Finished listening to this superb adaption of a classic Fourth Doctor tale, an audio adaption of the novel as written by Terrance Dicks from an original script by Chris Boucher. I do mean this is quite literally a classic tale, not just that is a story from the classic era. Its as close as one can get to a Quatermass tale as Doctor Who ever got, although it has come close on a number of occasions. Sharing its DNA as much as rifting on a Kneale trope. Actually, I am being a bit lazy there. It shares some themes and even the atmosphere of a situation when Science is mistaken for occult activity. Modern science does not make much room for miracles or deus ex machina moments as they devalue resolution. But as a means of drawing the listener down a dark path with goblin creatures on all sides this tight bit of speculative fiction really gets us there;
"Like one that on a lonesome road doth walk in fear and dread,
And having once turned 'round and turns no more his head,
Because he knows a frightful fiend doth close behind him tred."
Its spoke near the start of the first episode. Beautifully intoned by Tom Baker in the transmitted episode, with the equally beautiful Louise Jameson pulling narrative chores on this three discer. And the Fendahl is a frightful fiend. From its sibilant hissing and dragging to its giant alien tapeworm appearance it is one of the nastiest looking, and sounding, nightmare creatures ever to drag its way into the life of The Doctor and his companions. Its weird and almost Lovecraftian, so terrible a life form that the frightened Time-lords tried to eraze all knowledge of its existance from the universe, going as far as to timelock its homeworld. A tale too terrible to tell?
Chris Boucher delivered a pretty taut horror thriller, amazing to think this reached a family audience of millions, given how truly horrible the Fendahl is. He must have felt on a creative high, writing this and some really exciting Blakes Seven stuff around the same time. The BBC produced some amazing and hugely influential stuff around this era. An era which predates social media, an era mostly without agendas outweighing the basic call to entertain.Sure, wedge issues could come in under the radar but never to the extent where it was crushingly obvious and drama killingly stifling. This story is literally a warning to the curious. Be ready and beware the answers one may find when digging deep. Like the greedy dwarves of Moria who dug too deep and sealed their own doom. The fluidity of the script is aided by a perfect reading by a wonderfully adaptive actress; Louise Jameson. It helps she played the main character Leela I suppose but she is a woman of many talents. A writer and a director as well. Her voice shifts from narrator to companion effortlessly, talented people like her make it sound easy, which I am quite sure it is not. I have heard her speak quite a bit now, among the many afterwards on the Big Finish CD extras. She is smart and witty and very generous with praise for those who have earned it. i had always hoped for a meeting at some point between her and a current Doctor, perhaps on Galifrey, in the very hell of The Time War.
It has not happened yet but....
