Conversion

"You will not die. You will belong to us."

Writer: Nicholas Briggs 

Format: Audio

Released: November 2005

Series: Cyberman 1.03

Featuring: Brett, Samantha, Barnaby 

Synopsis

Fear is humanity's greatest enemy. The Cybermen can free us from it.

The Cybermen...

The great civilisation we could have been...

If we'd taken another path. A purer path.

The Scorpius strategy is now in full operation.

There will be victory in Orion...

THERE IS NOTHING TO FEAR...

Verdict 

Conversion was another excellent audio to continue the first series of the Cyberman spinoff wonderfully! After a shaky start things have really been set in motion and I loved how the Cybermen were a lot more prominent in this story. For the first time in the series, the story became about them. I thought that would have happened straight off but we were introduced to the Orion War between humans and androids but I just love what the role of the Cybermen is going to be in that battle. Through partially converting Paul Hunt, something the story started with in a neat flashback, the Cybermen had replaced the President of Earth and had now somehow persuaded Brett to go ahead with a plan to convert a sample of humanity into Cybermen. We as listeners know they won't stop there but they might delay things to make conquering humanity a lot easier by destroying the androids. The Cybermen need humans to extend their race so they'll obviously be against the side of the androids in the war but their reasons will absolutely be selfish. The continuation from Fear was excellent with Samantha and Barnaby suffering from the effects of the first stage of Cyber conversion in very different ways for obvious reasons. Barnaby was falling under the influence of the emotional inhibitor fluid as he was human but to Samantha, an android, it had a similar effect on her to food poisoning. Our Samantha does love a good kiss as we heard in the last story with the Prime Reordin but here she was constantly snogging Barnaby to keep his emotions and feelings in check and ensure he didn't submit to the Cybermen. With it already established that he found her attractive, I imagine Barnaby was delighted with what was happening. The dialogue between him and Samantha was once again superb and I really do love their relationship. It was strengthened so much that she would ensure he, the enemy, would not die and even admitted that she didn't want that to occur. She was more focused on the threat the Cybermen would soon pose. I get the feeling the Cybermen are actually going to unite both sides of the war in the next story which is set to be an epic finale to the series. I did not expect things to be headed for Telos but I'm very excited for it! There were fantastic references to The Tomb of the Cybermen and Scorpius which I always love and I'm now just intrigued to see the dynamic shift with what I imagine will primarily be a story not set on Earth. But a lot happened before we got to that point. I was interested by Brett's speech and considering she's the President of Earth she wasn't half being directed and listening to others rather than making the choice herself. Paul really is manipulating her brilliantly. I'm not sure how long it will continue but I'm interested so they're doing something right. I must admit I was a little sceptical about this spinoff series before listening because it didn't get a second series for a long time but after Big Finish offered the first story for free and the other three stories at a combined £8.97, I just couldn't not buy them. I'm now delighted I have though because it's been fantastic thus far! Overall, another brilliant story and the series finale has been set up very nicely. I'm really looking forward to seeing how this concludes!

Rating: 9/10