House of Plastic

"So much for saving the planet."

Writer: Mike Tucker

Format: Audio

Released: January 2025

Series: BBC Audio 27

Featuring: Seventh Doctor, Ace

Synopsis

When a new state-of-the-art recycling plant opens in North-East London, pensioner Roger Turner is all for doing his bit. In return for donations of unwanted plastic, he and his friends get to see AN-X Recycling's exhibition of life-size human and animal mannequins. 

The Doctor and Ace are also visiting the plant, but their unauthorised snooping doesn't go down well with AN-X's strangely impassive operations manager and their boiler-suited staff, keen to protect the secret that lurks at the heart of the factory floor. 

When Roger is attacked by a terrifying human exhibit, he finds himself joining forces with the strange Doctor and his friend. Soon they're all fighting for their lives – and for the future of planet Earth.

Verdict

House of Plastic was a great audio adventure! This is one I have been very excited about ever since it was announced as I think getting a full story with the Seventh Doctor doing battle against the Nestene Consciousness and their tyrannical Autons was a delightful prospect. I was also shocked to realise in the Doctor Who Magazine preview for the story that this is actually the first BBC Original Audio to feature the Doctor in his seventh incarnation! That just feels incorrect but thankfully that quirk is corrected here and in pretty strong fashion. I think the modern day setting with a Classic Doctor is a fun little twist and part of the charm of these audio series. This just wouldn't be possible to do accurately back during the late-1980s so to have it work here was great. Plastic and the environment are obviously pretty strong discussion points in the world in which we live currently and it just seems ripe for the Nestene Consciousness to come and cause chaos. I thought delving into a new realm for the Nestenes was excellent and I really liked bringing liquid plastic into play. The possibilities there really are fascinating and we had that come into fruition with the idea of a human-Auton hybrid! That was super exciting and not something I had ever contemplated being possible. It made sense for the Nestene to not need so many Autons to control when they had almost humans in that position, but the original Autons taking the form of shop window dummies again was a delight. That's a fantastic default for the Autons and something that has now become iconic. Whilst it did take rather a long time for the Doctor and Ace to enter the story, starting things with Roger as the pensioner was good and he was actually a very likeable character. I had sympathy with him for how he was being exploited by AN-X and their whole business programme of reward for recycling was strong, but definitely in the Whoniverse something dodgy. I liked the involvement of micro plastics too and it's quite incredibly really to think about the developments in plastic and plastic-based products since the Autons were first introduced in Spearhead From Space way back in 1970. Now there are all sorts of ways to prevent the environmental damage plastic causes as the Doctor mentioned with numerous versions of biodegradable elements. I thought Ace was a little bit missing in the story which was a bit of a shame as she's literally such an explosive character and I think tackling some shop window dummies would have been right up her ally but she didn't seem to have an awful lot to do. I thought Terry Malloy on paper sounded like a fantastic narrator for the story, and that was true in terms of pure narration, but I must say his take on the Seventh Doctor left a lot to be desired. That is a pretty harsh statement given the format of the story, but we have historically had some very strong impressions or at least impersonations but I didn't think that happened here. A little more excitement was needing to be injected into the performance to really take this up a gear. I think he was actually best with Roger and I guess that's down to his age and proximity to Roger's character. I thought the resolution to the story was pretty simple but with that it was very effective as the Doctor just changed the formula of the plastic to make it impure and something the Nestene Consciousness could no longer control. The image of Autons recycling themselves into the Consciousness was brilliant though and quite humorous! Overall, a really strong original audio to finally welcome the Seventh Doctor to the range. 

Rating: 8/10