Beyond Bannerman Road: Destination: Wedding

"Why did she invite them?"

Writer: James Goss

Format: Audio

Released: April 2023

Series: Rani Takes on the World 1.02

Featuring: Rani

Synopsis 

Rani and Gita Chandra have been invited to a dream wedding on a luxury island resort. But how did Tiff from school end up marrying a film star? And why has she asked all the worst people from her life alongside the Hollywood A-listers?

While Gita samples the canapés and criticises the flower arrangements, Rani sense something amiss... The perfect wedding comes at a rice – but who will be paying?

Verdict 

Destination: Wedding was a great story to continue my way through the Beyond Bannerman Road first series of Rani Takes on the World! I thought this was very good in calmly moving on after an eventful and frankly celebratory opener of Here Today and having a wedding was a good basis for that. It should just be a normal and happy affair, but as the episode goes on the subtle way in which details of something being wrong are revealed was fantastic. I was a big fan of the pace by the end but I must admit that after the first twenty minutes or so I was wondering was this literally going to be a story showing Rani and her mum going to a wedding! Of course, that wouldn’t be much of an adventure and that was far from what happened. Gita arrived on the scene at the end of the previous episode to reveal to Rani that the pair had been invited to old school friend Tiffany’s wedding. It was a slight surprise to Rani given their strained history but who could say no to a trip to an exotic island? Before the pair jetted off though, we had an emotional moment for Rani as she found the courage to step foot back in 13 Bannerman Road. With all of the memories and experiences there, that must have been tough. I was intrigued to find that Mr Smith seems to be broken as Rani jokingly asked after him with her also acknowledging that Sarah had always meant to get him fixed. It seems she never got around to it before sadly passing. I think it was important to establish a reason as to why Mr Smith wouldn’t be used when things are going to go wrong as will surely be the case as this series moves on. This is firmly Rani’s series with nothing more than a cameo for Clyde this time around. His presence was felt in a big way though as Rani was documenting the events of the wedding to him through her voice notes. That was a nice way of keeping him in the loop. Rani was continuously surprised by the guest list as it seemed to contain people that Tiff never got on with. As the episode rolled on, that would prove to be the very point of course. I thought the receptionist was an eery figure and it was clear from the off that he would be behind whatever was happening. I really liked the use of a perception filter to hide the fact that guests were disappearing. The island hardly did a good job in hiding that fact though with photos from each day and the guests consistently getting less and less! Rani and Gita worked well together to work that out and fight the effects of the perception. Their relationship was presented very well and I enjoyed the humour that came from Gita thinking her daughter might be married by now if she didn’t work so hard. I thought she might have been admiring of her drive instead! She would later make sure Rani knew just how proud she was which was nice. Gita taking her own initiative and questioning Kristoffay about his lovely bride. Well, he may have set the world record for the amount of times saying ‘I guess’ in a conversation. He was completely clueless about Tiffany which was fascinating. So why was the wedding happening? None of his family or friends were present and he was even on the phone to what seemed to be his partner asking to put the bins out! He was far from committed to the cause. The island itself being revealed as the enemy was unexpected but it worked well to show what was happening. It was feeding on all those people that Tiffany disliked and one by one they were disappearing. It was quite sad really that Tiffany felt her life had gone awry slightly and she felt she had to show off that she was actually living in luxury. She had the perfect Hollywood ending and whilst the celebrity guests went a little overboard, it was quite amusing in the end. I just felt sorry for Tiffany but Rani was on hand to show her how to put things right. It wasn’t exactly the best objection to the wedding, but she utilised Tiffany’s position in the contract to get what she wanted from the island. They had to provide her perfect wedding, and that would mean freeing everyone despite that being all the island was latched onto in reality. That was a very neat way of tying things up! Overall, a great audio adventure!

Rating: 8/10