Secrets of Telos

"The man is becoming cybernetic."

Writer: Matt Fitton

Format: Audio

Released: January 2022

Series: Fifth Doctor Adventures: Forty 1.01

Featuring: Fifth Doctor, Nyssa, Tegan

Synopsis

Professor Parry's expedition to the tombs of Telos was hardly an unmitigated success. The handful of survivors limp home  in a spaceship... unaware that the deadly peril they faced from the Cybermen is not yet banished. 

Into this situation stumble the Fifth Doctor and his friends Nyssa and Tegan – and they're soon in a deadly fight for their lives.

Except things aren't quite that simple – something odd is happening to the Doctor. He's suddenly in a different part of his own timeline inhabiting his future self with no idea of why or how this has happened.

Who is bouncing him through time? And what could they possibly want?

Verdict

Secrets of Telos was an excellent start to Forty! I love the idea of the Fifth Doctor getting a double boxset to celebrate forty years of his incarnation, and although my opinion has since changed he was my favourite Doctor when I delved into the Classic era so I love that we get to celebrate him here. I wasn't expecting it to start with a sequel to The Tomb of the Cybermen, but that's an idea I absolutely love and it was pulled off very well. I was intrigued by the concept of the Doctor jumping forward into his timeline from somewhere shortly afterwards the events of Four to Doomsday to somewhere shortly after Arc of Infinity. The big difference between those two timeframes was the missing companion in the form of Adric. The Doctor trying to get knowledge about the fate of his companion was intriguing because that was knowledge he just couldn't be allowed to have. Nyssa and Tegan trying to come to terms with the Doctor being from the past was fantastic and I liked the issues it presented. I liked that we never actually got an answer as to why the Doctor was pushed forward on his time vector to lead into the next story where it seems that he's been transported back to when he belongs. It was delightful to have some returning characters from Tomb on audio with Parry and Mr Hopper featuring extensively and I was fascinated that for them it had only been around six hours since they departed Telos. They took some time in coming to terms with the fact the Fifth Doctor was the same man they met and who helped them defeat the Cybermen, but they eventually came around which was nice. I loved the throwback to the serial that this is a sequel of with the droney version of the Cyber voice and it was also nice to have another infiltration of Cybermats. Tegan's relationship with Hopper was amusing as he was sexist and she wasn't having any of it. The Doctor realising that Tegan and Nyssa had knowledge of the Cybermen when he hadn't encountered them yet in their presence was superb, and the build to the cliffhanger at the end of part two was outstanding. After an ejected Cyberman continued to knock from outside in space to the ship, Hopper being killed and then the ship going into free fall to the planet that shouldn't exist and didn't show up on any charts, Tegan blurted out that they were going to suffer the same fate as Adric. The Doctor's reaction was one of being stunned and I'm fascinated to see if he will retain the knowledge that Adric will die. That will be tough for him to live with if so! The shift in story once we got to Telos Minor was great and it felt like its own distinct adventure which is often what you need in a four-part adventure. Vansom turned into quite the villain with her use of Cyber technology and her sick desire to create soldiers for Earth's military to sell on. The Cyber Converters were those failed experiments on up to seventy subjects which stalked the forest and sparked a whole new sense of danger with the unfinished Cybermen going down as pretty scary indeed. The manufacturing process on Telos Minor was brilliant and I loved how crazed Vansom was and how she saw the Cybermen as perfect with their mixture of organic and machine. The Cybermen didn't feel the same way as her though as she was seen as the source of corruption for those Cyber Converters that were seen as aberrations, in something not too dissimilar to the Daleks on numerous occasions. The factory exploding though brought things to a swift end and it was nice that Parry and Morton wanted to stay behind. Overall, this was a tremendous opener to the boxset and a worthy adventure to celebrate forty years of the Fifth Doctor! I look forward to hearing more.

Rating: 9/10