The Valley of Death (audio story)

The Valley of Death (audio story)

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The Valley of Death
Doctor:	[[doctor::Fourth Doctor]]
Companion(s):	Leela
Main enemy:	Emissary Godrin The Luron
Main setting:	The Amazon rainforest, 1 May 1873 London and the Amazon rainforest, 1977 West London and the Luron mothership, 1979
Key crew
Publisher:	[[publisher::Big Finish Productions]]
Writers:	Philip Hinchcliffe, adapted by Jonathan Morris
Director:	Ken Bentley
Release details
Release date:	January 2012
Format:	4 Episodes on 2 CDs
ISBN:	ISBN 978-1-84435-608-9

Publisher's summary

A century after his great-grandfather Cornelius vanished in the Amazon rainforest, Edward Perkins is journeying to the depths of the jungle to find out what became of his ancestor’s lost expedition. Intrigued by what appears to be a description of a crashed spacecraft in the diaries of that first voyage, the Doctor and Leela join him on his quest. But when their plane runs into trouble and ends up crash landing, everyone gets more than they bargained for.

The jungle is filled with giant creatures and angry tribesmen, all ready to attack. But in the famed lost city of the Maygor tribe, something far, far worse is lurking. Something with an offer to make to mankind. Who are the Lurons and can they be trusted? Will the Doctor defeat the plans of the malevolent Godrin or will he become just another victim of the legendary Valley of Death?

Plot

to be added

Cast

• Fourth Doctor - Tom Baker
• Leela - Louise Jameson
• Emissary Godrin / Dr. Summersby / Announcer - Nigel Carrington
• Overlord Saldor / Newsreader - Delia Lindsay
• Valerie Carlton - Jane Slavin
• Edward Perkins - Anthony Howell
• Professor Cornelius Perkins - David Killick
• General Hemmings / Valcon / Taxi Driver - Richard Bremmer

References

• According to his diary, Professor Cornelius Perkins and his expedition discovered "a frog the size of a rhinoceros" with the leg of one of the natives in its mouth while searching for the city of the Maygor tribe, the legendary Lost City of Gold, in the Amazon on 1 May 1873.
• The Doctor is still officially UNIT's scientific adviser. At the insistence of UNIT, he and Leela join Edward Perkins' expedition to the Amazon to learn the fate of his great-grandfather as scientific observers. From the evidence presented in his diary, UNIT HQ believes that Professor Perkins discovered a crashed alien spaceship in 1873.
• The Valley of Death is also known as the Second Bermuda Triangle as planes passing over it frequently experience problems with their equipment and occasionally even crash.
• The Doctor, Leela, Edward and Valerie find the remnants of a Ford Trimotor airplane known as a Tin Goose from the 1930s and a Douglas D-C4 from the 1950s in the rainforest.
• In the Valley of Death, time passes at a considerably slower rate than elsewhere on Earth and throughout the universe as it exists within a time bubble. Although 104 years have passed in the outside world, only a month has gone by from Professor Perkins' perspective since he discovered the alien spacecraft. Consequently, when the Doctor, Leela, Edward, Valerie and Godrin return to London, they find that more than two years have passed and that it is now 1979.
• Godrin's spacecraft is powered by a gravity inversion drive.
• The Doctor accuses Godrin as "doing the Wizard of Oz number" as he pretended to be the god of the Maygor tribe.
• The Luron mothership is in orbit of Jupiter in 1979.
• The taxi driver brings Godrin to the BBC Television Centre. Given his yellow skin and pointed ears, he believes that Godrin is a method actor working on a science fiction television series who is wearing prosthetic make-up.
• Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart is on a fishing trip in Olso, Norway at the time of the Lurons' arrival. In his absence, General Reginald Hemmings is the acting commander of the British division of UNIT.
• Godrin interrupts the third episode of a serial being broadcast on BBC1 in order to contact the Luron mothership.
• When the Luron mothership is detected approaching Earth, the Soviet Union places its entire nuclear weapons' arsenal at UNIT's disposal.
• The Luron mothership is more than a mile across. After entering Earth's atmosphere, it hovers above Windsor Castle. According to a BBC newscaster, Elizabeth II is not in residence.
• The Doctor refers to the 1956 science fiction film Invasion of the Body Snatchers, claiming the Lurons' plot is essentially the film's storyline in fast forward as a result of the effects of the Luron time dilation field.

Notes

• Jane Slavin (Valerie Carlton) previously played Onya in BBCR: The Paradise of Death.
• After BFA: Hexagora and BFA: The Foe from the Future, this is the third Lost Story to feature scenes set in 1977.
• As the British Prime Minister is repeatedly referred to as "she", the third and fourth episodes must take place after Margaret Thatcher achieved that position on 4 May 1979.
• This audio drama was recorded on 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 September 2011.

Continuity

• The Doctor previously encountered giant spiders, namely the Eight Legs, on their home planet of Metebelis III towards the end of his third incarnation. (DW: Planet of the Spiders) During his eighth incarnation, he encountered them once again in London in 2015. (BFA: The Eight Truths, BFA: Worldwide Web)
• Leela and Edward are incapacitated through the use of a poison dart tipped with a paralysing agent which she erroneously believes to be a janis thorn. After regaining consciousness, she tells Edward that the face of Xoanon was carved into a mountain on her native planet. Furthermore, she mentions that she is easily at home in a jungle as she comes from one. (DW: The Face of Evil)
• The Fourth Doctor was previously duplicated by the Kraals, who created an android copy of him as part of their attempted invasion of Earth. (DW: The Android Invasion)
• Leela refers to her temporary blindness, which resulted from witnessing the destruction of the Rutan Host's mothership on Fang Rock in the 1900s. (DW: Horror of Fang Rock) She would later be blinded once again during the Gallifreyan Civil War (BFG: Fractures) but her sight was eventually restored through the transfusion of Vampire blood on the Gallifrey of an alternative timeline (BFG: Annihilation).

Timeline

• The story takes place after ST: Dear Great Uncle Peter.
• The story takes place before DW: The Invisible Enemy.

External links

• Official The Valley of Death page at bigfinish.com