The Guardians of Prophecy

"We know better than to heed to superstition."

Writers: Johnny Byrne & Jonathan Morris

Format: Audio

Released: May 2012

Series: Lost Stories 3.04

Featuring: Sixth Doctor, Peri

Synopsis

The TARDIS materialises on Serenity, the last surviving world of the Traken Union. Peri expects a good place for a holiday – not tomb raiders, a labyrinth filled with terrifying monsters and a trap-laden necropolis.

For Serenity's gentle name belies its history as the home planet of the Melkur, soldiers created to serve a long dead dark force, the embodiment of evil itself. Whilst they sleep, vicious thieves are after this force's secrets, and will stop at nothing to find them.

But will they find more than they bargained for?

Verdict

The Guardians of Prophecy was a very good and enjoyable audio adventure! It is quite difficult to go wrong with the pairing of the Sixth Doctor and Peri and they were delightful together here once again. The idea of a loose sequel to The Keeper of Traken has made this a very desirable audio to acquire as that Fourth Doctor serial is a favourite of mine as it was the first ever Classic story I watched and it's just a wonderful adventure in its own right. This wasn't that much of a sequel in my opinion but that was absolutely fine and it was just fantastic to have the Melkur around and get some backstory on this being. The Doctor alluding to events involving the Master and his faux meeting with a Melkur and the destruction of Traken that would follow was brilliant and I really enjoyed how this brought back bad memories for him even if it was centuries ago. That was nice because it was quite a traumatic time, especially for Nyssa so for it to still have an impact on the Doctor was good to know. I really enjoyed the setting of Serenity and the politics on the planet were great. The characters that came with the setting were very good and them all centring around Prophecy as the be all and end all of the way of the planet was excellent. I thought Horgan and Auga in particular were enjoyable characters, but for me the best of the Buch was Ebbko. He was revered as a master thief so much so that even the Doctor was delighted to be in his presence and see him in action. His abilities were impressive and he could literally get out of any door in the universe! His explanation of how he would escape certain predicaments was something I appreciated and I loved the Doctor's calmness when it came to being locked up with him. His sacrifice at the end of the audio to save the planet was admirable and I thought the way he forced Peri into a coffin to save her life was testament to the man he was. A fine character. The use of the Melkur in the story was not entirely what I expected but I still very much enjoyed it. It developed them a lot more and gave a bit more meaning to the disguise the Master hid on Traken with. Their calling was very good and I enjoyed the sound effects very much with it added a lot to the mythology of their being. I thought the focus on the Tomb of Malador was very good and his arrival after being entombed for a millennium was a great cliffhanger. His role as creator of the Melkur was very good and the prospect of a scattered army was brilliant. I thought it also worked well with the concept of the Melkur needing evil to function, along with them supposedly being indestructible. The links with the creatures of the Labyrinth were intriguing and the idea of summoning beings from the Time Vortex is always fun. The actual arrival of those creatures could probably have been better though. Malador proudly proclaiming how he had his own conscience removed from his brain to enhance the effectiveness of his decision making was an unexpected development, but a concept I thought was mightily interesting and unique. It was quite the surgery to go under! The Doctor luring Malador into his trap was very good and I thought Colin Baker's performance was magnificent as per usual. The ending did work well and was quite pacy, if not perhaps a little too quick in its emphatic nature in dealing with both the Melkur and Malador and sending them into a different dimension. It was quite the way to tidy everything up though! The quick departure of the Doctor and Peri in the TARDIS was something I did like with the impending roof collapse. Overall, a really good and strong adventure.

Rating: 8/10