The Authentic Experience

"You've been thrown into the past."

Writer: Dan Starkey

Format: Audio

Released: January 2018

Series: Short Trips 8.01

Featuring: Sixth Doctor, Peri

Synopsis 

Tired of the old 9 to 5? The daily grind getting you down? Step this way to discover a universe of possibilities! If you're fed up with looking at screens all day, we can offer the authentic experience: whether you want to be as rich as Croesus and swim in gold, or feel the dirt and sweat of honest toil we're ready for your business. Forget the "Same Old", embrace the "New Old"!

(Terms and conditions apply)

Verdict 

The Authentic Experience was not the greatest of Short Trips adventures by any stretch of the imagination. I’m usually quite generous when it comes to blogging Doctor Who stories as I just love the show and all of the different formats its stories cross, but here I just couldn’t find myself enjoying the audio. I’m not sure if it was the circumstances of listening on a painfully long rail replacement bus after watching the football and seeing Cardiff City lose, but I just couldn’t get on with it. I was intrigued by the synopsis but I just felt the story was trying to do too much. When it clocks in at forty-four minutes long, there’s a lot of potential there for a strong story as I wouldn’t consider that short as the range title suggests. I mean there have definitely been full cast stories in the Ninth Doctor Adventures for example that have gone shorter. So I was bitterly disappointed that this just felt all over the place. Granted I may not have been in an ideal listening environment, but I just felt like the first half of the story was a mess and I didn’t entirely understand what was going on. The fact things started poorly for me made it hard to try and jump back in as nothing was pulling me in terms of enjoyment. I must say that I thought Nicola Bryant did a stellar job with the narration and I’m always impressed with how easily she differentiates her role as narrator from her character of Peri. It often does feel like there are two actresses present which definitely helps with proceedings. I never felt like the story really lived up to the synopsis which w sounded exciting with the advert format, but for me I was never buying what they were selling. The titular experience never really felt authentic and it certainly wasn’t something I would be buying! I wasn’t a fan of how long we had Peri referred to as a male because things moving in the direction of someone almost playing her as a character, and whilst there’s a good idea in the potential of Peri being utilised as a virus, I’m not sure how buyable or believable that was. Peri didn’t even seem convinced herself at the end! I thought the diminished role of the Doctor didn’t help either and that’s something I’ve never quite understood with the Short Trips range from Series 5-8 where we just have a different angled and expression face of whichever Doctor features in the story, even if their role is minimal. This adventure was crying out for Peri on the cover! I thought the moment the Doctor was trying to appeal to Peri and contact her through the past was decent, but there definitely could have been more elaboration on how he was actually going to find her considering she could literally be anywhere! There’s a lot of potential in the idea of mentally travelling back in time, but it just wasn’t handled overly well here. It’s a shame to say but I think if the concepts at the heart of this story were written by a more experienced writer or definitely in a story with more of a cast, this could have been better. But for now, this was not a favourite of mine.

Rating: 4/10