The Trials of a Time Lord (audio story)

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You may be looking for the television season of the same name.

The Trials of a Time Lord was a single story in three sections in the anthology of the same name released on 30 August 2024[1] by Big Finish Productions. It was written by Rochana Patel, Katharine Armitage and Stewart Pringle, and featured Colin Baker as the Sixth Doctor, Nicola Bryant as Peri Brown, Bonnie Langford as Melanie Bush, David Banks as the Cyber Leader, Nicholas Briggs as the Daleks and the Cybermen and Terry Molloy as Davros.

This story/anthology continued the 40th anniversary of Baker's debut as the Sixth Doctor, started in The Quin Dilemma.

Publisher's summary

The Sixth Doctor's fortieth anniversary celebrations continue, courtesy of LudoSphere Incorporated, with the greatest adventure ever streamed...

Responding to a distress call from an old friend, the Doctor and Mel find themselves in 'Cyberia', a prison camp run by an even older foe. But this time, the Cyber Leader's machinations are just the tip of one very sinister iceberg, one that will test the Doctor to his very limit, and beyond...

We hope you're hiding behind the sofa, because 'The Trials of a Time Lord' are about to begin!

The Trials of a Time Lord Parts 1 and 2 by Rochana Patel
The Trials of a Time Lord Parts 3 and 4 by Katherine Armitage
The Trials of a Time Lord Parts 5 and 6 by Stewart Pringle

Plot

Part one

On the snowy Juvenile Prime in the 99th century, Tiff sends out a distress call for the Doctor, asking him to repay her favour and rescue her and Voss from the Cybermen. The TARDIS picks up the degraded message and the Doctor and Mel respond, despite the Doctor's initial concern that it could be a trap, and the ship's arrival in Cyberia Prison Camp is detected by the Cybermen, prompting the Cyber Leader to alert his guards and capture the pair. As the Cyber Leader awaits instruction from the Controller, Mel is evaluated for her usefulness and the Doctor taken to Tiff and Voss to be inducted on procedures in the camp, his compliance ensured by threatening the lives of fellow prisoners. Whilst Voss is left to educate the Doctor, Tiff is taken for conversion as a punishment for sending the distress call.

Voss explains that most of the 150 prisoners, himself not included, are from 20th century Earth and shows the Doctor a map so that they can rescue Tiff and liberate a significant portion of the prison population, which is managed by a total of only thirteen Cybermen. The Doctor is surprised by the small number of guards, as well as the rate of conversion being only one a day and several escape plans having been successful already. He uses his umbrella to connect the electrified fence to an earthing rod and kills a Cyber Sentry by getting him to shoot the fence, attracting the attention of the Cyber Leader who leaves the conversion area with the Cyber Lieutenant. Tiff, assessed as a candidate for Cyber Leader, is left in a state of partial-conversion.

The Doctor contacts Mel using the surveillance equipment and directs her on how to escape and access the security code for the camp's transmat, which he then uses to transmat all of the Cybermen into the caves beneath the camp. Voss celebrates the end of a "brain-dead horror show" and the Doctor is transmatted in front of a studio audience with presenter Brot Zirkussen, who reveals that the Doctor has been inside Cyberia: Escape the Cybermen, a popular LudoSphere reality show. The Cyber Leader joins them, aware of the truth and using the show for the steady stream of conversions, and Zirkussen informs the Doctor that the Channel Controller has decided that he will be partaking in his own series: The Trials of a Time Lord.

Part two

On the first episode of The Trials of a Time Lord, the Doctor is locked in a cell and joined by the partially-converted Tiff who is fighting the programming and feels betrayed by the Doctor's failure to rescue her, her emotional inhibitor having been disabled by Mel. Mel, meanwhile, is in a green room in the Studio Dome with twelve Androgums and learns that she is under contract as a cast member. Despite this, she escapes using a transmat in the Androgums' kitchen and is taken to the Black Hole bar by Voss, who is part of the Anti-LudoSphere Protest League. Shortly after, the Doctor and Tiff are welcomed to the kitchen where they are to be cooked by the celebrity chef Stunrib.

Having had the opportunity to read through The Androgum Cookbook in his cell, the Doctor points out that Stunrib is not cooking gumblejack according to the proper karam practice and gets away to a savannah set with Tiff. They return to the kitchen after losing the Androgums and attempts to escape using the transmat terminal, but he lacks production's permission and brings Tiff back from the increasing cyber control by feeding her gumblejack. Mel and Voss watch on the screen at the bar as Stunrib and the Androgums corner the Doctor and Tiff and Tiff activates a distress beacon, calling Cybermen to her to wipe out the attackers, after which they take Tiff back to Cyberia and complete her conversion. The Doctor warns the show's producers that he will make them sorry and the Cyber Leader prepares to destroy him.

Part three

Peri, brought onto the show by Vurglemere to replace Tiff and boost ratings, saves the Doctor from the Cybermen using gold goo, but the Doctor does not initially believe that she is real given that she is a skilled warrior and she carries him away. They reach the sixth trial, "Betrayal in Plain Sight", where a group of people in a pit are tasked with expelling the one amongst them who has the Winkman virus. Peri advises them to look for a cure instead, but they do not listen and the Doctor claims to be the infected one. He is thrown into the expulsion pit with Peri, who saves them from the fall with a cable shooter, and they are attacked by fire monsters which she destroys with an ice grenade. Given how close he was to death, the Doctor accepts that the show is real, that Tiff is really dead and that Peri is real.

Voss is knocked out by Val, a former actor who starred as a rebel in a show for eighteen seasons until a boy died, after which she began a real rebellion, and taken to her group's headquarters with Mel. When he awakens, Mel suggests that they kidnap Brot to demand an audience with the Muskoids and they succeed in getting him into a van where they force him to read a message in which he confesses to his crimes and professes a newfound devotion to the rebellion. They send the message to Vurglemere and Grobolosh, who are annoyed that the Doctor has seen through their harmless Pseudomats and instead orders them and various androids to kill Peri to provide motivation. When the Muskoids transmat to the rebels, Voss tries to kill them to avenge Tiff, but they absorb his fire and release it to kill him before transmatting away.

Although the Doctor is able to shut down the androids, the Pseudomats continue to attack until Peri finds and deactivates their control relay by reflecting their kill-shot with a handheld mirror. They reach the door to Control, behind which Brot, who claims to be a true rebel now free from the Muskoids' control, tells Mel is the big bad who is in charge of the LudoSphere. The Doctor and Peri enter and encounter Davros.

Part four

Davros claims that he set up the LudoSphere to lure the Doctor to him, but the Doctor correctly deduces that he is simply part of the show and Davros fires his electricity, destroying his laboratory but doing no actual harm to the Doctor or Peri. He agrees to work with the pair to get away from the LudoSphere, after which the Doctor and Peri are time scooped back to the Androgum kitchen to start series 2 of The Trials of a Time Lord. They remain in contact with Davros and meet him in the lizard dungeon, on the way to which they find the Claudia Cure for the Winkman virus to stop the killing in the pit. Learning that the sets are restored by nanobots, the Doctor suggests that Davros work out a way to use the nanobots against the LudoSphere.

Mel, Val, Vic and a hesitant Brot break into the studio in the van and find that Brot's set has been repurposed for a show which is cancelled, leading to it being burnt down and the actors fleeing outside. The group escape thanks to Mel accessing the transmat and they order Grobolosh and Zurglemere to cease programming and release the Doctor, but the Muskoids inform them that the time scoop can only be used by Command. Mel proceeds to contact Sticklefen to pass on the message to the producer, which only results in Command turning Grobolosh and Zurglemere's power off, and learns from Brot that the Muskoids feed on the ratings. She too learns about the nanobots.

Davros discovers that the nanobots are nanoborgs containing Muskoid ooze and he and the Doctor agree to replace it with Peri's DNA so that she can take control of them, with neither trusting the other. They attract some by causing damage to the set and capture them, after which Mel manages to contact them using the speaker system and informs them that she too is adapting the nanoborgs. Peri relinquishes her control over the nanoborgs upon using them to escape the LudoSphere, only to find that they are still in a television show, that they are within another dome and that Val has been acting all along. The Muskoids congratulate the group on the ratings and Brot removes his disguise to reveal that he is actually the Master.

Part five

to be added

Part six

to be added

Cast

Stories

# Title Author Director Featuring Released
1 Parts 1 and 2 Rochana Patel Jonathan S Powell Mel 30 August 2024
2 Parts 3 and 4 Katharine Armitage Mel, Peri, Davros, Tremas Master
3 Parts 5 and 6 Stewart Pringle

Crew

to be added

Worldbuilding

Notes

  • Davros (Early Imperial) closer look.
    This story was said to be "following later in the year" with the announcement of The Quin Dilemma on 31 January 2024, but was untitled.[2] It was mentioned again in the article announcing the release of The Quin Dilemma on 22 March 2024, though remained untitled.[3]
    • It was on 23 April 2024 that the title, release month, and cast and story details were revealed.[4]
  • This story was recorded on 27 and 29 February, and on 1 March 2024 at the Soundhouse.[5]
  • The cover for this story was revealed on 28 May 2024.[6]
  • The Dalek renders were provided by James Johnson.[7]
    • Both Sean Longmore and Johnson make a distinct connection between Davros' chair featured on this release to the one featured on the cover of 2005's The Juggernauts, even so far as to mention that this new chair has been reconstructed from the remains of the one used on Lethe. Whilst the chair seen in The Juggernauts was intended to be a regular Dalek base, this iteration is styled more like his original chair, whilst taking design cues from the Necros Daleks featured in Revelation of the Daleks, including the lower black base and cream colours, whilst also incorporation two small interface discs to the front, reminiscent of the ones featured on Davros' Emperor Dalek chair as seen in Remembrance of the Daleks. Davros is also featured with a new robotic hand, similar in design to the one see in The Juggernauts.[8]
    • Corgi die cast release with Imperial Davros toy.
      Davros in a white and gold chair is also reminiscent of a toy created by Corgi in 2004, which featured Davros in Imperial Dalek colours opposed to his traditional black and silver.
  • This release comes with Behind the Scenes Interviews extras. They are after every two parts of this story on both the CDs and in the Big Finish app.

Continuity

Cover gallery

  • Textless cover

    Textless cover

  • Alternate cover

    Alternate cover

External links

Footnotes

  1. ↑ The Master was not in the credits on the Big Finish website or app, presumably to keep his appearance a surprise.
  1. ↑ The Sixth Doctor’s Time Trials
  2. ↑ Celebrating 40 years of the Sixth Doctor
  3. ↑ The four Sixth Doctors
  4. ↑ The Trials of a Time Lord
  5. ↑ 'Backstage' tab of the official The Trials of a Time Lord page at bigfinish.com.
  6. ↑ The Sixth Doctor’s monster mash
  7. ↑ https://twitter.com/ThatTallGinger/status/1795479917599293889
  8. ↑ https://twitter.com/ThePrydonian/status/1795472755413954914
v • e
The Sixth Doctor Adventures
Single releases
The Sixth Doctor:
The Last Adventure
The Sixth Doctor and Peri:
Volume One
The Eleven
Water Worlds
Purity Undreamed
Purity Unleashed
Purity Unbound
The Quin Dilemma
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