Review by Scott Lopes

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The epic Dark Gallifrey storyline continues with Dark Gallifrey: War Master, by James Goss.

Dark Gallifrey is a series the continues to both surprise and amaze. Dark Gallifrey: Morbius showed immediately the level of quality we could expect from the series, and the recent War Master trilogy does not disappoint one bit.

James Goss takes a very different approach in his trilogy than Tim Foley did with Morbius, that being more of a focus on Dark Gallifrey itself than the title character. At first this seems a little off putting, after all it had originally been assumed by many Dark Gallifrey would be entirely about each specific character, similar to how Morbius was structured. But thankfully, Goss manages to make this just as amazing, if not better than its predecessor. 

Going into this listeners should know the focus is not on the War Master himself,  with the focus being more on Dark Gallifrey itself, but that in no way means it isn’t still a fantastic story. If anything, the focus on Dark Gallifrey in this trilogy compared to Morbius feels more likely to keep listeners in for the entire series as opposed to choosing select characters.

The series starts out with Bernice Summerfield (Lisa Bowerman), alongside the Unbound universe Doctor (the late David Warner), going on an expedition to find the lost world of Dark Gallifrey. They quickly realize however that Dark Gallifrey is not something that should ever be found. As they both leave, both now permanently scarred, they come up with a way that they hope will prevent anyone from ever finding it again…

Unfortunately for them this trilogy features the most ruthless and determined of all the Master’s incarnations (Derek Jacobi)… and Captain John Hart (James Marsters). The rest of the trilogy sees the two villains attempt to infiltrate Benny’s life with their own respective plans, but when she manages two outsmart them both the two are forced to create an uneasy alliance to defeat her if either want a shot at claiming Dark Gallifrey for themselves.

At first glance this may sound a bit random and ridiculous, and that wouldn’t be the worst summary out there, but that doesn’t stop it from being a really fun time. It’s been a dream of mine for years to see some version of the Master team up with Captain John and wow, what a pair! Marsters and Jacobi’s chemistry together is spot on. It’s a pairing that you definitely wouldn’t expect but manages to perfectly deliver in every scene they share. It was also great to see Lisa Bowerman return as Bernice Summerfield, who completed this trio of focus characters quite well. All three are a lot of fun together, and the actors are all on the top of their games the entire time. Of course it would be impossible to not mention David Warner, who returned one last time for this story as the Unbound Doctor. Without spoiling anything this was really a very perfect finale for his character, and I’m really glad he was here.

Overall Dark Gallifrey: The War Master continues the Dark Gallifrey storyline with yet another fantastic trilogy. With an incredibly fun and interesting story, fantastic performances and some unexpected but very welcome team ups, anyone who’s already been listening to Dark Gallifrey or has been considering jumping into it need to check out this trilogy, it’s absolutely worth it.

Dark Gallifrey: The War Master is available on CD or as a download from http://www.bigfinish.com

Dark Gallifrey continues next year