The Belly of the Beast

"We don't need to kidnap workers. We grow our own."

Writer: Jonathan Morris
Format: Audio
Released: February 2019
Series: Missy 1.04

Featuring: Missy

Synopsis

Missy's scheme nears completion. All she must do is subjugate one little planet and bend the inhabitants to her will.

But slaves will keep rebelling. It's almost as if they don't want to unearth an ancient artefact to fulfil Missy's plans for universal domination.

She'll have to do something about that.

Verdict

The Belly of the Beast was a great little audio to conclude what has been a sublime first series of Missy! I had high expectations going into this series, but I have to admit that they even exceeded my hopes. It was absolutely brilliant from start to finish and whilst this one didn’t quite live up to the first three stories, that’s just testament to the quality of the series because this was still a brilliant adventure! One thing I will say is that I think the format of this audio had been done before so that may be why it was slightly down on the others as it became a tad predictable, but I fully appreciate how difficult it is to come up with completely original stories! The actual setting was of course new and we had Missy orchestrating an expedition inside a giant stone alien creature. That pretty much suits her down to the ground and it was a lot of fun having Missy in charge. She obviously embraced that with all the brilliance that is Michelle Gomez and it was terrific to have her giving orders here, there and everywhere. Her frustration at having to think of everything when being contacted about certain problems was wonderful, but it was quite ironic given the fact that she was the one that was in charge of the cloning operations. I was quite surprised by that revelation in the factories but it made a lot of practical sense. Missy wouldn’t exactly be one to care about morals or ethics! She needed a workforce and she didn’t have the time to recruit so she just grew her own which was just horrific to think about! That’s a horrible prospect and the moment they were found was really good. The moment that Aleyna, Cort and Sath  realised that they were also clones was quite harrowing, but I do question how it had never cropped up that they had the same memories. I guess it’s unknown how long they had known each other prior to the start of the audio, but it was very harrowing so I didn’t give it a great deal of thought. Aleyna was particularly good as a guest character and her development of free will and standing up to Missy was fantastic to hear. She wasn’t too accepting of her situation and who could blame her! Missy claiming to be a god over the clones was really intriguing because she didn’t quite seem to want that position which seems slightly against her character of the past. More influence from the Twelfth Doctor perhaps? In typical Missy style she was being quite barmy and that actually involved standing a rebellion against herself! Only Missy would do that and it was just ridiculous, but fantastic at the same time. I didn’t expect Missy’s actual future self to be the true nature of her arch nemesis. Nothing should surprise me when it comes to Missy though! The use of the cobalts was decent and Missy’s reaction to all of the death around her was just terrific. When Mr Brice died, her complete lack of reaction and just wanting a new one created was superb stuff. Missy is so great. Missy contemplating Aleyna as her companion was really interesting, and she would soon have the means to take her travelling. Her hunt for the TARDIS was a nice reveal and I liked how things came together with Divorce, Beheaded, Regenerated and The Broken Clock and the Monk’s TARDIS component and the use of Mark being thrown into the Eye of Harmony to provide a new power source. Missy hadn’t just located any TARDIS though, this was the Master TARDIS. The ability to potentially have a TARDIS that ruled over all other TARDISes was very interesting and the prospect of Missy being in control of that is hugely exciting! It was a sublime way to end things and I really hope it’s set up Series 2. One other thing I should mention is the three blind mice performance from Missy on the piano. Glorious stuff. Overall, a very good finale to what has been a sensational series of adventures for Missy!

Rating: 8/10