Virgo: Virgin Lands

"She had to believe in monsters to absolve her race of all its sins."

Writer: Sarah Groenewegen

Format: Short Story

Released: March 2002

Printed in: Short Trips: Zodiac 06

Featuring: Seventh Doctor, Ace

Synopsis

Take a TARDIS trip through the constellations, as the Doctor travels to twelve thrilling tales inspired by the mystical zodiac. 

Telepathic fish, miniature lions and twin planets are the least of his problems, as the Doctor – all eight of him – faces the Capricorn Killer, endures a mind swap with the Machiavellian Master, and dances with Death herself. 

And that's not the half of it – as the two K9s can attest.

Verdict

Virgin Lands was another average story to continue my way through the Zodiac edition of Short Trips! It’s fair to say that this collection is not something I’m massively enjoying so far with a consistently average run so far. I don’t think the stories are particularly bad, but there just doesn’t seem to be a lot happening and that’s a consistent theme I’m finding so far. I’m not sure if it’s because it’s the first edition of this range from Big Finish and the writers and editors were finding their feet, but it just feels like there’s a lot left on the table. The Zodiac theme has been pretty boring as well up to this point but I will certainly compliment this adventure on being easily the best so far in linking to its star sign. I did like the little Kasterbrous extract explaining the star sign of Virgo, although I do think some of the use of the word virgin in the story were forced in providing the link to the umbrella title for the book. On paper, the idea of the trio of the Seventh Doctor, Ace and Benny was really exciting and I loved the unique setting of Sydney. I think it’s important in these kind of stories that we can visit more niche and unique settings like this because there are no budgets so it makes sense to leave British shores. Unfortunately, I don’t think it was properly utilised which was a shame. I think if this story was better paced and structured it could definitely have been improved, but the way things ended felt like the adventure was just incomplete. It left a lot of questions in my opinion and didn’t feel like a resolution at all. The idea of incorporating Death into the story was brilliant but the utilisation left things wanting for me. It wasn’t bad, it just needed to be more. I thought touching on the Doctor feeling loss because of LaMort as death essentially getting bored needed more explanation as I got the impression that he was yearning for death? I know he wouldn’t want death to be eradicated because that’s the natural cycle and there’s no life without it, but he seemed to be too much at the forefront now. It was also a little strange for him to be so central to the plot but barely appearing in the story. Having the focus on Ace and Benny is no bad thing and it was fun to explore their relationship as my reading of the New Adventures is still in its infancy so I haven’t reached the point where they’re both companions. It was a nice little snapshot into the future of that range for me. The way Benny was utilised by the Doctor was intriguing as he hoped to show LaMort that humanity would soon travel among the stars and that meant new worlds for it to explore, and I preferred it even more that Ace was none the wiser to what seemingly was a plan by the Doctor and Benny. She’s not always kept in the loop and that’s fun even if I do feel sorry for her! That felt like a typically Seventh Doctor element in the story, and it was also nice to get the Ghost Light reference when it came to Ace and a scary house, but it just felt lacking in a resolution and real depth. Overall, an average adventure. 

Rating: 6/10