Tag Archives: Phil Mulryne

Doctor Who: Wave Of Destruction. Audio Drama Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Tom Baker, Lalla Ward, John Leeson, Phil Mulryne, Karl Theobald, Alex Wilton Regan, John Banks.

We take radio for granted now, in much the same way as television, as any device that allows us to hear the words of another several thousand miles away from home, and yet we must remember what it must have been like to experience that sensation for the first time, the moment that radio burst into the home and allowed, for example, cricket fans to enjoy a day at Old Trafford, the first outside broadcast from The Albert Hall, and allow old soldiers to hear The Last Post from fields in France as commemorations of World War One were held to honour the fallen…we take radio for granted, but in the hands of dark forces, that benevolence of human spirit and endeavour can be turned against us

Doctor Who: Wave Of Destruction. Audio Drama Review. full post

(439 words, estimated 1:45 mins reading time)

Doctor Who: Wave Of Destruction. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 7/10

Cast: Tom Baker, Lalla Ward, John Leeson, Phil Mulryne, Karl Theobald, Alix Wilton Regan.

The insurrection of music in the 1960s, of having the bravery to go against Government control and play songs that not only inspire the young but in which the world now turns, was a battle that was worthy of any high sea drama and one that was important to win; one side in the war to play music that people actually wanted to hear against a near tyranny who wanted impose their own set of rules and standards…a war that that the unfortunate side effect of allowing advertising to creep ever further into the world and something far more disturbing.

Doctor Who: Wave Of Destruction. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish. full post

(457 words, estimated 1:50 mins reading time)

Doctor Who: Psychodrome. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Peter Davison, Janet Fielding, Sarah Sutton, Matthew Waterhouse, Robert Whitelock, Phil Mulryne, Camilla Power, Bethan Walker.

We are made up so many different facets in our genetic and mental make-up that it somewhat surprising that more is not made of the split personality within the world of Science Fiction. For The Doctor, the many personalities that have lived and also have the potential to do so hides perhaps a frightening question, does the Doctor ever really know himself, even he meets parts of him in someone else?

Doctor Who: Psychodrome. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish. full post

(603 words, estimated 2:25 mins reading time)

Terry Nation’s Survivors: Audio Drama Review. Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Caroline Langrishe, John Banks, Chase Masterson, Terry Malloy, Adrian Lukis, Camilla Power, Louise Jameson, Sinead Keenan, San Shella, Lucy Fleming, Ian McCulloch, Carolyn Seymour, Phil Mulryne, John Dorney, Lisa Bowerman.

For those that remember with fondness or indeed with a tightening grip of fear Terry Nation’s 1970s apocalyptic serial Survivors, the frightening aspect of a civilisation falling apart very quickly is one that is perhaps the most powerful and enduring images of its time and is probably matched only by the television film Threads a decade later. To see it happen on screen as part of a drama is one thing but to have it re-recorded by audio drama specialists Big Finish, already the guardians of the legacy of Doctor Who in audio form as well as establishing a great following with their episodes of the likes of The Avengers, Sapphire and Steel and Blake’s 7, is quite a different proposition.

Terry Nation’s Survivors: Audio Drama Review. Big Finish. full post

(675 words, estimated 2:42 mins reading time)

The Avengers: The Lost Episodes. The Radioactive Man. Audio Drama Review, Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Anthony Howell, Julian Wadham, Lucy Briggs-Owen, Phil Mulryne, John Banks, Tim Bentinck, Beth Chalmers, Anjella Mackintosh, Richard Franklin, Kieran Bew, Colin Baker.

Some stories are just so timeless that they can be placed almost anywhere within a certain epoch and they would still resonate and be explosive as if set with a timer, a red and yellow wire attached and the words caution, contains volatile and unstable elements stamped in black broad letters on its outer box.

The Avengers: The Lost Episodes. The Radioactive Man. Audio Drama Review, Big Finish. full post

(563 words, estimated 2:15 mins reading time)

Doctor Who: Breaking Bubbles And Other Stories. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Colin Baker, Nicola Bryant, Jemma Churchill, Andy Secombe, Allison McKenzie, Janet Henfrey, Jessica Knappett, Paul Panting, Anjella Mackintosh, Phil Mulryne, Johnny Gibbon, Toby Fountain.

 

There are times when Big Finish pulls something rather terrific out of the bag and what the listener hears is the culmination of endeavour, love and devotion mixed with the art of excellent story telling. There are many full length stories that fall into the category, some with so much ease that they feel as though the writer has had the moment of divine interpretation placed between their ears. On the rarer occasion, it falls to four separate writers to bring out the special in the speciality in providing a voice for the much loved Time Lord.

Doctor Who: Breaking Bubbles And Other Stories. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish. full post

(655 words, estimated 2:37 mins reading time)

Doctor Who: Tomb Ship. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish Productions.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * *

Cast: Peter Davison, Sarah Sutton, Eve Karpf, Amy Ewbank, James Hayward, Jonathan Forbes, Ben Porter, Phil Mulryne, Francesca Hunt.

It is worth remembering that Big Finish have been producing Doctor Who audio dramas now for almost 15 years, nearly 200 separate adventures in the main canon as well as the plethora of spin offs involving the very best of companions, so occasionally you listen to a story, in this case Tomb Ship, and you nod your head with great understanding that it didn’t just miss the mark, it hit the larger target next to it and disturbed all the arrows that seemed firmly in place.

Doctor Who: Tomb Ship. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish Productions. full post

(480 words, estimated 1:55 mins reading time)

The Avengers: The Lost Episodes Volume 1. Square Root Of Evil. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Anthony Howell, Julian Wadham, Lucy Briggs-Owen, Phil Mulryne, Beth Chalmers, Tim Bentinck, Alan Cox, George Rainsford, Kieran Bew, Blake Ritson, Sophie Aldred, Colin Baker.

The murky world of forgery and counterfeit are the next in line to be investigated by John Steed and it gets all a little too close for comfort for him as the net closes in the third of the rejuvenated lost stories of The original Avengers scripts, the Square root of Evil.

The Avengers: The Lost Episodes Volume 1. Square Root Of Evil. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish. full post

(392 words, estimated 1:34 mins reading time)

Hot Snow. The Avengers: The Lost Episodes. Volume One. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Anthony Howell, Julian Wadham, Camilla Power, Colin Baker, Tim Bentnick, Adrian Lukis, Phil Mulryne, Blake Ritson, Anjella Mackintosh, Kieran Bew, John Banks, Richard Franklin.

Arguably The Avengers was one of I.T.V.’s flagship programmes that for its time possibly rivalled B.B.C.’s Doctor Who for its intrigue and audience adulation. Like the B.B.C. though, the television programme‘s early broadcasts were not as keenly looked after as they should have been.

Hot Snow. The Avengers: The Lost Episodes. Volume One. Audio Drama Review. Big Finish. full post

(607 words, estimated 2:26 mins reading time)