‘The Eternal Summer’ (Audio)

‘THE ETERNAL SUMMER’

Please feel free to comment on my review.

Stockbridge in Summer with Maxwell Edison, the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa

Tim Bradley’s CD cover of ‘The Eternal Summer’ signed by Peter Davison, Sarah Sutton and Mark Williams

Tim Bradley with Peter Davison at ‘Regenerations 2016’, Swansea, September 2016

Tim Bradley with Sarah Sutton at ‘Collectormania Glasgow 2012’, Braehead Arena, August 2012

Tim Bradley with Sarah Sutton at ‘Collectormania Glasgow 2012’, Braehead Arena, August 2012

Tim Bradley with Sarah Sutton at ‘Collectormania Glasgow 2012’, Braehead Arena, August 2012

Tim Bradley with Mark Williams at ‘Film & Comic Con Cardiff’, Motorpoint Arena, Cardiff, March 2019

“But thy eternal summer shall not fade…” – Sonnet XVIII, William Shakespeare.

‘The Eternal Summer’ is a thrilling, fantastic and brilliant instalment in ‘The Stockbridge Trilogy’! 🙂 As stated in my ‘Castle of Fear’ review, I inserted Disc 1 of ‘The Eternal Summer’ into my CD player straightaway when I listened to these stories over Christmas in 2009. They were such happy times. 🙂

I was excited and thrilled when being immersed back into the world of Stockbridge and wanting to find out what happened to the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa. The story is very clever and rather complex, but it’s thanks to the cast, led by Peter Davison and Sarah Sutton, that kept me engaged throughout.

I’ve had my CD cover of ‘The Eternal Summer’ signed by Peter Davison at ‘Regenerations 2016’ in Swansea, September 2016 and by the lovely Sarah Sutton at ‘Collectormania Glasgow 2012’ in August 2012. I’ve also had the CD cover signed by Mark Williams at a Cardiff event in March 2019.  🙂

Sarah Sutton, Mark Williams, writer Jonathan Morris and Pam Ferris in ‘The Eternal Summer’.

I’ve shared with Sarah how much I love these ‘Doctor Who’ audio stories set in Stockbridge and that they’re my favourites. Sarah told me that they’re her favourites too. Even upon revisiting these stories in 2024, ‘The Stockbridge Trilogy’ continues to keep me engaged and entertained thoroughly.

‘The Eternal Summer’ follows on from the Doctor and Nyssa failing to prevent the Rutan spaceship from exploding. Instead of being shattered into smithereens, the Doctor and Nyssa end up back in Stockbridge in the present day. However, something isn’t right, as time goes haywire in the village. 😐

This second story of ‘The Stockbridge Trilogy’ is a four-part adventure by Jonathan Morris. I loved the concepts featured in this story, as Jonny Morris loves his time paradoxes and fiddling about with time, making it wibbly wobbly, timey wimey. 😀 It makes the story pretty compelling and fascinating.

In the story, Jonny Morris focuses on the Stockbridge locals who get to live forever. Everyone, including the Doctor and Nyssa, are caught in a time bubble. They get to experience their past again and again, which includes not just the good stuff but the bad stuff too. This is hell more than heaven.

Mark Williams, Roger Hammond, Peter Davison, Susan Brown, Sarah Sutton, Nick Brimble and Abigail Hollick in ‘The Eternal Summer’.

For the Doctor and Nyssa, they’re being treated ‘as if’ they’ve been inhabitants ‘of this settlement for years’. The Doctor happens to be the ‘village doctor’ whilst Nyssa happens to be the ‘post mistress’. As the story progresses, they learn that Stockbridge is in the time bubble and can’t escape.

Jonny Morris recreates Stockbridge village as I remember it from ‘Circular Time: Autumn’ – my favourite Big Finish audio story. Mind you, there’s the peaceful, calm and heavenly quality to the village merged with something sinister, especially added for the villagers being trapped and unable to escape eternity.

The story’s guest cast are great. There’s married couple Roger Hammond as Harold Withers and Susan Brown as Alice Withers. The late Roger Hammond has had his fair share of ‘Doctor Who’ acting credits, since he played Francis Bacon in ‘The Chase’ and Dr. Runciman in ‘Mawdryn Undead’.

This is Susan Brown’s second appearance in ‘The Stockbridge Trilogy’, as she previously played Maud the Withered in ‘Castle of Fear’. I’m not sure if Alice Withers is a descendant of Maud the Withered or not, but you could be easily led to think that, as their names sound similar – ‘Withered’; ‘Withers’.

Roger Hammond and Susan Brown in ‘The Eternal Summer’.

Harold and Alice run the Green Dragon as a B&B in Stockbridge. They seem to give the impression that they’ve known Dr. John Smith all their life for as long as they can remember. They seem pleasant at first, but there’s a dangerous side to them, especially when the Doctor tries to escape the village.

It’s sad when their son Philip gets killed once the village school is on fire. This happens twice, but every time the Doctor tries to save him, it ends in failure. It’s also disturbing when Harold and Alice take turns to die and one of them is at their bedside. It horrifies the Doctor when he’s visiting them.

The story’s guest cast also includes Nick Brimble as Dudley Jackson, the landlord of the Redfern Inn. Nick Brimble would go on to play Jack Chapman in ‘Grantchester’. There’s also Abigail Hollick as Jane Potter, the village schoolmistress. It’s intriguing how Dudley and Jane’s relationship developed here.

Dudley and Jane have an intimate relationship with each other, and it’s implied that Jane may be bearing her and Dudley’s child. As the story progresses, it’s revealed that Jane wants nothing to do with Dudley, which unfortunately causes her to fall into the River Stock and drown pretty severely. 😦

Sarah Sutton, Mark Williams and Pam Ferris in ‘The Eternal Summer’.

The guest character of paramount interest is Mark Williams as Maxwell Edison – Max for short. Max is the Doctor’s friend in Stockbridge. He debuted in the ‘Doctor Who’ comic story ‘Stars Fell on Stockbrdge’. There’s even a flashback from the comic story in this audio story, which was so exciting.

Mark Williams delivers a marvellous performance as Max. I like how he plays Max with his bumbling and yet somewhat keen and enthusiastic charm whilst helping the Doctor. Max is rejected by the locals, since he’s not considered part of the village, but he has a sixth sense to help him save the day

I’m looking forward to when Max will return to ‘Doctor Who’ on audio. I wonder whether he’ll be reunited with Peter Davison and Sarah Sutton again or whether he’ll be in an audio adventure featuring Paul McGann’s Eighth Doctor, since Max has appeared in the Eighth Doctor comic stories.

Since writing this review, I’ve shared some ‘Doctor Who’ stories on ‘Bradley’s Basement’ that feature Maxwell Edison in Stockbridge, including ‘The Stockbridge Terror’ and briefly in ‘The Prime Factor’. I’ve also included Max in one of the Divergent Wordsmiths stories called ‘Interdimensional Rescue’.

Pam Ferris guest stars as Lizzie Corrigan, the leader of the Psychic Investigation Group – P.I.G. for short (Yes, I know ‘the pig’ 😀 ). I was very pleased to hear Pam Ferris in this audio story. For me, she played the villainous Miss Trunchbull in the 1996 film ‘Matilda’, one of my favourite children’s films.

I’ve seen her in more film and TV roles since then, including ‘Call the Midwife’ and the first two ‘Nativity’ films. Pam Ferris delivers a charming and lovely performance as Lizzy, who knows that something’s wrong when she and the P.I.G. are investigating the mysterious disappearance of Stockbridge.

She manages to take Nyssa out from the time bubble when she and her group appear in Wells Wood in their environmental protection suits. Lizzie utilises Nyssa’s help in ‘Part Three’ and they work well together. I also enjoyed Lizzy’s scenes with Max, especially once there’s a romance between them. 🙂

It was sad when by the story’s end, everything was reset and Lizzy didn’t know Max at all. In my story ‘Interdimensional Rescue’, I slightly changed things for an alternative version of Max meeting an alternative version of Lizzie, since she still runs the P.I.G. I’m glad I touched on that story aspect. 🙂

The guest cast also includes Nicholas Briggs as Geoff, one of the P.I.G. members. The story’s director Barnaby Edwards plays the Vicar, who officiates the funerals for people like Harold and Alice Withers as well as for Maxwell Edison at one point. Nick Brimble also plays Dave, who appears at the story’s end.

Peter Davison excels as the Fifth Doctor. Once he knows something is wrong with Stockbridge, he tries to sort it out. I loved it when he met up with Max, as Peter plays that scene so enthusiastically. I also liked the Doctor’s scenes with the villagers and how he comforts and confronts them at times. 🙂

I like the Doctor’s scenes with Nyssa, including when he tries to find her and when he realises she’s been taken. He tries to dissuade her from coming with him into dangerous territory, but she’s insistent. I liked how horrified he became when he met the Lord and Lady of the Manor in ‘Part Two’.

Sarah Sutton is equally wonderful as Nyssa. This story stands out well for her. Sarah likes the earthbound stories, as she can visualise them easily when recording them on audio. I love how Nyssa reacts to time going wrong in Stockbridge; when she meets Lizzie; and when she solves the mystery.

I love the references to ‘Circular Time: Autumn’ when she and the Doctor realise they’re back in Stockbridge and she tries to find her ex-boyfriend Andrew. I liked it when Nyssa’s psychic abilities are put to good use, as she tries to make contact with the Doctor and tries to rescue him in Wells Wood.

A thing that annoyed me is that as well as Andrew not making an appearance in ‘The Stockbridge Trilogy’, his surname happens to be Harper in this story, whereas in ‘Circular Time: Autumn’, it was clearly Whittaker. I made light of this continuity error when I included Andrew in ‘The Stockbridge Terror’. 🙂

The story’s villains happen to be… the Doctor and Nyssa – the Lord and Lady of the Manor. These versions of the Doctor and Nyssa are thousands of years old and withered, as they rule Stockbridge within the time bubble. They’re not the Doctor and Nyssa we know and love, since they’re evil and all.

I couldn’t help but sympathise when the Lady couldn’t recall the happy times she had when she was the younger Nyssa. I also found it disturbing when the Lady became harrowing and vampire-like, as she sucked the memories of the villagers, which provided nourishment for her and the Lord.

The Lady demands more when she gets a thirsty appetite. Sarah plays the evil vampire-like Lady well, balancing the sympathetic and disturbing aspects brilliantly. I look forward to hearing the audio adaptation of ‘Goth Opera’ by Big Finish soon. I’m sure Sarah will play Nyssa very well in that story. 🙂

Peter clearly enjoyed playing his evil version of the Doctor in this story. He sounds very malicious and cackles when he laughs. According to Peter in the behind-the-scenes interviews, he tried to play the Lord of the Manor with a Valentine Dyall-like voice. This is as good a place as any to do that kind of voice. 🙂

As well as playing the Lord of the Manor, Peter Davison also plays Viridios, an ancient God‐like ‘Green Man’ spirit of the trees in Wells Wood. This is clearly evident when the Lord and Viridios seem to merge as one by the story’s end, as the Doctor, Nyssa and Max confront him in Wells Wood.

When the Lady of the Manor touched the younger Nyssa to satisfy her appetite, I liked it when audio clips of previous stories were included to represent Nyssa’s memories. This included ‘The Mutant Phase’, ‘Primeval’, the two ‘Circular Time’ episodes ‘Spring’ and ‘Autumn’, and ‘Return to the Web Planet’. 🙂

Apparently, according to the script for ‘The Eternal Summer’, there was going to be more audio clips of other Nyssa stories by Big Finish, including ‘Spare Parts’, ‘Creatures of Beauty’, ‘The Haunting of Thomas Brewster’ and ‘The Boy That Time Forgot’. I would have enjoyed hearing those audio clips. 🙂

‘The Eternal Summer’ is a very good and clever story. ‘The Stockbridge Trilogy’ is one of my absolute favourite trilogies featuring the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa. The Big Finish team made the best of Peter Davison as the Fifth Doctor and Sarah Sutton as Nyssa in all three stories, which I’m very pleased about.

As this story is called ‘The Eternal Summer’, I could do with more summery days (though not like the ones in the story itself), as it rains quite often in UK summers nowadays. In February 2010, I heard this story before I met up with Sarah Sutton for the first time at my first ‘Doctor Who’ convention. 🙂

The CD extras are as follows. On Disc 1, there’s a ‘coming soon’ trailer for the third and final story in ‘The Stockbridge Trilogy’ called ‘Plague of the Daleks’, starring Peter Davison as the Fifth Doctor and Sarah Sutton as Nyssa. At the end of Disc 1, there are behind-the-scenes interviews with the cast and crew, including Peter Davison, Sarah Sutton, Mark Williams, Pam Ferris, Susan Brown, writer Jonathan Morris, director Barnaby Edwards, etc. I’m pleased that Sarah visited the real Stockbridge in Hampshire and stayed overnight in a B&B. At the end of Disc 2, there’s ‘Episode Nine’ of ‘The Three Companions’, starring Anneke Wills as Polly, Nicholas Courtney as the Brigadier and John Pickard as Thomas Brewster. ‘The Three Companions’ is complete in ‘The Companion Chronicles Specials’ box set.

If you subscribe to Big Finish for ‘The Eternal Summer’ via a 6 or 12 download subscription, you’ll get the following extras. There are extended extras and a PDF script for ‘The Eternal Summer’. There’s also a bonus Short Trip audio adventure called ‘Museum Piece’, featuring the Eighth Doctor and Kalendorf, read by Nicholas Briggs.

‘The Eternal Summer’ rating – 10/10

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The previous story For the Fifth Doctor was ‘Castle of Fear’ (Audio) For Nyssa was ‘Castle of Fear’ (Audio) For Maxwell Edison was ‘Stars Fell on Stockbridge’ (Comic)	The next story For the Fifth Doctor is ‘Plague of the Daleks’ (Audio) For Nyssa is ‘Plague of the Daleks’ (Audio) For Maxwell Edison is ‘The Stockbridge Terror’
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