| PROJECT: LAZARUS by Cavan Scott & Mark Wright |
| Story 45 Synopsis: The Doctor finally finds a cure for the Twilight virus, and brings Evelyn to Norway to find Cassie. But the TARDIS lands them a few years later, and when they find Cassie, she has gone over to work for Nimrod, under the appellation Artemis. Everyone is taken to the Forge, where Nimrod wants to trigger a regeneration in the Doctor so he can witness and study its effects. But Evelyn breaks through Cassie's conditioning, reminding her of her son, Tommy. A vengeful Cassie interrupts Nimrod's experiment, and helps the Doctor and Evelyn to escape. But in the process, Nimrod kills Cassie, and a horrified Doctor can only return to the TARDIS. Evelyn takes the news badly. Some time later, the Doctor detects a time disturbance, which he traces to the Forge. A race called the Huldran have been beseiging the place for months. The Doctor is surprised that Nimrod has enlisted his previous incarnation as special scientific adviser. The Doctor opens the portal in the Huldran ship, but as a few enter, they attack the other Doctor, cutting his arm off. This gives the Doctor the final clue that this is just a clone created by Nimrod from a blood sample taken on his last visit. The clone is Project: Lazarus, and says there were only 3 made. But the Doctor shows him that there have been many more, and his memories are transplanted each time, so that far from being years old, he's only days old. A vengeful Lazarus launched the Hades Protocol, a device that will sterilise by explosion every level of the Forge. The Doctor manages to rescue and return the Huldran through the portal, but Nimrod kills Lazarus and escapes. The Doctor narrowly avoids the final destruction of the Forge. But elsewhere, Nimrod starts again... |
| Review:- Sequel time, as the Doctor and Evelyn are reintroduced to the shady world of the Forge, and its chilling director, Nimrod. Though they've had a few adventures since Project: Twilight, for Cassie, it's a straight continuation, tempered by the time difference, which the TARDIS has conveniently created. The full effect of that doesn't become clear until the end of part 1. In the meantime, the listener is gulled by the talkative Professor Harket (wonder who he was named after, eh?) and his spooky tales of Huldran. When Cassie's double-cross is revealed at the end, it's a feasible plot development given her situation. So far, so good. Part 2 shows Nimrod get to work on the Doctor, whilst Evelyn tries to find out why Artemis should have forsaken her help so totally. It's the reminder of her son that makes the difference, and builds on the friendship the two ladies showed in their last encounter. As soon as Cassie turns, it's just a matter of time to rescue the Doctor - but the cost is high. Cassie's death seems rather predictable, so it's a baffling shame that neither she nor the Doctor realise Nimrod's likely action. Evelyn is distraught, perhaps especially after Cassie revealed her heart problem - something that will perhaps come to more prominence later? This ending is barely even a Pyrrhic victory, as the Forge is left in a stronger position than before. But the arrival in part 3 of a strangely talented piano-playing Doctor means that time is up. The Huldran attack follows on from the previous actions by Nimrod, but the revelation that the previous Doctor might have returned to work with Nimrod provides the new mystery. His evasive answers and lack of knowledge are giveaways that all is not as it should be, but it takes the dramatic loss of his arm to give the real Doctor his chance. Whilst Nimrod revels in his new specimens, the Doctor undermines him from elsewhere with 'Lazarus' help. The shock for him that there were other clones, and that he isn't even the man he thought he was, combines with his mocking mimicry, shown to good effect in the previous part. Unfortunately, things take a dip here. Lazarus makes exactly the same mistake as Cassie in assuming they could avoid Nimrod's usual wrath, and goes the same way. Whilst the Doctor is able to rescue the Huldran and the wider picture, he's helpless to save Frith. What rather diminishes the drama is that the Hades Protocol apparently takes just 6 minutes to happen, but there is no realistic way that the events that then take place would compress into such a short time. Unless perhaps Nimrod had a crude time experiment at the Forge that slowed things down? Come off it. The naff ending, suggesting that Nimrod's disappearance was so he could set up a new Forge elsewhere, is entirely unwelcome. Will he back again one day? One rather hopes not... The gimmick of casting both Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy in the same story works because it leads to 2 2-part stories, which helps no end. The deaths of Cassie and Lazarus are shocking, but predictable. Evelyn's fate remains open... So, a very good sequel, and an entertaining story. |
| Disclaimer: I own a copy. |