Released: May 2014
Range: The Main Range
Range Number: 186
Starring Peter Davison, Sarah Sutton, Eve Karpf, Amy Ewbank, James Hayward, Jonathan Forbes, Ben Porter, Phil Mulryne & Francesca Hunt
Written by Gordon Rennie & Emma Beeby
Directed by Ken Bentley
The TARDIS brings the Doctor and Nyssa to a vast pyramid, floating in space. A tomb ship - the last resting place of the God-King of the Arrit, an incredibly advanced and incredibly ancient civilisation, long since extinct.
They're not alone, however. Another old dynasty walks its twisted, trap-ridden passages - a family of tomb raiders led by a fanatical matriarch, whose many sons and daughters have been tutored in tales of the God-King's lost treasure.
But those who seek the God-King will find death in their shadow. Death from below. Death from above. Death moving them back and forward, turning their own hearts against them.
Because only the dead will survive.
After Moonflesh, I was hoping for a more energetic story that may not have been the most novel or original, but was interesting enough to be an enjoyable slice of Who action. However, Tomb Ship seems to be a story which has squandered it's original-sounding premise with cliche upon cliche. Particularly when it comes to characters, it feels like writers Gordon Rennie and Emma Beeby just pulled out every Davison-era cliche that they could to create a story with a distinctly average flavour. This leaves a very bitter after-taste in the mouth.
The plot revolves around the discoveries in the heart of a tomb spaceship, which gives the play an Indiana Jones-vibe. However, this is completely uncapitalised upon, because the traps that the Doctor and the tomb raiders have to get around are so simple. There's nothing new about them, there simply the sort of thing that this genre has done before, and even others. For example, the key cliffhanger at the end of episode 2 is just a similar test to the one the Doctor set for the Elder Gods at the end of Protect And Survive, and the solution is exactly the same as the previous story. I'm sorry, but the blatant plagiarism of traps and tests is utterly ludercrous. If they had been similar traps, but with a difference that meant that the solution wasn't as obvious as it first appeared, it would have felt much more original. However, because they were blatantly ripped off of other stories like Protect And Survive and Death To The Daleks, it doesn't quite work. It just feels like the writers had no real interest in trying to tell an original story. The story therefore looses the interest of the audience very quickly, because it just feels like a parody of this genre of story. It also attempts to throw a family drama into in the mix, but it's a family drama that fails to have any drama. It feels like a soap, a simple drama with lots of shouting and anger, rather than actual emotions and moments of character development. I don't understand why some writers in Big Finish's retinue believe that shouting is equated with drama, because it's really not. It just means that a lot of moments loose there intensity, because everyone's shouting at one another trying to make themselves heard over each other. It just therefore collapses upon itself, making the final moments of the story unintelligible and simply full of noise. Yes, this may be audio, but subtlety is always the order of the day with regards to it. I just feel like the story also takes far too long to get going, with it only really starting half way through. That's proberbly why it decends into shouting, because it's running out of time to tell the story that it wants to. All of this makes the opening and closing episodes very unpalatable, but the middle episodes aren't much better.
The characters of the family are prehaps the story's greatest letdown, however. There simply cliches, with no life beyond the story. To be honest, there's little difference between the different characters, because each of them are the same: they go on the same journey, with little to distinguish them from each other. It just feels like that these are the same characters duplicated so more of them can die. Yes, one's a little bit more naive than the others, but that doesn't really alter anything. It still feels like the characters aren't important, despite the fact that one half of the story is all about the family. If it's all about them, then why create the blandest set of supporting characters ever. Not even Eve Karpf's character, who is mildly interesting can fire any life back into this story. Even the Doctor and Nyssa are written lazily, because nothing about them stands out. You could swap them out and put in the sixth Doctor and Peri, or the seventh Doctor and Ace, and little about this story would change. Even Peter and Sarah seem to realise this, and downplay the material, or at least Peter does. It's no wonder though, because the characters get very short shrift in this story. What was a surprise (in fact the only one to come out of this audio) was the surprise return of Hannah Bartholomew from Moonflesh. However, not only does this feel contrived in the extreme, Hannah never proved herself worthy in the previous story as a justifiable companion. Added to that, she only turns up at the end of the third episode, meaning that she's only twenty-five minutes with which to do stuff. And, let's be frank, she doesn't. There's also the whole issue of her dodging all the traps that the Doctor and co have spent an hour and a half working out how to get round. I just call that a load of rubbish. Francesca Hunt does the best she can, as do the rest of the cast (particularly Amy Ewbank and Eve Karpf), but the characters aren't there to begin with. Ken Bentley's direction also seems a little off, not quite in touch with the story. However, since it was so poor to begin with, it's no wonder. However, one element which is pitch perfect is the music and sound design from Richard Fox and Lauren Yason. The pair deliever what is most proberbly one of their most competent scores to date, with so much to recommend it. The atmospheric and haunting melodies are simply beautiful, and it just goes to show what happens when the right people get to work on something, even if in every other respect, your production is terrible.
Tomb Ship isn't particularly bad, not in the same way as Dark Flame or Eldrad Must Die! What it is, however, is one of the weakest examples of the main range trying so desperately to give itself some new life and failing miserably. Rennie and Beeby's script is littered with problems, and that's where the story falls down. If it could have pushed the boundaries with plot and character a little more, than Tomb Ship would be a resounding success. However, as it is, Tomb Ship ends up coming out distinctly average, which may be a surprise to some. However, were I to make a judgement on whether it was good or bad, it would proberbly fall in the bad camp.
Rating - 5/10
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