The Doctor, Rose and Adam are caught up in a temporal tsunami – but can the new arrival on board the TARDIS cope?

Scott Handcock steps up for the third story in this box set, with a story set between Dalek and The Long Game. Adam Mitchell has gone from being the brightest guy around – and used to the acclaim that came with it – to being something of an also-ran, following the advent in his life of the Doctor, and Handcock picks up on that sense of untethering and discomfort in this story. Bruno Langley seems to step back effortlessly into a role he last played twelve years ago, recreating Adam’s less than perfect attitudes towards the situations in which he finds himself, aided by some brief but appropriate additions to the narration.

Handcock also provides some good insight into the characters of both Rose Tyler and the Ninth Doctor and the depth of the bond between them – which, you have to remember, has been seriously tested by the events of Dalek. Going the “long way round” for the Doctor also means that there’s been a real gap for him between Dalek and The Long Game, which perhaps explains the change in tone between the two episodes. Nick Briggs once again produces a fine rendition of the Ninth Doctor, with his Rose more stable (and possibly strong!) than in the previous adventure. The door’s left open for further stories in this “gap”, with it seeming at the end as if the Doctor is accepting Adam on board the TARDIS…

Verdict: An interesting extrapolation of a character we didn’t get to see as much of on screen as he perhaps deserved. 8/10

Paul Simpson