The BF Time Warp 010: Winter for the Adept

[SiHart]

When a teleportation accident goes badly wrong, Nyssa finds herself stranded on the freezing slopes of the Swiss Alps in 1963. But is it mere coincidence that she finds shelter in a snowbound school haunted by a malevolent poltergeist?

When the Doctor arrives, Nyssa and the other inhabitants of the school soon discover that the ghost is merely part of a darker, deeper and more deadly game involving rogue psi talents and something else... Something not of this Earth.

What are your thoughts on this early Big Finish release?

Si xx

[Rob McCow]

As far as I can remember, the main distinguishing feature of 'Winter For The Adept' was that it was the very first Big Finish adventure that had absolutely zero entertainment value. The only other point of note is that it's not 'Land of The Dead'.

It was cool that they got Peter Jurasik though.

[stuartdg]

Part one being largely Davison free is the best of the four episodes,and while I appreciate the twist regarding the spillagers and indeed the debut of India Fisher a lot of the dialogue appears to be descriptive as hinted at by the diary extracts.That's not to say its without merit however,the idea of a haunted house certainly has atmosphere and both Sally Faulkner and Peter Jurasik(despite the accents) are solid.Average.

[Jon Masters]

Can we extend the voting scle down into negative numbers for this one ?

Must...force myself...to listen beyond episode 2.....

[Dirk Gently]

Shall we just put you down for a 1/5 & save you the bother of listening to it?

[SiHart]

It's not very good. Form the tell don't show effort of writing and it doesn't really work.

Oh and Spillagers is a silly name for an enemy.

Si xx

[Jon Masters]

OK, having tried today and finally given up halfway through part 4 I can't take any more. I admit I haven't heard every single release (and there are loads on the shelf waiting for their first listen when we get to them) but at the moment this stands as the worst ever BF I have heard.

It has no redeeming features. The writing is awful, managing the almost impossible feat of producing 3 truly dreadful cliffhangers in exactly the wrong places. It drags for hours , then dumps huge amounts of information in a matter of seconds. It commits the cardinal DW sin of making ghosts real. It has no logic to it, and one dimensional characters, and the whole alien invasion thing seems horribly tacked on and wedged in all over the place. There is exactly zero sense of drama or story progression, and I think the headmistress killed herself in an effort to get out of the story as quickly as possible.

The performances manage to sink to the level of the writing (not even the great Peter Juraisk can polish this garbage) , the music is inconsistent in style and even the cover is frustratingly rubbish.

I'll be glad never to listen to it again !

[MacNimon]

I didn't think it was as bad as all that! Granted, it's been years since I've listened to it but I remember it as being really atmospheric, although not particularly exciting. I can't actually remember much more about it...

3/5

[Anthony Williams]

Looking through everyone else's reviews (with the possible exception of Kenny's), I initially thought that I had clicked on the wrong thread, and was reading the reviews of Land of the Dead! (shudder)

And, to an extent, you could be forgiven for thinking you were listening to that play, too. Once again, the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa land in a snowy area. No, not the Arctic this time, but the Alps. I wonder if this is going to be a recurring theme for this pair... (well, actually I don't... I've heard the next few with Nyssa, so I know it's not. But I would be wondering if I were listening to most of these for the first time!)

Anyway, this play is by no means Big Finish's best. But in my opinion, it never sinks to the lows of the atrocious Land of the Dead or the nearly-as-bad Red Dawn. The plot itself isn't too bad, and there's some nice imagery both in the script and in the production of the play. The helicopter crash in particular comes to mind, as well as lines like "brandy by candlelight, it's not so bad.", which really creates an impression of warmth. However, there are times when it gets slightly ridiculous - the ghost summoned at the seance hanging around for a chat, for example!

Going further with the mixed nature of this play, it's clear that Andrew Cartmel had very little experience of writing for audio before, thanks to such narrative lines as "The ski poles! They're rising into the air!" Such blatant attempts to tell us what was going on suggests relative inexperience in the format, and that's a shame. I haven't heard any of his Lost Stories yet, but I can't help but wonder whether he had improved with this, ten years later... Likewise, the "framing" of the story by an older Alison just doesn't really work, and really adds nothing to the audio.

Further, I can't help but feel that Cratmel doesn't really "get" the character of Nyssa - she comes across as uncharacteristically cranky at times here. The sarcasm that she's often given by the script reminds me more of things that Tegan, not Nyssa, would say. Yet, this is only when the Doctor turns up - when she's mostly solo in the first episode, she's actually quite likeable. Very strange! Still, at least the Fifth Doctor is much better here than he was in Red Dawn. Davison has not yet given a poor performance, but he was definitely let down by the script of the previous play. Here, however, he really seems to have a lust for adventure, and comes across as a much more mature version of the Fifth Doctor than on tv. Hurrah!

The guest stars aren't too bad, either. I was expecting India Fisher to come in and steal the show, knowing that she would later play Charlotte Pollard with the Eighth Doctor, I really thought that this would essentially be her audition piece. But she's mostly in the background for most of this story. The real standout peformance from the guests was Sally Faulkner as the psychotic spinster Miss Faulkner.

Overall, this is play is definitely lacking in some places, but some strong performances and a few good ideas mean that this is neither good nor bad for me... 3/5!

[Richard Brinck-Johnsen]

This one is definitely going to be a candidate for relisten as I remember quite enjoying it but that was nearly a decade ago when all BF was new and exciting to me (although even I struggled with Land of the Dead and Red Dawn)!

[Si Hunt]

I'm surprised this has had such negative reviews. I quite liked the wintry, icy feel and the boarding school setting, and India Fisher gives a spirited enough performance that they decided they wanted to employ her forever-more afterwards. I quite liked the Poltergeist scenes with things flying around everywhere. I don't think it's too bad a tale at all!

Si.

[Paul Clement]

It was, and still is one of my favourites of the early Big Finishes. There are certainly problems with the story, and as someone has already mentioned, Spillagers was a silly name for an enemy, but it's certainly not the worst example of that. The acting was generally quite good, and I enjoyed the plot and the setting.

[brandynigma]

Quite, quite bad. Not as bad as Nekromanteia, of course, but what is?

The main problem here is one of the cack-handed characterisation. The Fifth Doctor is written as the Seventh. I'm not saying the Fifth Doctor wouldn't have accidentally transmatted a companion out of the TARDIS (one presumes that the transmat was one of the damaged systems in Earthshock)- but his indifference to Nyssa's discomfort, as well as his drugging a school girl, are totally inimical to the character. The Fifth Doctor could be absent minded to the point of not noticing emotional states (many instances of being distracted by tech whilst Tegan or Nyssa are getting scared), but he always made up for it by sowing concern as soon as he became aware of the problem.

Here, the Doctor is concerned with the alien invasion alone. It's even an inconvenience to take the school girls home after everyone around them has been slaughtered by aliens or become an alien. This is the darker, manipulative side of the Seventh Doctor of which Cartmel is so fond, and further indication that whilst he was a great script editor, his own stories leave much to be desired.

There are some welcome bits of absurdity, such as the not only friendly but erudite ghost, India Fisher's excellent debut appearance and some great sound design work- but the potential to be a great, haunting ghost story goes wrong with misplaced emphasis, woeful characterisation, inconsistent pacing and a significant absence of real menace.

Oh, and riding out the thin end of the avalanche? Bugger off.

I sense another podcast coming on...

[Nyder]

I hadn’t read this thread before listening to this story. Brendan – it’s spooky because I came to the same conclusions as you:-

a) This would have suited the 7th Doctor & Ace better
b) The avalanche-dodging antics in Episode 4 really was a bit of sloppy writing

Any yes, I agree with EVERYONE that The Spillagers is a terrible monster name! But apart from those niggles (okay not niggles – major flaws!) …. I really enjoyed the story! The atmosphere of the haunted Finishing School was very well realised and I enjoyed the paranormal aspect of the story. I know that most paranormal elements in DW usually get explained away as being alien in origin, so I was pleased that this wasn’t the case with this story.

Now there’s a thread all of its own – “What’s the more fantastical concept – paranormal activity or alien life?” Discuss……. :-)

So that’s my first 10 BF DW Main Range all done and dusted! Now’s a good time for me to take stock and rank them. I already know my Top 3 and my bottom 2 clunkers – I’ll have a think about the rest and find an appropriate thread to deposit my list!