The Shadow Heart

"I know you of old."

Writer: Jonathan Morris

Format: Audio

Released: November 2012

Series: Monthly Adventures 167

Featuring: Seventh Doctor

Synopsis 

One empire has fallen and another has taken its place. The race known as The Wrath are expanding into new territory. Only the Earth Empire stands in their way. 

It's been fifty years since the Doctor last visited this sector of space. And one man in particular has been awaiting his return. As the mistakes of his past come back to haunt him, and with a price on his head and bounty hunters on his tail, the Doctor is heading for a last reckoning.

The pieces are finally coming together. Somewhere deep within The Shadow Heart.

Verdict  

The Shadow Heart was a very decent story to continue my way through the Monthly Adventures and conclude the trilogy that started back with The Burning Prince and continued into The Acheron Pulse! It’s been quite a journey as three different incarnations of the Doctor have tackled the Drashani Empire and encountered the deranged Prince Kylo in very different forms over a period of eighty years. I think it was fun for the Doctor to be arriving fifty years after we last left Kylo in the guise of Tenebris and he seemed certainly as whacky as the last time. I wasn’t sure about his character direction after the humanity the Sixth Doctor showed him last time out, but he was once again consumed by his love for Aliona. It’s amazing to think how long this has lasted now and those feelings don’t seem to have dissipated despite her actually cutting off his hand and throwing him out of the air lock. Talk about forgiveness! It’s rather a shame for him that the love was unrequited, but he had a way to fix that. He had actually gone as far as resurrecting her through unconventional methods to the extent that he could condition her to love him. That was rather disturbing and even at the end when she knew the truth, Aliona admitted to really loving him which was quite the way to bring things full circle. It was a good position of jeopardy for this version of Aliona to be the last as the copies couldn’t last too long, especially when they were copies of copies. The lifespan just got less and less and only a year was the timeframe now which wasn’t much of a life! This story is an important one in introducing us to Vienna Salvatori who was absolutely the highlight of the story for me. I’ve known about her for a long time now given that she has her own spin-off range and also stars alongside the Eric Roberts incarnation of the Master in his own series, but I hadn’t managed to listen to any of her until now. That will certainly change moving forward now I’ve been introduced to her character and she’s certainly a great one! She didn’t show much remorse in killing when her name was revealed or known, it was the best policy. Her being after the Doctor was good and I think she more than stood her own against him, even if he always seemed to be two steps ahead of the game. That was the feeling even when he was actually behind the curve on what had happened because for him, he didn’t meet Vienna in the right order. That was a direction I wasn’t a big fan of to be honest as it got somewhat tiresome by the end. It felt a little convoluted and not entirely necessary to what was happening in the plot with the Wrath. The significance of the Shadow Heart itself was good and I liked that it was basically the heart of the Wrath and their evolved position, and the fact that the Doctor using himself as a template for their rewriting meant they couldn’t help but interfere was pretty amusing. More should have been made of that! The Doctor actually stopping his hearts was nicely done and I really loved that Vienna was arrested at the end, but we definitely haven’t heard the last of her! Overall, another solid tale but I can’t say I’m not happy to moving on from this trilogy despite its strong points.

Rating: 7/10