Robophobia

"The Sandminer where everyone’s worst nightmares came true."

Writer: Nicholas Briggs

Format: Audio

Released: July 2011

Series: Monthly Adventures 149

Featuring: Seventh Doctor

Synopsis

Nothing has ever been officially confirmed, but there is a rumour that on a Sandminer, bound for Kaldor City, the robots somehow turned homicidal and nearly wiped out the entire crew. Can that really be true?

The robot transport ship Lorelei has a cargo of over 157,000 robots on board, all deactivated. So even if there were any truth in the rumour of that massacre, there'd still be no danger. Surely, there wouldn't...

But then, the Doctor witnesses a murder.

Verdict

Robophobia was a great story to continue along the Monthly Adventures! I am a huge fan of the idea of having a sequel to The Robots of Death as there is definitely a lot of untapped potential in the Sandminer robots and the societies within which they inhabit. This was a fine job of revisiting them and having the continuity and recap with the aforementioned Fourth Doctor serial was a nice touch. It was important to establish events for the unlikely listeners who may not have had eyes on that famed classic, and it was a helpful reminder for me as I consume so much Doctor Who content that it's easy to forget exactly what happens and when! I liked the Seventh Doctor travelling solo again and it definitely seems like something more is going to happen here. Obviously, this story was released eleven years ago so I know that Liv Chenka goes on to return and have a more prominent role in Big Finish Doctor Who, and this was a fine introduction for her. I liked how she was a med-tech and that seems like a good occupation for a future companion. I'm sure she and the Doctor will get along splendidly when they reunite in the future, but she filled the companion role very nicely here. I really enjoyed the audio representation of the Sandminer Robots as a big part of their success was the striking visuals, but apart from the CD cover art, that is missing here so the voices play a big role in bringing them back to life and creating those images in the listener's heads which was something I thought Nicholas Briggs did a stellar job with. I thought there were a lot of similarities to The Robots of Death with the theme of the robots turning against the humans, and the idea of what happened on that Sandminer being a nightmare was terrific. How could it be possible that the machines built to serve humanity could then turn against them? It seemed like that was happening one again here on Lorelei and with the threat of 157,000 Robots on board, that was quite a lot of danger! Of course, it didn't quite turn out to be that way as we discovered Farel had dressed up as a Robot and was trying to shift the blame onto the Robots on a huge scale that couldn't be covered up like the situation the Fourth Doctor faced. I thought that was terrific knowledge to have post those events, which didn't seem like they were too far in the past from what was happening here. The truth regarding Elicien and this being Farel's deceased wife was a strong emotional turn but the Doctor seemed to have already worked it out. He was very much experienced with robophobia and the reveal that this was what Farel had used to try and justify his wife dying in a sandstorm was awfully harsh, especially as it was the Robots that tried to save her! I really loved that we had SV10 featuring as a follow on from SV7, and also having the Doctor mistaken for Tal Karus worked well with the Robots not being programmed to believe humans could die. Overall, this was a really strong outing and I'm sure it won't be the last of the Sandminer Robots from Big Finish, but it served as a fine introduction and return. 

Rating: 8/10