The Harvest (audio story)

The Harvest
Doctor:	[[doctor::Seventh Doctor]]
Companion(s):	Ace Hex
Main enemy:	The Cybermen
Main setting:	London, 12 October 2021
Key crew
Publisher:	[[publisher::Big Finish Productions]]
Writer:	Dan Abnett
Director:	Gary Russell
Release details
Release number:	58
Release date:	June 2004
Format:	4 Episodes on 2 CDs
Production code:	7W
ISBN:	ISBN 1-84435-096-7
Big Finish Doctor Who audio stories
← Previous	Arrangements for War
Next →	The Roof of the World

Publisher's summary

On the morning of 12 October 2021, Hex woke up. He was expecting to go to work at St. Gart's in London as normal and, that evening, have a great time in the bar of the White Rabbit, celebrating his 23rd birthday.

But after his ex-flatmate is wheeled into A&E following a bike accident, and the strange young woman from Human Resources tries to chat him up and an eight-foot-tall guy in a Merc tries to run him down, Hex realises things are not going quite as he expected.

Then in a Shoreditch car park he meets the enigmatic Doctor, who explains that he's an extra-terrestrial investigator and something very strange is going on up on the thirty-first floor of St. Gart's.

Therefore, aided and abetted by the Doctor, and his other new friend, 'Just McShane', Hex decides to investigate. Trouble is, everything that goes on at the hospital is being observed and noted by the occupants of the thirty-first floor; occupants who are none too pleased that people are poking their noses into business that doesn't concern them; occupants who will go to extraordinary lengths to ensure that no one discovers the truth...

Cast

• The Seventh Doctor - Sylvester McCoy
• Ace - Sophie Aldred
• Hex - Philip Olivier
• Subject One - William Boyde
• Doctor Farrer - Richard Derrington
• David Garnier - David Warwick
• Doctor Mathias - Paul Lacoux
• System - Janie Booth
• Polk - Mark Donovan

References

to be added

Notes

Comic preview from DWM 344.

• Although the Doctor discovers that Hex is the son of Cassie Scholefield in this story, this information was not revealed to the audience until BFA: Thicker than Water, which was first released in September 2005.
• Hex's status as the Seventh Doctor's latest companion was foreshadowed in BFDWU: He Jests at Scars, released in September 2003. In the alternative timeline, the Valeyard tells Melanie Bush the names of various companions with whom the Doctor might have travelled in another timeline (namely, the proper timeline). Aside from Ace and Hex, they included Peri Brown, Evelyn Smythe, Charley Pollard and C'rizz.
• Both this story and its prequel BFA: The Gathering take place on the relevant companion's birthday. 12 October 2021 is Hex's 23rd birthday whereas 22 September 2006 is Tegan Jovanka's 46th birthday.
• This audio drama was recorded on 30 and 31 March 2004.

Continuity

• The Fifth Doctor and his former companion Tegan Jovanka were involved in the circumstances surrounding System's creation in Brisbane, Australia on 22 September 2006. (BFA: The Gathering)
• Presumably, the White Rabbit bar where Hex has his birthday party, is the same "White Rabbit" on the Embankment, which Mrs Van Gysegham's late husband had once owned. The Doctor had visited it at least once by the time of his sixth incarnation. (BFA: The Reaping) Ace would later meet Henry Noone in the White Rabbit on several occasions between June and August 2027. (BFA: A Death in the Family)
• The Doctor discovers that Hex is in actuality "Little Tommy," the son of Cassie Scholefield, whom he and his companion Evelyn Smythe met in BFA: Project: Twilight and BFA: Project: Lazarus. He would later reveal this information to Evelyn in BFA: Thicker than Water. Having previously observed him from a distance in BFA: The 100 Days of the Doctor, Evelyn would eventually meet Hex in BFA: A Death in the Family.
• The Doctor mentions that he witnessed the creation of the Cybermen. (BFA: Spare Parts)
• By 2021, Totter's Lane is a commercially zoned area of Shoreditch which is mostly made up of office blocks. A car park has been built on the former location of I.M. Foreman's junkyard. (DW: An Unearthly Child, CC: The Perpetual Bond, DW: Attack of the Cybermen, DW: Remembrance of the Daleks)
• Ace tells that Hex to warn her when "it gets all eyestalks and sink plungers" and then to "run like hell." (DW: Remembrance of the Daleks, BFA: The Genocide Machine)
• In the far future, radio and television broadcasts concerning St. Gart's Hospital could be accessed via the Gogglebox inside the Moon. (BFA: The Reaping, BFA: The Gathering)

Timeline

• The Harvest occurs after BFA: The Rapture
• The Harvest occurs before ST: The Things Take Time
• The Harvest also exists as the final part of a trilogy comprising: The Reaping, The Gathering and The Harvest. This was retroactively done by Joseph Lidster.

External links

• Official The Harvest page at bigfinish.com
• The Harvest at the Doctor Who Reference Guide