After The Daleks

"You're all alone on an alien world."

Writer: Roland Moore

Format: Audio

Released: August 2021

Series: Early Adventures 7.01

Featuring: Susan

Synopsis

The Dalek Invasion of Earth is over, but there's still so much left to do. Susan is trying to help rebuild society as best she can, but some people don't see it as a chance to restore what was lost. Some people see it as a chance to claim power for themselves. 

It's not just human survivors that Susan has to worry about. Unbeknownst to her, a lone Dalek survives. A lone Dalek with a single purpose – to reclaim the Earth!

Verdict

After the Daleks was a magnificent audio to kick off the seventh series of the Early Adventures! I was incredibly excited by this release because The Dalek Invasion of Earth ranks as one of my all time favourite stories across all of Doctor Who, so getting a sequel and follow on from where the televised serial left off is right up my alley. I certainly wasn't left disappointed! This was well worth the pre-order and I thought Carole Ann Ford did a tremendous job in the lead role. Her linking narration was good when it was required and I was impressed with how little of that there actually was, It felt like a full-cast and feature length story which is exactly what you want. Although they were recast, I thought it was excellent to have David Campbell and Jenny in this story. They were such crucial parts of the original televised adventure that they just had to feature here. I thought the immediate follow on from where Susan was left was brilliant and hearing her reaction to the TARDIS dematerialising and her experience for the first time from the outside was superb. It really brought home the fact that she was no longer with her grandfather in the TARDIS, but that didn't stop her looking up at the stars in wonderment which was a really nice touch. One element of the audio that surprised me in a good way was David coming to terms with the fact that Susan might be an alien. It's intriguing to think that this isn't really alluded to on screen between the pair, so his sneaky use of the Dalek machine to hope to find if Susan was human or not was really good. I liked that it wouldn't change things for him and how he felt about Susan. The state of the world, and specifically the UK, after the Daleks were defeated is such a great place and time to explore. I really think there could be the potential for a whole series here depicting the rebuild after years of Dalek oppression. Victor was a really good character and exploring the emotion behind his decade as a Roboman was very powerful. He'd lost ten years of his life and after the orange slime had cured his condition, to him it had only been a few weeks since seeing Jenny so that was obviously going to impact their relationship! Marcus Bray was a fantastic villain and his political scheming was what you'd expect from someone in that position. Even after all that had happened, positions of authority were still important and he would do anything to get that power. Hearing of his past and how he aided the Daleks said a lot about his character and his selfishness. It was quite fitting that he was dealt with by the Dalek creature that was ravaging around the story. I thought it was fun that this wasn't a Varga or Slyther or anything we'd seen before. The ending of this audio was poignant with Susan having the opportunity to use the Dalek machine to travel into the sky and try and find the Doctor again, but she implemented the self destruct and ensured that it was indeed her choice to stay on Earth with David. That was a really nice moment. Overall, a brilliant story! 

Rating: 10/10