12 Days of Big Finishmas - Lost Stories - The Mega, on sale today and tomorrow for $3/£3 download.
http://www.bigfinish.com/releases/v/the-mega-823
The Lost Stories are stories that didn’t make it into TV production, for whatever reason. Big Finish writers take the scraps and turn them into a full-fledged classic Who story of the style and length appropriate to the era, with surviving actors reprising their roles and filling in as needed, plus guest cast to round out the drama. Most Lost Stories are recovered from the abandoned seasons of the 6/7 era, but there’s a smattering of revamped scripts from other periods, especially precious for the earlier Doctors.
I loved the First Doctor audio, Farewell, Great Macedon– It’s right up there with Marco Polo. The Elite/Hexagora/Children of Seth with Five, Nyssa and Tegan were a mixed bag of average to fantastic classic Who. I haven’t had a chance to listen to Three-era The Mega yet, but the Big Finishmas sale offers so far have been good representative audios from each range: not the exceptional OMFG-this-should-win-all-kinds-of-awards best of the best, but enjoyable, solid stories that give you a reasonable idea of why BF is worth listening to. I expect this is one of those.
And of course, Katy Manning is a joy on the audios. Her voice has aged since she debuted as ditzy spy trainee Jo Grant exactly 45 years ago today, but she adds a lot of life into every BF she’s done. Richard Franklin (Captain Yates) provides a bridge back to the heyday of UNIT.