The Hope

"Aren't you afraid of dying?"

Writer: James Goss

Format: Audio

Released: August 2019

Series: Torchwood Monthly 30

Featuring: Owen, Andy

Synopsis 

Megwyn Jones is one of the most hated women in Britain. She used to run a home for troubled children in an isolated part of Snowdonia called The Hope. For a long time there were rumours about what was happening there, and then one day it was realised that the children had gone missing. 

Ever since, Megwyn's kept her peace. Is she innocent? Is she guilty? Where are the bodies?

The years have been long and hard on Megwyn and on the families of the children. But now Megyn's dying, and she's agreed to go back to The Hope, to reveal the horrible secret she's kept all these years. 

Verdict

The Hope was an excellent story to continue my way through the monthly series of Torchwood from Big Finish! I can't quite believe I have managed to reach the thirtieth release already as it seems to be absolutely flying by, and there's no sign of letting up as I have just purchased the next six instalments in a recent sale. I am very excited by what's to come and this format really allows for an individual character of the traditional main cast to develop and shine. We haven't heard a huge amount from Owen thus far in the Torchwood series so this a great opportunity for him to showcase. Pairing off Owen and Andy was a lot of fun and they worked really well together which on paper might not seem like the most obvious match. Andy was fully aware of Owen's inability die which placed this adventure somewhere after Reset and the relevance of that would soon be felt as the truth of the ground at The Hope was revealed. It took a while for us to get there though as we were introduced to the slightly disturbing Megwyn Jones in the prison. She was a fantastic character because she was just awkward and had such a horrifying vibe with her chilling personality. Considering the crimes she was accused of, it was a little difficult to listen to the concept of children going missing at The Hope. Megwyn seemed to have absolutely no remorse and whilst it wasn't ever proven that she was guilty of all of the children going missing, and potentially dying, she was clearly in the know. That added to the disturbing nature of her character and just hearing her converse was excellent. The fact that she was dying and now was willing to go back to The Hope to reveal the truth about the bodies and where they were buried was quite horrifying, especially when she wanted one of the victim's siblings to dig them up! That was such a powerful moment as we realised that the 'kind' ground of The Hope was actually covered in Rift energy and ended up as a temporal flux that kept those buried within as they were when they entered. That was quite something, but making use of Owen being dead and the ground giving life was outstanding. I thought that was brilliant to play with and the brief moments where Owen got to be alive again and hear his heartbeat was tremendous. The humour that came from him being able to eat and revelling about crisps, only for Andy to have ready salted flavour was a good injection of comedy in what was a very serious episode. The interaction between Owen and Megwyn was sublime and they really had a strong dynamic. The insinuation of Owen being different was good but I don't think Megwyn was expecting the truth about him being he wasn't dead. Owen sacrificing himself to stop Megwyn's long scheme of an insurance policy of immortality was really well done and Andy getting to be there in a serious moment at the end to console him about the loss of life once again was fantastic. Overall, a really eery story with a wonderful setting and just chilling. Great stuff!

Rating: 9/10