The Shadow of London

"Where are all the people?"

Writer: Justin Richards

Format: Audio

Released: May 2018

Series: FDA 7.05

Featuring: Fourth Doctor, Leela

Synopsis

The TARDIS materialises in the backstreets of London in the 1940s. Whilst K9 entertains himself in the time ship's library, the Doctor takes Leela for a walk in the streets.

But England's capital is oddly quiet. There are no cars and very few pedestrians... whilst those people they do meet appear really quite English indeed. And all the while they are monitored by cameras feeding images into a secret control room.

Something strange is happening in the city. Traitors are running wld... and nothing and no-one are quite as they seem.

Verdict

The Shadow of London was a very good audio adventure to kick off the second half of the seventh series of Fourth Doctor Adventures! I thought this was a very decent opener and served as a good and solid standalone outing. I must admit that I have been a little surprised that there hasn't been any overlapping story arc throughout the series given the change in format to have it spread across two boxsets rather than single releases as with the first six series, but that's not a problem in the slightest! The pairing of the Fourth Doctor and Leela very rarely fail and they were on top form together again here. The scenes in the TARDIS control room were good and I liked how Leela was questioning why she was dressed in ridiculous clothing again. Her comment about asking what the 1940s were late for when the Doctor announced they'd arrived late in the decade was magnificent and Leela at her very best. She's so thoroughly enjoyable when it comes to taking comments literally. I love it. Their arrival into London was unique given the atmosphere and edge of quietness that greeted them. It felt a bit like the start of The Dalek Invasion of Earth and it was a good point of reference for Leela to hark back to the events of The Talons of Weng-Chiang and that busy London being a stark contrast to where the TARDIS had now arrived. But the systems had shown that this was 1940s London, so what was wrong? Hemmings made for a very enigmatic character and his comments about the edge and use of the word authentic told us straight away that this wasn't the real London, although I'm not entirely sure why it took the Doctor so long to work that out! The local population being particularly English was fun and things changing drastically once the screaming started was a good step. Maddox watching from the control room and reporting on what she saw and questioning the new arrivals was very good and I thought she made for a good little character. The arrival of the animal creature that had the appearance of an augmented life form was good and provided us with the threat the story needed at the right time, and it finding the Doctor and Leela made for a pretty decent cliffhanger, although I never believed they were in firm danger. It was excellent to use Leela's huntress experience and instincts throughout this story and it really made her a fantastic asset as a companion. K9 meanwhile was pretty useless and left reading books in the TARDIS library which I found amusing. Hemmings taking Leela to Maddox was intriguing and the latter's recognition of the former's past at school cost her life in what was a strangely predictable turn of events. The Doctor making a link to The Android Invasion was terrific and I liked that he connected the similarities between the two events. It turned out that we were actually in Germany during 1944 and a World War Two training ground for Nazis where they had recreated their own London! I thought that was brilliant and in a longer format we could have explored that to great effect. The Doctor intending on destroying the base was good and I liked the development that Hemmings was an MI6 agent and released the creature in the first place because of the cruel experimentation it was enduring. The Doctor and Leela finding Maddox dead and quickly realising it was at Hemmings' doing worked well and it was also great that he wasn't actually outright evil, but more so acting for his country and the cause of war. He had been sending the names of all those trained in the facility back to the UK so they could be captured on arrival which I thought was fantastic. The action at the end with the Doctor sparking the house into an explosion and Hemmings ensuring the creature was inside tied everything up rather nicely. Overall, a good start to the second half of the series!

Rating: 8/10