Blood & Steel: Wulf

"You're a Cyberman now."

Writer: Aaron Lamont

Format: Audio

Released: September 2022

Series: New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield 7.02

Featuring: Benny

Synopsis

A young man returns home – will he save his village or will it save him?

Verdict

Wulf was another great episode to continue my way through the Blood & Steel seventh series of the New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield! This dealt with the after effects of Willkommen in a strong and very emotional way which is pretty ironic considering the Cyber element of the ongoing story arc. Benny avoided become anything close to a Cyberman by the narrowest of margins, but the nanites got to Wulf and ensured he was at the least partially a Cyberman. He had enhanced strength and was clearly possessing some sort of cybernetic qualities. It's a shame we didn't have a visual because there's something inherently chilling about a partial conversion. We saw it in Cyberwoman and Ashad was also pretty disturbing! It just works well as part of the fear factor and who would think that the Cybermen are scarier when they're not fully turned into one? This did feel a bit like Wulf's version of Bill in The Doctor Falls which was really nicely done, except he basically knew what he was. He wasn't a full Cyberman yet, but he would never be the same again. The fact he even returned to his home village was a bit of a surprise in of itself because it would likely not be normal or welcomed for him to be accepted. But the community pulled well and he was actually useful for manual labour and the kind of thing. I mean, it's good that he was still able to contribute utilising his strength, but it must have been weird to try and be integrated. His family tried to act as if nothing was different and I'm not convinced that was the right approach. Surely you have to discuss and adapt to the elephant in the room? It was still early days for Wulf though I guess and he was coming to terms with his newfound existence. Well, Benny confronted him in an apologetic way as she found him after hunting remaining Cybermen with the Doctor and she was brutally honest with him. She acknowledged her part in failing to help him but she did think he was dead and I can see things from her perspective. He was showing emotion though and that's ironic given what happened to him. He didn't seem angry at Benny though which was nice. He was just sad. I mean, when Benny is warning everyone that Wulf will be a danger one day it's not difficult to understand why! She had to be prudent though and that meant tackling awkward situations. I was surprised by the absence of the Doctor until the very last scene but this is Benny's series and she shone here. I was really impressed with her and I liked continuing the theme of their setting. She was after the Cyberman but she was almost more disgusted when getting involved with a man in uniform. Considering when and where they were, her distaste for the Facists came out in full force. That was terrific. I thought the way things ended were a little ambiguous or leaving things perhaps a tad too open-ended? I'm not convinced anything was actually really resolved from Benny's perspective but it said a lot by the end that she didn't even want to say goodbye to Wulf. He was obviously going through some substantial changes and went against Marius which was a bit of a shock, but becoming partially converted into a Cyberman will do that to you! Overall though, a really strong listen to continue the series! 

Rating: 8/10