CC6.02: The Rocket Men

We've met John Dorney before in this marathon, wearing his actor hat in The Fragile Yellow Arc of Fragrance and Farewell, Great Macedon!; but this is the first time we've hit one of the stories he's written. He is actually the author of my favourite Companion Chronicle, Solitaire; though as a full-cast two-hander I always feel that hardly counts, so he may have to console himself with the fact that it's also one of only eight 10/10 audios I've heard so far (out of about 200).

This one, though not quite up there, is still very good; and again the production suits the script. As long-time readers will know I'm a bit of a William Russell fan, and he's on good form here. There's a lot of emotion in his reading, which is appropriate to the underlying theme of the story as well as the action-packed nature of the narrative. Gus Brown as Ashman is a well-chosen foil, suitably nasty and with a distinct voice. I am renewing my determination to find out what an audio director actually does beyond the obvious, but the prolific Lisa Bowerman certainly gets a lot right - and congrats on the recent Benny anniversary, Ms. Bowerman! The sound design is excellent, modern yet appropriate to the story. If it had tried to match the style of the Republic serials where the rocket men originated I think it would have spoiled the mood.

Ah yes, the Republic serials. I've not seen King of the Rocket Men or its sequels, but I have seen the Disney film The Rocketeer, adapted from the comic of the same name (which is almost a tribute to the serials). The clever thing Dorney has done is to take all the pulpy trappings of the original, place it in a Golden Age SF setting - and then treat it completely seriously. This is not a pastiche, despite what a summary of the plot might indicate, and it's all the more original for that.

This is also one of the releases with an 'extra' - in this case an interview with the author, which was great for finding out how he went about writing it. Learning of the missing framing sequence (set after Barbara's death) and how this wouldn't fly with Cardiff was enlightening - I can see how it would have worked with this story, but to be honest it isn't needed anyway. I was also happy to find that he didn't have a story until he had the emotional hook, since this is something I often find myself; and to learn of his love for the experimental nature of this period of the show (in particular The Web Planet, which I hope I have boosted a little in my recent reviews).

Changing Formats
I liked the cover of this one - but since I only own it as a download I don't get to see it that often, or in a particularly high resolution. As I'm writing this it's the last day of the digital switchover for television in the UK. A couple of weeks ago some friends who were upgrading to a touch-screen edition of the Kindle gave us their old one, so we now have another electronic entertainment device to fight over. Technology rolls on.

Meanwhile, in our house, we don't have unlimited space (though it's still much bigger than the house I grew up in). Because of the way my mind works, one of the ways I tackle this is by being as ruthlessly organised as my health and family will allow; and one of the areas this has worked best is in collecting together all our audiovisual stuff. We have two alcoves in the lounge, either side of the fireplace, and have allocated the largest to this purpose. It houses the equipment (TV, hifi, Isaac's Gamecube, a few odds and ends); a small number of cassettes, videos, and LPs; and a large number of discs. All of my Doctor Who material is now in two huge cases (holding over 500 discs each), with the inlays, in chronological order from the Doctor's viewpoint. But there is also an increasing number of stories that I only own in digital format (the most recent being Voyage to Venus), and this change loses something that previous format changes haven't: the physical cover or inlay.

Some of my friends bemoaned the move to CD because they loved the physicality of vinyl. I didn't feel the same, but was sad to see the large record sleeves go. In fact, one of the few LPs I've kept - Anthony Phillips' Private Parts and Pieces II, Back to the Pavilion - I also have on CD, and I retain the original purely for the cover, by the wonderful Peter Cross. These things matter to me. Not as much as the actual content, but they matter.

I mention this because I have realised that the ideal Big Finish story combination for me would be download-only audio plus full booklet. If they started including a (printable-quality) PDF of the booklet with the download, I would be a happy man.

And our cupboard space would thank them too.

Published:
Date: August 2011
ISBN: 1-84435-581-5

Rating:
7.5/10.

Next Time:
Some more of my own fiction, for once being posted in its correct chronological position. This is probably going to be a two-part story; it's designed to go just before The Crusade, and I'll be releasing it in short chunks (about a page at a time). So join me for the first scene of the first episode, which is titled Dialogue Disasters (in honour of Cornell, Day and Topping's Discontinuity Guide) - although it may be a while before the reason becomes clear...