Master (audio story)

Master
Script release:	The Audio Scripts: Volume Four
Doctor:	Seventh Doctor
Featuring:	First Doctor
Main enemy:	The Master, Death
Main setting:	Perfugium, the far future
Key crew
Publisher:	Big Finish Productions
Writer:	Joseph Lidster
Director:	Gary Russell
Producer:	Gary Russell, Jason Haigh-Ellery
Music:	David Darlington
Sound:	David Darlington
Cover by:	Clayton Hickman
Release details
Release number:	49
Release date:	31 October 2003
Format:	4 Episodes on 2 CDs; Download
Production code:	7Y
ISBN:	ISBN 1-84435-031-2
Official trailer
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Master was the forty-ninth story in Big Finish's monthly range. It was written by Joseph Lidster and featured the Seventh Doctor and Geoffrey Beevers as the Master.

Publisher's summary

Many years ago, on a dark and stormy night, the disfigured and enigmatic Doctor John Smith invited his closest friends, Inspector Victor Schaeffer and his wife, to a dinner to celebrate his birthday. A mere few hours later all the occupants in that house had been changed — some were dead, others mentally scarred forever by the events of that night.

So, what happened to the distinguished dinner guests on that evening? Perhaps we'll never know. But two clues have led to much speculation — found outside the study window, a charred umbrella with a curved red handle and found inside the house, a blood-stained copy of Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde.

For one person, this night represented an ending: an ending to one thousand years of darkness and an ending to ten years of light.

But for everyone else, is there no ending of this one night of Hell?

Plot

to be added

Cast

• The Doctor - Sylvester McCoy
• The Master - Geoffrey Beevers
• Victor Schaeffer - Philip Madoc
• Jacqueline Schaeffer - Anne Ridler
• Jade - Charlie Hayes
• The Man - Daniel Barzotti
• Child - Joe Bassett
• Whispering Voices - Gary Russell

References

Books

• John Smith owns books by Dr Julia Steer (The Divided Self), Professor Summerfield (Man, Two Hearts in One Mind), Dostoevsky, Stevenson, Welsh.

Personifications of concepts

• Death makes an appearance.

Planets

• Perfugium is a human colony.

Individuals

• An Empress is mentioned.
• Victor Schaeffer is an Adjudicator.

Time Lords

• The Doctor and the Master were bullied as children by Torvic.

Notes

Illustrated preview from DWM 336 by Martin Geraghty.

Cover of the Classic Villains Trilogy

• This story marks the first appearance of Death in an audio drama.
• This would be the final audio drama to feature the Master until Trail of the White Worm in May 2012 and his final appearance in the main range until And You Will Obey Me in April 2016.
• This audio drama was recorded on 30 and 31 July 2003 at The Moat Studios.
• An illustrated preview by Martin Geraghty appeared in DWM 336.
• This is the first story in any medium to feature the Master where his name is part of the title.
• This is the third part in a loose tetralogy of "villain"-focused stories to celebrate Doctor Who's 40th anniversary, beginning with Omega and ending with Zagreus.
• The trailer to the story is unusual; rather than using clips from the story, Geoffrey Beevers recites an original monologue for it.
• In January 2020, Master was provided as a free gift to purchasers of DWM 547, along with Omega and Davros, as part of the so called Classic Villains Trilogy with a brand new cover.
• This was the first Big Finish release to feature the First Doctor and an Eternal.
• This story is set between Survival and the 1996 TV Movie.
• This story was originally released on CD and download. It is now available as a download only.

Continuity

• The Master claims to be Death's champion, similar to how the Doctor was Time's champion. (PROSE: Love and War)
• When the Doctor talks about the Master's history, he refers to events on Traken (TV: The Keeper of Traken) and Duchamp 331. (AUDIO: Dust Breeding)
• The Doctor first encountered this incarnation of the Master on Duchamp 331. (AUDIO: Dust Breeding)
• The Doctor uses the name "Vaughan Sutton" as a pseudonym. (AUDIO: Excelis Decays)
• The Doctor says he's known "one or two" Adjudicators. (PROSE: Original Sin)
• The Doctor mentions how he was disowned by his family. (PROSE: Lungbarrow)
• The Doctor recalls someone telling him "exposure to evil, even the smallest amount, can corrode the soul". (AUDIO: Primeval)
• Death refers to how the Doctor used to play with his spoons and mix his metaphors, (TV: Time and the Rani) but how he is now too busy destroying planets and wiping out old foes. (TV: Remembrance of the Daleks, Silver Nemesis, PROSE: The Pit, Blood Heat)
• Death sings a version of the Zagreus poem, then wonders what put that into her head. (AUDIO: Zagreus)
• The Master would later once again lose his memories of being a Time Lord and live the life of an ordinary human. (TV: Utopia)
• The Doctor tells the Master that he wants his old friend back. A later incarnation of the Master would later express a similar sentiment to the Twelfth Doctor. (TV: Death in Heaven)

External links

• Official Master page at bigfinish.com; note that it is out of print and is available as download only.
• Master at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
• DisContinuity for Master at Tetrapyriarbus - The DisContinuity Guide