Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Cast: Derek Jacobi, Silas Carson, Pippa Haywood, Maeve Bluebell Wells, Samantha Beart, Angela Bruce, Richard Earl, Barnaby Edwards, Tom Forrister, Simon Ludders, David Menkin, Kai Owen, Wilf Scolding, Joe Shire.

It is a falsehood of our times that we are force-fed, almost as doctrine, as a mantra of deceitful moment of hope, that good people win in the end, that the lies of the social anarchist who pulls down walls whilst standing on the side-lines, acting in their own self-interest whilst orchestrating the ritual desecration of the soul of the good, will eventually be punished, subjected to an eternity of suffering for the wrongs that have been committed, is nothing more than a substantial, and cunning, lie.

Evil is highlighted by those that seek their own ends and allow the world to run its course whilst happily seeing their own desires met, and for that the character of the Master from the long running British television serial is the perfect example of a storm that destroys all that it hits whilst leaving a patch, the eye of the tornado, unscathed, the result being of an emperor with a beautiful garden to walk around, whilst all outside the walls is broken, ground to dirt.

The Master of Callous is an model of such long-term planning, of sitting on the edge of chaos whilst all is going to Hell, the long game that can stretch back years, for that one moment where the time is right to act, that the seeds sown are ones that bare the bitterest fruit.

The four episodes, James Goss’ Call for the Dead and The Glittering Prize, and Guy Adams’ The Persistence of Dreams and Sins of the Dead sees the idea of corruption, dishonest exploitation visit the mining colony world of Callous as both the person who dreamed of beauty and prosperity and the sentient Ood, are shown to be under a greater threat than one provided by the so called security office underneath the greedy eyes of Teremon.

Whilst the opening episode of The Master of Callous is particularly Master- light, that is not to say the insidious, devilish man of Galifrey is not to be found, like poison being carefully dripped into the ears of old King Hamlet, the tempest and death to come is put in place without the need to understand who is on the end of the phone, spreading despair, urging the miners and the Ood to die.

For the listener, the treat comes in the way that the four episodes knit neatly together. Not just as a story, but in the best traditions of a family saga, the storm consuming two generations and all they love, and the side events that those families do not witness. This is a story one comes bounding out the kennel and baring sharpened teeth in Guy Adams’ superb The Persistence of Dreams, an hour in which the listener quite rightly will question what they would do when left alone in a confined space as a guard, master of all they survey but without the freedom to enjoy it; indeed they are subjected to the insanity that comes with isolation.

An excellent four-part series, The Master of Callous carries on the fine tradition of long-term storytelling by Big Finish with exceptional heart.

Ian D. Hall