The Final Amendment (audio story)
The Final Amendment was the thirty-ninth Bernice Summerfield audio story released by Big Finish Productions. It was the fifth story of the eighth season.
Publisher's summary[[edit] | [edit source]]
Forget the war and death and boring stuff like that with another trip to the Braxiatel Collection!
"A welcome return of an old favourite!" – Earth Empire News
"A moving parable on what it is to be human in these ever-changing times." – BFM
"Glorious, crukking filth! Hooray!" – Moonmaker
"Something of a curate's egg." – Fandomania
Joined by friends old and new, Jason Kane returns for his 15th series! Will Benny find out about him and Bev? Or about him and Adrian? What is the mysterious connection between Joseph and Doggles? Will Brax ever reveal his sinister plans?
And just who the hell is Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart?
Plot[[edit] | [edit source]]
After receiving an anonymous note asking for help, Benny travels to the White Rabbit on Bedrock XII and finds that the note is from Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart. Kadiatu knocks her out with a tranquiliser patch and takes her to President Fiona Dickens on Earth, where Benny learns from Fiona's son Howard that clones of herself, Jason and their friends star in a GalNet show. When Jason calls her and tells her that he has done something wrong, Benny is too upset with him to engage and tells him that they will speak once she returns to the Braxiatel Collection.
Benny and Kadiatu drink at the Hag's Head in the Undercity where Benny realises that all of the patrons are human; Kadiatu explains that aliens are being excluded and that Fiona seems to have been possessed or replaced, having previously been an ineffectual leader but now sending her political opponents to the Lunar Penal Colony. Unbeknownst to the two of them, Fiona is listening to them through a bug that she had a robot place on Benny and reveals to Howard that she is a clone. She has a clone of Howard incapacitate him and sends clones of Benny and Kadiatu after them, planning on getting them out of the way so that she can replace as many ministers as possible and start a war.
After Kadiatu kills her clone, Benny notices that her own clone is upset and realises that she is sentient. The Benny clone gets the two of them to subdue her and take her back to the palace, telling them about how Bernard Jones of the Stonehauser Medical Facility injected the clone of Fiona with his own racist beliefs. After Jones died two months ago, the clone's conditioning activated and she replaced the real Fiona. Benny's clone sends the real Benny to GalNet where the real Fiona and Howard are being held whilst she and Kadiatu confront Fiona, who kills the clone of Howard in an attempt to implicate Kadiatu and her alien DNA.
Her plan having failed due to Kadiatu being aware of the deception, Fiona sends a message to the clones to send them after Benny; clones of Bev, Adrian and the Doctor, joined by a robot of Braxiatel who explains that he is "caught up in the adventure", hunt her until Kadiatu reminds Fiona who she really is and what Jones has made her do. She calls the clones off before falling to her death. The clones are given new jobs and Kadiatu takes Benny back to Bedrock, after which she returns to the palace and agrees to take the real Fiona and Howard with her on her adventures in her time machine.
In the White Rabbit, Benny gets a call from Adrian and goes outside whilst the barman, John Wilson, watches the inauguration of Benny's clone as President of Earth. He hears Benny cry out and calls out to her to check if she is alright.
Cast[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Bernice - Lisa Bowerman
- Narrator - Nicholas Briggs
- Fiona - Ann Bryson
- Kadiatu - Sara Carver
- Bev - Louise Faulkner
- Jason - Stephen Fewell
- Howard - Richard Glaves
- Adrian - Harry Myers
- Braxiatel - Miles Richardson
- Joseph - Steven Wickham[1]
Uncredited cast[[edit] | [edit source]]
Worldbuilding[[edit] | [edit source]]
Events[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Actors protested against the use of clones in the Equity Uprising in New Newport.
- The White Rabbit, London was moved from Earth during one of humanity's recent wars. Kadiatu says that it might have been the war against the Jullatii, Daleks, or Draconians.
Foods and beverages[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Benny drinks a gin and tonic.
- Benny and Kadiatu have a drink in the undercity.
Individuals[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Bernice mentions Chris Cwej and Roz Forrester.
- Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart is a descendant of Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart from the 22nd century.
- Kadiatu was once Earth's Champion.
- Bernard Jones died on the Stonehauser Medical Facility.
- Terry Columbus is a reporter.
Planets[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Benny mentions Terra Alpha.
Television series[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Hollyoaks: Life on Phobos is broadcast after the Jason Kane Adventures.
Toys[[edit] | [edit source]]
Notes[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Joseph Lidster was initially asked to include Iris Wildthyme and started to work on a storyline in which she took Benny to the 21st century where time had changed and a human resources supervisor had taken over Earth, making it politically correct. Iris was removed after Simon Guerrier became concerned that the entire series relied on the availability of particular actors. (REF: Bernice Summerfield: The Inside Story)
- The original title of The Last Amendment was amended to The Final Amendment following a consultation between Guerrier and John Ainsworth. (REF: Bernice Summerfield: The Inside Story)
- The clone of Braxiatel tells the clone of Benny that he is in love with her, that she is the daughter he always wanted and that he wants her to call him "daddy". The same dynamic was between Francis Urquhart (played by Ian Richardson) and Mattie Storin (played by Susannah Harker) in House of Cards.
- Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart's ship makes a TARDIS-like dematerialisation sound.
- This marks the first appearance of the Doctor in a Bernice Summerfield audio drama, albeit a clone.
- This story was originally released on CD.
Continuity[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart first appeared in PROSE: Transit. Benny "helped" her (with the whole mad psychosis thing) in PROSE: The Also People and they last encountered each other in PROSE: The Dying Days.
- Benny mentions that Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart came to her wedding to Jason in Cheldon Bonniface on 24 April 2010. Kadiatu points out that it was hardly an exclusive event, given that Sherlock Holmes also attended. (PROSE: Happy Endings)
- Benny has been to the Undercity before in PROSE: Original Sin (which is in the "future") which she and Kadiatu have both seen.
- Time's Vigilante, who met and knew both Benny and Kadiatu, also became Earth's Champion. (PROSE: Set Piece)
- The pub that Kadiatu and Benny meet up in is the White Rabbit, moved there generations ago. (AUDIO: The Harvest, A Death in the Family)
- Benny notes when governments go wrong, mentioning the Nazis, (PROSE: Just War) the British government in the 21st century (AUDIO: The Fearmonger, The Time of the Daleks, PROSE: Trading Futures) and Terra Alpha. (TV: The Happiness Patrol)
- When Benny gets in a fight with her clone, she starts to sing Happy Place. (AUDIO: The Worst Thing in the World)
Adventures of Jason Kane and Bernice Summerfield - TV series[[edit] | [edit source]]
In the TV series excerpts there are several references to previous stories:
- The Oracle of the Lost and Bernice's cancer: PROSE: Tears of the Oracle
- The effects of her cancer and the Mary-Sue: PROSE: Return to the Fractured Planet
- The TV Jason says he deals in PROSE: Death and Diplomacy
- Irving Braxiatel and his plans: AUDIO: The Crystal of Cantus
External links[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Official The Final Amendment page at bigfinish.com
- The Final Amendment at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
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