‘THE MELTING POT’
Please feel free to comment on my review.
On the planet Piir with the Eleventh Doctor
‘The Melting Pot’ is a rather unusual story in ‘The Eleventh Doctor Chronicles: Volume Two’. I did enjoy the story, but I don’t think it’s as good as ‘The Evolving Dead’ and ‘The Day Before They Came’.
The story is by Christopher Cooper, who also wrote ‘The Grand Betelgeuse Hotel’ in ‘You Are the Doctor and Other Stories’. He’s also written comic stories in the ‘Doctor Who Adventures’ magazine.
From hearing this story, you can tell we’re on an alien world and that Chris Cooper is going for more animal-like aliens. This is especially when he includes rodent and hippo-like creatures in the episode.
If you’ve seen the cover for ‘The Eleventh Doctor Chronicles: Volume Two’, you might have been curious what the rat-like creatures were. I did wonder if there was going to be a sequel to ‘Rat Trap’. 😀
I honestly didn’t realise the aliens in ‘The Melting Pot’ were the rodent-like aliens until I listened to the behind-the-scenes interviews. Mainly because the rodent-like aliens did chirrup a lot of the time.
Yeah, chirruping is not something I associate with rodents. Usually, chirruping is more associated with birds. Unless my wires are crossed, shouldn’t the rodent aliens have squeaked a lot of the time? 😐
I will give credit to Chris Cooper. It’s a very unusual way to depict an alien species with a rodent-like appearance that chirrup a lot. I’ll also give credit to the guest cast playing these unique characters. 🙂
In the episode, the Eleventh Doctor is hoping to sample the local cuisine on the planet Piir. But he finds the society wildly different from the one he remembers, since he visited the planet a long ago.
Jacob Dudman continues to be excellent as the Eleventh Doctor. It was intriguing to learn that the Doctor had visited Piir before. Two hundred years ago, apparently. And he was in a different body. 🙂
Whether that was as the Third Doctor or as the Tenth Doctor, I’m not sure. There’s also the usage of the Doctor’s bow tie in the audio story, especially since the bow ties are symbols for the Piir people.
The Doctor meets up with Elix, one of the Piir who runs her own café, I believe. They work together to find out what’s gone wrong with planet Pirr, especially as the violence is brewing on the streets. 🙂
Milly Thomas guest stars as Elix. In other circles, Milly Thomas is well-known for playing Georgina Jones in the Big Finish audios of ‘Adam Adamant Lives!’ This is her first ‘Doctor Who’ story, I believe.
It’s interesting the Eleventh Doctor has one-off companion characters in these stories so far. First it was Babs in ‘The Evolving Dead’, then it was Kayla in ‘The Day Before They Came’, and here, it’s Elix.
I quite like how Milly Thomas brings across the vulnerable side to Elix’s character as well as her determined and willful side. Elix’s chirruping can be distracting at times, but she is a nice character. 🙂
There’s Joe Jameson, who guest stars as Arvin. Arvin is ‘promised’ to Elix. Joe Jameson is no stranger to Big Finish, as he’s been in the ‘Doctor Who’ audio anthology ‘Recorded Time and Other Stories’. 🙂
He’s also played Alan Tracy and Gordon Tracy in the Big Finish/Anderson Entertainment audios of ‘Thunderbirds’. It was intriguing to hear Arvin, especially when he was working with the main villain.
Seriously, another boyfriend/fiancé has a bad fate. It was Maxwell in ‘The Evolving Dead’, next it was Lee in ‘The Day Before They Came’, and now it’s Arvin. 😐 What’s wrong with Big Finish these days? 😀
There’s Nicholas Asbury as Preacher Stem. Nicholas Asbury has been in the ‘Doctor Who’ story ‘The Zygon Invasion’/’The Zygon Inversion’, and he’s been in the Big Finish audios, including ‘Out of Time’.
I’m quite disappointed there isn’t a satisfying payoff to Preacher Stem as the villain of the episode. In fact, by the end of the episode, Stem seems to have been forgotten about, especially by the Doctor.
Interestingly, the name ‘Stem’ and the name of the monsters called the ‘Ra’ form the anagram of ‘Master’. Does this mean Stem was an incarnation of the Master? Could have been. Think about it. 🙂
Jeany Spark guest stars as Gonch, an associate of Stem’s, as well as a Pirr mother. Like Stem, I’m disappointed Gonch didn’t get a satisfying payoff by the story’s end. She seems forgotten about too. 😦
‘The Melting Pot’ is a decent episode in ‘The Eleventh Doctor Chronicles: Volume Two’. The ending could have been better, but I liked the creative the world-building in this, and Jacob Dudman is good.
The CD extras are as follows. There are behind-the-scenes interviews with Jacob Dudman, Milly Thomas, Joe Jameson, Nicholas Asbury, Jeany Spark, writer Christopher Cooper, producer Alfie Shaw and director Nicholas Briggs.
‘The Melting Pot’ rating – 8/10
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