Infamy of the Zaross

"The show must go on."

Writer: John Dorney
Format: Audio
Released: November 2017
Series: TDA 2.01

Featuring: Tenth Doctor, Rose

Synopsis

When Jackie Tyler takes an away day to visit her old friend Marge in Norwich, she finds her holiday immediately interrupted in the worst way possible - an alien invasion! The infamous Zaross have come to take over Earth. Or have they? After Jackie calls in the Doctor and Rose to deal with the menace, it soon becomes clear that this is a very unusual mission indeed.

The Doctor is about to uncover one of the most heinous crimes in the history of the galaxy. And if he can't stop it... an awful lot of people are going to die.

Verdict

Infamy of the Zaross was a very good audio adventure and a great way to spend my birthday! I have been dying to get the second series of the Tenth Doctor Adventures now but I just couldn't justify the £35 price tag for three stories and I could never seem to find a good offer on eBay. Thankfully though, with enough hints directed towards my girlfriend, I unwrapped the set today and just had to start it straight away! Hearing David Tennant and Billie Piper reunited was an absolute treat and I thought the era of Series 2 was pretty well captured. I liked having Jackie in the story as well and I thought the shift in setting from London to Norwich was really refreshing. I particularly enjoyed that Norwich's proximity to alien invasion was referenced. The Doctor not having heard of the Zaross was intriguing given his knowledge but as Rose mentioned, he couldn't possibly know of every single alien species. Even the ones that were prone to a planetary invasion. What made this all the more interesting was when the TARDIS didn't recognise them either. Now things began to fall into place and after hearing the retake scene much earlier in the story, the truth was soon revealed. The Zaross weren't actually invading Earth, they were just filming for a television show and had made it look like the planet was at their mercy! It was quite extraordinary but they were actually killing people and the Doctor was appalled in the greatest possible regard. He was vexed. Rose was disgusted too and I liked that Jackie didn't know the truth until quite a bit later than the pair. I did love how she just called the Doctor and Rose to Norwich when an alien invasion had occurred. The calmness was terrific and I really enjoyed that they had arrived their early and were hiding. That was quite humorous. Ikron was a decent villain and his role as the director of the show was very good. The reveal that the Zaross were actually the Forzell, the very species the TARDIS identified them as having the closest resemblance to, was unexpected and the way the Doctor ridiculed that was great. I thought the Tenth Doctor was on top form for this story and I particularly enjoyed how he convinced the Zaross to turn on the producers of the TV show after it turned out they were just a wheel in the cog and would soon be killed once their ability to pull in viewers faded. The fact they were oblivious to that was quite startling. I really liked how they wanted to make sure that the Doctor and Rose got away before enacting their revenge. Jackie's relationship with Marge was quite good and I thought Jess was decent too with her obsession with fame. She was taken with the offer of intergalactic celebrity status but Rose wasn't too pleased with her actions. Overall, a very good audio adventure!

Rating: 8/10