By Cavan Scott and Mark Wright

Big Finish, out now

To escape a pursuing Travis, Blake takes Liberator into an area of space despite Zen warning against it – and suffers the consequences.

Big Finish’s first B7 novel features the original Liberator line up, as well as Servalan and Travis, and fits neatly into the early adventures. Scott and Wright capture the personalities of the crew well – the POV scenes featuring Vila are especially noteworthy – although, perhaps appropriately, Gan is rather underused.

The Forgotten emulates the structure of the series at that point, with scenes for Servalan and someone for her to butt heads with separate from the main storyline, but takes it into more grey areas of morality than the broadcast show did – something which is also a hallmark of the new audio adventures. Blake’s idealism and Avon’s knowing cynicism are both put to the test when they meet another rebel against the Federation, one who is more than happy to cross the line whenever he deems it necessary.

There’s more than a flavour of the Star Trek episode Space Seed and its sequel, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan about the story (mysterious area of space that affects instrumentation;  a group of convicts taking over a ship), but with some key differences that mean the reader is never quite sure exactly how the crew will overcome the odds.

Verdict: Although occasionally slipping into B7 cliché, this is a good start for the new written adventures. 7/10

Paul Simpson

Click here to order The Forgotten from Big Finish

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