Review by Daniel Mansfield

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After previously reuniting with Vicki and Steven long after their TARDIS travels were over, the First Doctor concludes his series of visits to old companions in Beware the City of Illusions as he bumps into Polly Wright. This time, though, there’s a twist… he hasn’t met her yet!

While Stephen Noonan and Anneke Wills have pleasant chemistry, there’s no getting past the fact that the Doctor reuniting with a companion out of order almost completely takes the fun out of things. The last two instalments in this trilogy of First Doctor Adventures really worked because we got to hear both the Doctor and his former companion react to meeting again after so long, but on this occasion, with the Doctor having no idea who Polly is, things feel oddly one-sided.

To add to the strangeness, we barely even scratch the surface of what Polly’s life has been like since settling back down on Earth. She’s some sort of environmental activist, certainly but any other details, including the whereabouts of Ben, are thin on the ground, which makes you wonder what the point of this story even is.

And there isn’t just one older companion featured here – Beware the City of Illusions introduces us to an older Dodo, played once again by Lauren Cornelius. Dodo is one of those sorely underused characters whose life beyond the TARDIS is ripe for exploration, yet she sounds and acts exactly the same as her younger self here, and all we learn about her is that she works for the government and is pals with Polly. Another wasted opportunity.

With ecological undertones, corrupt politicians and heaps of action, Nicholas Briggs‘s script feels more like a Third Doctor adventure than something from the First Doctor’s more 60s-flavoured oeuvre, which is certainly novel, but further adds to the strangeness of this story.

This new First Doctor Adventures range was sold on telling the untold stories of the Doctor and Dodo’s travels after leaving Steven behind and, while the first two boxsets capitalised on that tantalising premise, the last three have pushed Dodo aside (and, on one occasion, actually locked her in a cupboard) in favour of spotlighting other companions and embarking upon a vaguely-sketched story arc of the Doctor being thrown around in his own timestream.

Perhaps if this arc had been resolved in any meaningful way, or if the events of the past three years worth of stories had any lasting impact on the characters, I might feel more forgiving towards the whole endeavour. As things stand, though, I can’t help thinking these last few stories, Beware the City of Illisions especially, were a complete missed opportunity. Maybe, like the Doctor, it’s best to forget they ever happened.

Beware the City of Illusions is available on CD or as a download from http://www.bigfinish.com