Sven and the Scarf

"Seven years in space!"

Writer: Andrew Ireland
Format: Webcast
Released: 30 April 2020
Series: #DoctorWhoLockdown

Featuring: Sven

Synopsis

There's been a new arrival at Henry van Statten's museum...

Introducing alien researcher Sven, Adam Mitchell's predecessor at GeoComTex. Sven will feature in the forthcoming Dalek Target novelisation.

Verdict

Sven and the Scarf was a terrific little webcast adventure! This one served as a lovely prologue to Dalek to go along with the #TheMetaltron watch-along of what is, in my opinion, the best Ninth Doctor episode. It brings the Daleks back to the modern era in a sublime way and having all of the destruction with a singular Dalek makes the finale of Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways all the more impactful when there are literally hundreds of thousands of them. This webcast adventure took us back to the day that the Dalek was first brought to Van Statten's museum and I really do wish there could somehow be further stories within that setting. It's honestly so good and full of potential. Something like an episode in The Diary of River Song or even a second Jenny series would work absolutely perfectly. Here we were introduced to Sven who seems an intriguing character being placed as the predecessor to Adam Mitchell who would of course go on to be a very short-lived companion alongside Rose Tyler. I am very excited for the Target novelisation of this episode as anything more for the Ninth Doctor is something I am eager for and even though this won't exactly be new, it is an extension and something different which will be fantastic. I am looking forward to reading what role Sven has in the novelisation and how it ties in with the events we saw in the episode itself. The idea of having the famed scarf of the Fourth Doctor as a museum piece was magnificent and the dissection that occurred was very humorous, if not a little silly. But this is lockdown and it's all about having some fun which was definitely the case with this bonus story. There were numerous references to stories from the Fourth Doctor era which were really quite hilarious. The mocking of The Ark in Space with the bubble wrap referencing the Wirrn was a little sad, might the Doctor have now come into contact with some of the deadly wrap seen in Kerblam!? I'd like to think so. The reference to Terror of the Zygons and the part of a Zygon that was very possibly just pizza was terrific. I really liked the brief moment of "Eldrad Must Live!" which was a lovely throwback to The Hand of Fear and I also thought the use of the wires and the semi-recreation of that famed moment in Genesis of the Daleks was a good image, but slight overkill. Just how would these wires have got ingrained in the Fourth Doctor's scarf? Of course, there is something to be said about suspending belief for these lockdown stories and I fully appreciate that. My absolute favourite moment came when the cactus-like fragment was picked out of the scarf, even if for continuity purposes it was the incorrect scarf, and we had the reference to Meglos. However, it was the pun that followed about it nearly being a "mega-loss" that had me literally laughing out loud. I absolutely loved that. Really great moment and props to the writer for the comedy there. Sven initially suspecting that a green jelly baby might be an alien life form was quite funny and the moment he realised that it was in fact just a sweet was great. I thought the image of all of the different specimens in one little container and labelled was good and I was very impressed with the way this was filmed from Sven's point of view. That's quite a unique perspective which worked very well. Overall, this was a lot of fun even if it was slightly silly. That was just part of the appeal.

Rating: 8/10