship’ story and tie everything off in a way that feels neat rather than cheap. Plus, Kingston and McCoy bounce off one another delightfully and that rapport combines with the flat out sprint of a pace to produce a hell of an opening story.

‘Five Twenty-Nine’ by John Dorney could not be more different. Not just to the other stories here but to very nearly everything else the show has produced. River arrives on a quiet little island. It’s the near(ish) future and Emmett and Lisa (Robert Pugh and Ann Bell) enjoy a quiet life with their daughter, Rachel (Salome Haertel). Rachel is a synthetic, and she’s the reason River is here…

What unfolds starts like the usual Doctor Who puzzle box but soon becomes something more intimate, horrifying and emotional. These are the people that River spends the end of the world with and as their world shrinks, and quietens, their lives become as vital as they do fragile. Pugh, Bell and Haertel, along with a great supporting turn by Aaron Neil make you feel every second of the clock ticking down and the story plays thematically in a loosely similar way to the TV episode ‘Turn Left’. There’s the same sense of the solution not arriving in time, the same fatalistic approach but a deeper, rich undercurrent of compassion. River, in the end, is not the heroine here. She’s here to observe heroism in its quietest, gentlest form. Unique, heartbreaking and haunting this is the standout of the series with an especially impressive cameo from Dan Starkey as the announcer at the end of the world.

‘World Enough and Time’ by James Goss opens with River starting work at Golden Futures. Goss throws us in at the deep end, both with how the story connects to what went before and just what’s going on. We’re not alone either, as the Sixth Doctor makes his entrance wearing…a remarkably respectable tie?

Goss excels at the curdled horror of office comedy and his bone dry wit is on top form here. Even better, River and 6 are huge fun together and the nature of the story both cleverly explains what’s gone before and sets up the final story. It also, crucially, re-emphasizes the principal difference between River and her fella; the principled ruthlessness that’s kept her alive up to now. And that, as the finale demonstrates, also gets her in a lot of trouble.

‘The Eye of the Storm’ opens with River in prison. And the Doctor condemning people to death. And the OTHER Doctor trying to save them. And, well, it’s complicated. Like the rest of the series, it unpacks that complexity with a lightness of touch and wit that makes it all look easy. But as Matt Fitton’s script combines the terrified denizens of 1703, the end of the arc plot, River having to save the day again and two Doctors having a verbal slap fight, clearly a huge amount of work went into it. There’s one scene in particular where everyone converges that’s almost musical in its composition. That scene, in fact, is the sun the story orbits. The clash of ideologies between 6 and 7, the victims of the storm, the victims of Golden Futures, the consequences of River’s actions. All of it circling this single event, an event that is both cause and consequence. It’s incredibly smart writing, evoking River’s ‘main’ incarnations of the Doctor and the ‘corner of the eye’ monsters so beloved of the modern series but with a belligerently unique perspective. The ending brings not just the plot but the thematic nature of the series full circle, with River’s own twisted relationship with the Doctor providing the key for someone else’s final, impossibly brave act. It’s deeply moving stuff, romantic and horrific and spitting in the face of the monster that chases it down.

The ending also impresses, with River and 7 verbally sparring in a manner that would lead Steed and Peel to nod approvingly. 7 knows she’s going to be important to him, River desperately wants to come clean and well…it escalates from flirting to banter to a moment of private, quiet heroism. It’s a really smart, honest, complicated way of dealing with their complicated, untidy relationship. It also leads, in her final line of the season, to a moment of self awareness so glorious you can almost see River, and Alex Kingston, winking to camera.

Verdict: The Diary of River Song is fast becoming one of the jewels in Big Finish’s crown. As well as providing the sort of sideways perspective on Doctor Who that many of their series excel at, it’s also a clear eyed look at one of the show’s most complicated, interesting characters. That complexity is being channelled more and more into stories that are audacious puzzle boxes, equal parts character study and apocalyptic action movie. It’s a unique approach to a unique, complex character and it’s only getting better. Here’s hoping there’ll be more diary entries soon. 9/10

Alasdair Stuart