Shield of the Jotunn

"Welcome to the new Ice Age!"

Writer: Ian Edginton

Format: Audio

Released: November 2015

Series: Monthly Adventures 206

Featuring: Sixth Doctor, Constance

Synopsis

2029 AD. In the desert of Arizona, billionaire philanthropist Dr Hugo Macht is trying to save the world from climate change. But his great project to "scrub the sky clean" with nanoatomic machines grins to an unexpected halt when his diggers break into something unexpected: a Viking burial barrow containing eight corpses, a mysterious shield, an even more mysterious inscription... and a yet more mysterious traveller in time and space, known only as the Doctor.

And that's not even the strangest part of Dr Macht's day. Soon, it'll begin to snow. Soon, the Doctor and his Girl Friday, Mrs Constance Clarke, will come face-to-face with an ancient horror in the blizzard. A Frost Giant, in need of a new body. In need of flesh...

Verdict

Shield of the Jotunn was a somewhat average story to continue my way through the Monthly Adventures and conclude the latest Sixth Doctor trilogy with new companion Constance Clarke. I remain surprised that we have another new companion for this incarnation as it really doesn't feel long at all since Flip joined the fray, but I think I'm preferring Constance here with her being from wartime. Going to the near future of 2029 was a good setting from her perspective because to the locals the likes of the Second World War and all other twentieth century conflict were firmly in the past and just casually talked about, and that was something that took her back a little. She didn't want to know if there were more wars after the one she was taken from and I respected that. I also liked how proud she was to be serving and made it very clear she was not a deserter. Lisa Zetterling was a fun character to almost team up with Constance for a lot of the adventure and her realisation that she was actually a time traveller and genuinely was from the 1940s was marvellous. It was no fancy dress uniform! I thought the history dating back to the Viking era was fascinating given the Arizona setting as I'm not sure the history books ever had them definitively coming this far. Dr Macht was a weird sort of character and I think he just became more and more annoying as the story went on. He was pretty useless and couldn't understand why a mound or hill couldn't just be flattened. The Doctor and Constance being found inside it alongside an ancient burial site was intriguing, but the legend seemed to dissipate the more and more I learned about it. I think it would be incredibly harsh of me to say that what came was bad, but it was just not exciting to me. It didn't get me wanting to listen to more which is a shame. I didn't like the use of Herger from the past taking over from Constance in her reading of the ancient scribe as that just took away. I don't think we needed to actually hear from the Viking at all to be honest. It would have worked better had he made his first appearance at the end when they were restored. I did like the Doctor claiming to be from Midgard though as a way to have instant credentials with the Viking clan. Major De Casta was a decent character and I was surprised that he was killed off so soon. It felt very early and then they didn't even end up using his bones when it was revealed that calcium was the means to thwart the Talessh. They sounded fearful but I didn't really get much in terms of actions or credentials in what they could do. There was a lot of description without action which was a shame. It also didn't do much for me to think that some Vikings had already tackled one of the species with seashells so they were hardly the scariest or fearful of enemies! I did like the idea of them wanting the sun quite literally although Macht's response of that being a summer holiday was incredibly irksome. The use of energy in the story was something I did enjoy and I liked the seriousness of the threat of losing flesh. That was pretty gruesome and not a nice way to go! I thought it was quite amusing also for Constance to learn of the mandatory perk of TARDIS travel with the translation circuit coming into effect. She feels like a fully fledged companion now, but I still get the feeling she has an ulterior motive in regards to her husband. I'm very invested in her journey. The way things petered out here was predictable and just as the Vikings returned they were off again. It was all tied up well but it just didn't enthral me. It wasn't bad I must stress, but I was only half invested and that's why my rating is a pretty low one as far as I'm concerned. Overall, some good moments and I like Constance, but not my most favourite of adventures!

Rating: 6/10