Night Thoughts was the seventy-ninth story in Big Finish's monthly range. It was written by Edward Young and featured Sylvester McCoy as the Seventh Doctor, Sophie Aldred as Ace and Philip Olivier as Hex.
- You may be looking for the original, unproduced television story.
Produced three years before Big Finish began producing their range The Lost Stories, this is the first example of an unmade television story being adapted for audio.
Publisher's summary
"I warn you, things could get very nasty here before they get better."
A remote Scottish mansion. Five bickering academics are haunted by ghosts from their past. Reluctantly they offer shelter to the Doctor and his companions Ace and Hex.
Hex, already troubled by a vivid nightmare, is further disturbed by the night-time appearance of a whistling, hooded apparition.
Ace tries to befriend the young housemaid, Sue. Sue knows secrets. She knows why the academics have assembled here, and she knows why they are all so afraid. But Sue's lips are sealed — she prefers to communicate through her disturbing toy, Happy the Rabbit.
And then the killing begins. Gruesome deaths that lead the Doctor and his friends to discover the grisly truth behind the academics' plans, and — as the ghosts of the past become ghosts of the present — to recognise that sometimes death can be preferable to life...
Plot
to be added
Cast
References
Individuals
- Ace's maternal grandmother, Kathleen Dudman, died in 1973. She remembered that her mother Audrey cried for days afterwards.
- Hex was raised by his father and maternal grandmother, the mother of Cassie Schofield whom the Sixth Doctor and his companion Evelyn Smythe had met on two occasions, in 1999 and November 2004. They witnessed her death at the hands of Nimrod on the latter occasion. Hex believed that his grandmother was actually his mother until he was six years old.
Cultural references from the real world
- Ace refers to the Doctor as "Batman".
- Ace asks the Doctor "What's up Doc?", while doing an impression of Bugs Bunny.
- Ace later says that the Doctor is "smarter than the average bear".
- Ace mentions late actress Thora Hird, in reference to a series of Churchill Stairlift advertisements which aired in Britain throughout the 80s and 90s.
Notes
- Night Thoughts was originally a story considered for the 27th season of Doctor Who, had it not been cancelled after Survival. It would have been a three-part story.[1]
- An illustrated preview for this story appeared in issue 366 of Doctor Who Magazine illustrated by Martin Geraghty.
- This audio drama was recorded on 7 and 8 November 2005 at the Moat Studios.
- It was released on CD and download. It is now available as a download only.
- This story is set between Survival and the 1996 TV Movie.
- This story credits Edward Young, an 18th century Romantic writer. The audio drama was inspired by the poem of the same name.
Continuity
- The Doctor refers to Kathleen Dudman, Ace's maternal grandmother whom they met at Maiden's Point in 1943. (TV: The Curse of Fenric)