Snake Head

"There's no such thing as a Varkolak."

Writer: Jonathan Clements
Format: Audio
Released: January 2005
Series: UNIT 1.02

Featuring: Emily, Dalton

Synopsis

A mobile phone call to the emergency services, a body found on Government land and an ancient burial site unearthed at an archaeological dig all point toward an odd mystery by the coast...

UNIT's new commander, Colonel Robert Dalton, and its political officer, Colonel Emily Chaudhry, investigate strange goings-on in Southend. What is out there on the beach? What happened to the recently found savaged body? And what of the man who's just been smuggled into the country?

Is this just a simple case for the local police or, as Chaudhry suspects, is there more to it than meets the eye...?

Verdict

Snake Head was an unexpectedly superb audio adventure! I was absolutely delighted listening to this one on a cramped train home from a job interview - it really perked me up after quite a draining day. I still haven't really recovered from a football trip to Slovakia, but I'm slowly getting there and I was really pleased with this story. The structure was so much better than Time Heals and the story was just modern with a neat twist. There wasn't exactly alien invasions or time travel, but we played off real life events and mythology and that worked fantastically. It's exactly what should happen in this UNIT spinoff series and I think things will be hard pressed to be topped from the remaining two stories. The Southend setting was new and refreshing and I thought Emily and Dalton getting the main character treatment with no sign of the Brigadier worked very well. I thought I was going to miss his presence as I knew in advance that he would not feature but I was pleasantly proved wrong. They have a great relationship and I think it's only natural that questions would now be asked of their potential relationship. Emily was reiterating on numerous occasions that he was not her boyfriend. I have expectations that the series will not quite end with them not being together, but I don't really mind either way. Continuing on the theme of Dalton not being fully invested in the whole extraterrestrial or supernatural involvement in UNIT matters was really good and I liked the frustration coming out in Emily because of his continued sentiments. I do hope that continues in the next story, even if we did have confirmation of the Varkolok for Dalton here. The mythology behind that was really good and I loved that the tensions involving the political situation of Kosovo were combined with the British issue of immigration. I found that quite intriguing nearly fifteen years since the audio was released and with it being set in 2005, presumably, a 2019 head looking back makes this a story of further interest in my opinion. When it comes to having a 2019 head, hearing the term ICIS being exactly resemblant of the current terrorist group is quite something. I guess their attempts to keep things internal might ring true of the real life organisation though! I really enjoyed the reference to The Coup and whilst I think things could've been expanded upon concerning the whole Silurians living in peace with humanity aspect of the plot, I do hope that will come later as it is a pretty monumental event. It's something the Doctor tried to achieve in The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood in 2020 so for it to be in effect is staggering really. The guest cast in this one were excellent and I thought Goran and Kevin were the obvious standouts. They were really good and interesting to learn about. The Albanian 999 call was another good element of the story, but I couldn't help thinking that UNIT must have some translation software - even if it was 2005! The ending was full of action which I enjoyed and the pace was good, and I liked how it seemed that there was no Varkolok after all with Dalton going on one hell of a rant was a superb false finish. Then came the real killing and even though the Varkolok did truly disappear once killed, Dalton had seen it in action to convince him of its existence. Its being invisible to anything that was not a Varkolok was great and I thought the ending with there being no evidence to clear up was very neat. Overall, a fine adventure to get this series well up and running!

Rating: 9/10