‘I Am The Master’ (ST/Audio)

‘I AM THE MASTER’

Please feel free to comment on my review.

The Master Tells Us a Story

This story is written and read by Geoffrey Beevers. It features the Master and the Fourth Doctor.

‘I Am The Master’ was originally released as a download by Big Finish in October 2018. I listened to this story on Disc 4 of the ‘Masterful’ limited edition CD box set. I enjoyed listening to this Short Trip audio and to hear Geoffrey Beevers’ take on the Master both as a writer and as an actor on audio. 🙂

Geoffrey Beevers has penned a number of books over the years which aren’t ‘Doctor Who’-related. They include books like ‘The Progress Road’, ‘The Forgotten Fields’, ‘Superseeds’ and ‘The Withdrawal’. The books are under Fantom Publishing. Geoffrey’s abilities as a writer aren’t in doubt.

I also enjoy Geoffrey’s portrayal of the Master whenever he does an audiobook reading or when he’s in a full-cast drama playing the Master in ‘Doctor Who’. It was interesting how Geoffrey did a short story about the Master in Big Finish audio. And Lisa Bowerman’s the director of this Short Trip audio!

The story is in the style of a ‘Companion Chronicle’ where the Master narrates from his perspective. He also narrates when recording what he has to say in a recording booth, much like the recording booth Geoffrey uses to read his story as the Master. There are a number of Big Finish in-jokes about.

This includes references to the ‘green room’ and having lunches. It turns out that the story takes place after ‘The Keeper of Traken’. So, this must be the post-‘TV Movie’ Geoffrey Beevers Master we’re talking about here and must take place after ‘Mastermind’ according to my Master’s timeline.

The story has the Master telling us as an audience about the time he took over the planet of Glox. Apparently it’s a planet in the Alpha Centuari system which the Master took over and he destroyed it over some several centuries. The Master relates how he took over the planet in various stages here.

This includes being involved at a university campus, I believe, as well as becoming a politician before becoming president, I think. It’s amusing when Geoffrey Beevers’ Master shares the triumphs he’s had in being in control of the planet Glox before he leaves to have a recording break or something. 🙂

When he comes back to continue narrating the story, it seems to have gone pear-shaped for the Master once the Fourth Doctor turned up and ruined his plans, causing him to flee in his TARDIS. Even though we don’t hear Geoffrey playing the Fourth Doctor in this audio tale, his presence is felt.

I like how Geoffrey makes the story interactive for us as a listener. He even says there may be a part for us to play in the story towards its conclusion, whether we’d be strong-willed or weak-minded about it. I’m sure I was pretty strong-willed and didn’t succumb to the Master’s hypnotism in this. 😀

The Master does express his disapproval of the good guys always winning and expresses how he considers other life-forms inferior compared to him. He believes himself to be superior above everyone else, especially when he’s detailing how he took over the planet Glox and the people on it.

It’s ironic that this Short Trip audio foreshadows things that will happen when the Master’s thinking about ideas. This includes the possibility of having multiple clones of himself, which happened in ‘The End of Time’ and the Master becoming a politician is what happened in ‘The Sound of Drums’. 🙂

It’s made clear by the Master that he stole multiple bodies over his various lifetimes, including Tremas in ‘The Keeper of Traken’ and Bruce in ‘The TV Movie’. I wonder if the Peter Pratt/Geoffrey Beevers Master is the default incarnation for whenever the Master’s running low on lives or on his life-force. 😐

Glox is described as a pink planet with pink skies and pink seas. I couldn’t help be reminded of the planet Thoros Beta in the ‘Mindwarp’ segment of ‘The Trial of a Time Lord’. I wonder if everything’s pink on Glox, or is it like that Blue planet that was in the ‘Doctor Who’/’Mr. Men’ book ‘Dr. Sixth’. 😀

Incidentally, the Master’s TARDIS is disguised as a recording booth when he parked it in the Gloxian recording studio. This explains how the Master was able to get away when the Fourth Doctor ruined his plans. Incidentally, there’s no theme music that accompanies before and after ‘I Am The Master’.

I wonder if that means ‘I Am The Master’ is not essentially a ‘Doctor Who’ story and is more a part of the Master series of Big Finish audios even though there isn’t a Geoffrey Beevers Master range. Mind you, recent ‘Doctor Who’ stories sometimes tend not to have opening theme music nowadays.

I enjoyed ‘I Am The Master’ when I heard it. Geoffrey Beevers provides an entertaining take on his Master, both in terms of acting and writing. It was a chilling when the Master kept checking whether we were still listening. This is a story meant to keep you on your toes when you have to listen to it. 🙂

‘I Am The Master’ rating – 7/10

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The previous story For the Master was ‘Masterful’ (Audio) For the Fourth Doctor was ‘Survivors In Space’ (Audio)	The next story For the Master is ‘Ravenous 4’ (Audio) For the Fourth Doctor is ‘Doctor Who and the Iron Legion’ (Comic/Audio)
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