‘THE PERFECT PRISONERS’
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The Fourth Doctor, Ann and K-9 meet the Syndicate
And here we are on the sixth and final story of ‘The Syndicate Master Plan’ season of ‘Doctor Who’, starring Tom Baker as the Doctor, Jane Slavin as Ann Kelso and K-9, voiced by John Leeson. This is what ‘The Syndicate Master Plan’ has been building up to and the final adventure is pretty dramatic.
‘The Perfect Prisoners’ is a four-part story by John Dorney, who is also the script editor on these ‘Fourth Doctor Adventures’ by Big Finish. Interestingly, ‘The Perfect Prisoners’ is listed as a four-part story with one title instead of a four-part story with two titles when released on CD and download. 🙂
It’s like ‘The End of Time’ and ‘Spyfall’ since their episodes are ‘Parts One and Two’ whereas most of the stories in the new TV series are listed as ‘Alien of London’/’World War Three’, ‘Ascension of the Cybermen’/’The Timeless Children’, etc. The same thing applies to ‘The Fourth Doctor Adventures’. 😐
It’s a pity ‘The Perfect Prisoners’ was released as two separate releases instead of one whole release. Mind you, the two separate releases of ‘The Perfect Prisoners’ are available as downloads only as opposed to ‘The Syndicate Master Plan’ box sets which are available both on CD and download here.
Anyway, let’s talk about the story itself. For a long while, the Doctor, Ann and K-9 have been on the trial for the mysterious Syndicate who have been behind most of the operations in this audio season. As it turns out, not everything is as it seems and the dramatic twists and turns are pretty shocking. 😐
In the story, we start off with the Doctor, Ann and K-9 contending with killer robots and dangerous aliens on an alien planet somewhere. The endeavour ends rather badly, especially when one of the people the Doctor, Ann and K-9 are looking for ends up getting killed, but we’ll get to that in a bit. 🙂
The clues that the Doctor, Ann and K-9 have been picking up lead them straight to a machine that can literally make your dreams come true. It’s a device which could lead to the misery of billions of lives if in the wrong hands. The concept of the dream machine featured in this is rather interesting. 🙂
It changes your perception on how you see the world, whether you want it to be a happy place or a miserable place. This includes changing the tone of the sky or removing things you don’t like with the touch of a button in the air. A bit like how the Google phones work nowadays now I come to think about it.
For a while, I didn’t know where the Google-like dream machine devices were going to go and how they would enhance the story. But of course, someone is using the dream machine devices to his advantage and he happens to be in charge of the Space Security Service and one of the Syndicate. 😮
The Syndicate happen to be the heirs to the members of the Daleks’ planned Galactic Council that appeared in ‘The Daleks’ Master Plan’. I didn’t think much of them in that story as well as ‘Mission to the Unknown’, as they made quite a few appearances in those ‘Doctor Who’ stories from the 1960s.
Also because the stories are currently missing from the BBC Archives and I couldn’t identify the Galactic Council members much from what’s available in the surviving second episode of ‘The Daleks’ Master Plan’ and the ‘Mission to the Unknown’ remake episode released in October 2019. 😐
However, Big Finish have been able to expand upon the alien characters featured in ‘Mission to the Unknown’ and ‘The Daleks’ Master Plan’. This is in both ‘The False Guardian’/’Time’s Assassin’ and ‘The Perfect Prisoners’. It was very fascinating how Big Finish expanded upon those characters here.
The Syndicate members include Malpha, played by Christopher Naylor, who also plays Harry Sullivan in the Big Finish audios of ‘Doctor Who’. In his visual appearances, Malpha has been played by actors like Robert Cartland, Bryan Mosley and Paul Stenton. I believe it’s the same Malpha character in this.
Christopher Naylor also plays Sentreal, though I don’t believe he said much in his visual appearances in the ‘Doctor Who’ series. 😐 Sentreal ends up killing Trantis III at the end of ‘Part Two’ before he jumps out of a window and kills himself. Christopher Naylor also plays a trooper and a worker in this.
As mentioned, there’s also Trantis III, played by Timothy Speyer in this story. Trantis III is the son of Trantis II who appeared in ‘The Daleks’ Master Plan’. Trantis III wanted revenge on the Doctor, blaming him for his father’s death on Kembel in the year 4000. Trantis III comes to a sticky end here.
Timothy Speyer also plays Beaus, who apparently in ‘The Daleks’ Master Plan’ was played by an actor called Gerry Videl. Beaus is the person that the Doctor, Ann and K-9 are looking for when they visit the planet full of attacking killer robots and such. Unfortunately, Beaus gets killed in the story. 😦
There’s also Celation, played by Francesca Hunt. Celation was played by Terence Woodfield and Ian East in ‘The Daleks’ Master Plan’. Apparently, Celation’s species can change gender, which is interesting. Francesca Hunt is no stranger to ‘Doctor Who’ since she’s done Big Finish audios before.
She played Hannah Bartholemew in ‘Moonflesh’, ‘Tomb Ship’ and ‘Masquerade’ with Peter Davison and Sarah Sutton. I still want to know what became of Hannah. 😀 Francesca also plays Gearar, another Syndicate member, and Drarn, a lady who shows the dream machine to the Doctor and Ann.
And of course, there’s Ronan Vibert as Zaal, a Technix who’s in charge of the Space Security Service and a member of the Syndicate who, for his own greedy agenda, is attempting to wipe out every member of the Syndicate. He’s a bit like Karlton who appeared in ‘The Daleks’ Master Plan’ here.
Ronan Vibert also isn’t a stranger to the ‘Doctor Who’ universe, since he played Nicholas Skinner in ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’ story ‘The Last Sontaran’. The Technix happens to be grey-skinned and bald-headed. Interesting that Zaal ended up being in charge of the Space Security Service on Earth. 🙂
The biggest shock to be featured in this ‘Doctor Who’ story is that Jane Slavin as Ann Kelso isn’t who she turns out to be at all. She’s the one who is responsible for the deaths of Beaus, Trantis III, Sentreal and the other Syndicate members. The Doctor is pretty horrified once he’s witnessed this.
It turns out that Ann Kelso happens to be a sleeper Time Agent called…Anya Kingdom. Anya ends up being a villain in this adventure and it was shocking when the Doctor had to fight her compared to when they were friends at the start. Not sure if Anya is related to Sara Kingdom by this point in the series. 😐
With Ann gone and Anya taking over, K-9, voiced by John Leeson, ends up being the Doctor’s companion and loyal friend for the second half of this adventure. The Doctor even decides for the first time that K-9 is his foremost best friend, which is very touching when listening to this audio tale.
K-9 is well-written in this adventure, especially when he offers suggestions to the Doctor on how to solve the mystery and how to outwit Zaal and Anya in their endeavours to control the human race. Tom Baker’s Doctor still has a go at him at times, but it’s clear the Doctor is very fond of his pet dog.
The Doctor and K-9 are also helped by Simon Bubb as Jodor Colwyn, who is a member of the Space Security Service. Jodor happens to be a play on the names ‘John Dorney’ – Ha, ha, clever. 😀 Jodor ends up being a pretty ‘good egg’ when he helps the Doctor and K-9 to thwart Zaal and Anya’s plans.
To be fair, Anya is being manipulated by the evil Zaal for his plans to control the human race on Earth. It takes some effort for the Doctor, K-9 and Jodor to outwit Zaal with whatever plans he has in mind, and to break the conditioning he has on Anya and the other humans affected by the dream machine.
I must admit, I found myself a bit puzzled when the Doctor had been taken prisoner by Anya and escorted to Zaal whilst K-9 seemed to be destroyed. Thankfully, it turns out the Doctor had used the dream machine to his advantage and he’s able to outwit Zaal once his endeavours start to go awry. 🙂
By the story’s conclusion, the Doctor refuses to have Anya accompany him further on his travels in time and space. This is a sad parting scene between them, but the Doctor understandably preferred Ann over Anya. I wonder whether the Doctor will ever meet Anya again at some point in his future. 😀
Jane Slavin, Tom Baker and John Leeson in ‘The Perfect Prisoners’.
‘The Perfect Prisoners’ is a very enjoyable finale in ‘The Syndicate Master Plan’ season of ‘Doctor Who’ audios by Big Finish. It’s well-put together by John Dorney and the performances of Tom Baker, Jane Slavin and John Leeson are wonderful to listen to as they play their characters in the story.
The CD extras are as follows. After ‘Parts One and Two’ of ‘The Perfect Prisoners’, there’s a ‘coming soon’ trailer for the conclusion of ‘The Perfect Prisoners’ with Tom Baker, Jane Slavin and John Leeson. At the end of both volumes of ‘The Perfect Prisoners’, there are behind-the-scenes interviews with the cast and crew, including Tom Baker, Jane Slavin, John Leeson, Ronan Vibert, writer/script editor John Dorney, director Nicholas Briggs, etc.
‘The Syndicate Master Plan’ season of ‘Doctor Who’ has been an enjoyable collection of audio adventures by Big Finish. It was interesting how the journey of Ann Kelso as a ‘Doctor Who’ companion progressed and how she ended up not being who she seemed to be from the beginning.
The elements of this season being a sequel to ‘The Daleks’ Master Plan’ are also enjoyable. The Big Finish team are also very inventive in telling these stories without having the Daleks involved. Tom Baker and Jane Slavin steal the show as their characters and it’s good to hear John Leeson voice K-9.
Now I’ve finished ‘The Syndicate Master Plan’ season, I can enjoy the ‘Dalek Universe’ audios next! 😀
‘The Perfect Prisoners’ rating – 8/10
‘The Syndicate Master Plan’ season rating – 8/10
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