War Room: Allegiance: Collateral Victim

"You can die ignorant or you can die informed."

Writer: Alfie Shaw

Format: Audio

Released: August 2022

Series: Gallifrey 13.03

Featuring: Leela

Synopsis

Rasmus, Leela and Veklin are despatched into dangerous territory: a place where time itself is in tatters. One TARDIS and its crew has already been lost – will the Norvis system claim another?

Verdict

Collateral Victim was an excellent episode to continue my way through the Allegiance volume of War Room to serve as Gallifrey's thirteenth series! This was definitely the best of the boxset so far and the format was right up my alley. I'm a sucker for a story involving time and the jumping around Mellacron's history was brilliant. There was a complete lack of control for much of the story which was great and I really enjoyed the unpredictable nature of what was happening. There was no knowing when they would end up! I thought it was fun to split the group up and the dynamic between Leela and Rasmus in particular here was strong stuff. It was obvious that their minds were not their own for much of the story and that led to Leela challenging Rasmus in a big way when he was willing to see the people of Mellacron destroyed. They literally were just considered as collateral damage and I adored Leela's counter to his argument that they shouldn't exist. The fact was they did exist and so they needed help! That was tremendous. I am a big fan of her compassion and that is certainly something that seems missing from the Time Lords during the Time War. The search for Bandar was a good direction for the story but the more intriguing character was certainly Sorn. The truth regarding him as Bandar's very own TARDIS that had developed a conscience was excellent but it didn't stop there. A sentient TARDIS is more than enough for entertainment in its own right, but the achievement of trapping an entire galaxy within its interior dimension was incredible! That's a sensational concept and the fact Rasmus was considering it as a means of ending the Time War was very good. I'm all for finding ways to end the Time War, but I would have appreciated getting an insight into Rassilon's thoughts on this as a means of victory. I get the sense that he would not be content with the Daleks surviving in essentially a pocket universe believing they were victorious. He would want them completely wiped out in my opinion. I really liked Ephra as a character and her connection with Bandar was terrific. They'd built quite a relationship since he'd initially arrived and the way she utilised his ability to manipulate reality was fantastic. She gave Leela the power to merge TARDIS interiors which was delightful and something she revelled in as the means just came to her. The emotion that came from the episode drawing out with Bandar losing his mind and slowly his power was sad stuff, especially with Veklin once again showing her ruthlessness in killing Ephra and using her as a shield. She's a dark horse this one! I'm a big fan of her and she is quite the asset for Ollistra to have in her arsenal. Sending the planet as a temporal bomb literally straight into the Dalek fleet was quite the fate for this planet that had experienced a lot, but this really was wartime. There were no lengths the Time Lords were seemingly willing to not go, but they did accept that the plan of trapping the Daleks within a universe inside a TARDIS interior was not feasible when accounting for the natural expansion of the universe. They would have to continually be building battle TARDISes and that wasn't entirely feasible. It was an exciting idea though and one I absolutely got behind. Overall, an excellent episode! 

Rating: 9/10