Monday, November 2, 2009

7th Doctor - The Fearmonger

Serial 7R - The Fishmonger
The Fishmonger
An Extract From The EC Unauthorized Guide O' Wholesome Cod Pieces

D O C T O R W H O

Serial 7R - The Fishmonger



Part One

The Doctor, his companion Ace and "Cat Molester" Jones have decided to abandon the quarry planet of the Cheetah People and catch the 9.15 vortex portal back to Perivale. Unfortunately, they have caught the 9.14 vortex portal straight to Sydney instead, and non-plussed trio reappear at a One Nation rally at Circular Quay.

The Doctor complains bitterly that the next vortex to Perivale is at 11.35, Mr. Jones tells Ace that the annoying redhead One Nation leader, Pauline Hanson, is, in fact, a hideous alien monster known to the people of the universe as the Fishmonger.

Ace pulls out an assault rifle and opens fire on Hanson – to no avail, as the bullets were used up in a previous New Adventure.

The Doctor and Mr. Jones are surprised at Ace's actions. They hadn't even got to the bit about the Fishmongeroid, from the planet Fishmongos, being an Evil from the Dawn of Time yet. They hadn't even got round to telling her she was evil, yet.

Security guards close in on them and the trio split up.


The Doctor soon finds his way to a local talk-radio station where John Laws asks to interview him about his 'Pro-Murder' policy to free-thinking political parties.

The Doctor vigorously defends himself – those Taran wood-beasts may have SEEMED like they had created the ultimate political utopia, but the Time Lord mind can sense true evil. The hairy monsters would have crushed all the lesser races and removed the very democratic process that allowed them to ascend to their position!

John Laws explains he was talking about Pauline Hanson.

"Who?" asks the Doctor, confused.

At that moment, Ace phones in and requests John Laws plays 'The Ace of Spades' by Motorhead. She also has a go at the Doctor for not giving her equal status on the interview.

John Laws demands to know who Ace is, and the Doctor airily explains she is, in fact, his granddaughter and the whole age gap can be easily explained by the fact both he and Ace are shape-shifting time traveling arsonists with hair-trigger psychosis.

John Laws nods, plays an add for his new book "Me Biased? Fuck Off!", and offers the Doctor a chance for a regular prime time slot. He admits he hasn't seen anything this twisted since that Jerry Springer marathon about redneck Cybermen cheating on their gingham-dress-wearing pig lovers and business partners.

The first installment of 'The Seventh Doctor Segment' goes quite well. The Doctor handles a few calls from former companions and a wrong number asking for pizza, plays some of Triple J's Hottest One Hundred six years before it was made, and also tells the audience there is a monster in Australia, something evil out there that must be fought.

"The Fishmonger...

No one is sure of its origins, but legends claim that a number of extremely-pissed psychic forces were engineered by an alien race to incite group emotions and unite their people. Pride, hate, fear, lust, a desire for peace...

Unfortunately, all the cool ones worked perfectly, and the only rogue Mongers were the really inane, crappy ones like the Wallpapermonger or the Lentilmonger. But when the civilization collapsed, the Fishmonger escaped... HERE, to Earth, to Sydney!

Since then it has been stirring up racial fear and a desire for fish and chips ever since! You have been feeding upon the results! And the Fishmonger is now in the body of Pauline Hanson!!!

But, in the meantime listeners, here's the John Butler Trio with 'Something's Gotta Give Right Now'."

Once the song is over, the Doctor phones directly the local lunatic asylum and talks to Doug, the psychotic pyromaniac who is fresh from trying to burn down the inmates' recent production of Cosi Fan Tutti.

Doug and the Doctor discuss the recent poor performance in the cricket, before turning onto the matter of the alien psychic monster residing in Pauline Hanson's excuse for a brain.

Doug explains that he once set fire to his mother's house and a cage full of kittens – this has nothing to do with the Fishmonger, but he just really wanted to share this. He also plans to escape from solitary confinement and kill the Fishmonger with his own bare hands.

"You can't just strangle her, Doug!" the Doctor protests. "If you kill Hanson like that, the Fishmonger will simply move to another host and all you've done is commit murder! You've got to hurl her straight into a fat of boiling chip fat you fool!"

Doug takes this advice on board and apologizes for not thinking of it earlier. However, at that point, Mr. Jones arrives and kung-fu kicks Doug to death over his mistreatment of cats.

The Doctor tries to convince Mr. Jones he is being slightly hypocritical about this, but the line goes dead and the Time Lord hastily plays a cover of "Stairway to Heaven" by Rolf Harris.

After the song, the Doctor begins winding up. He gives a brief homily over the nature of chaos theory and damp butterflies, hums a snatch of Bohemian Rhapsody, before announcing that he and his companion Ace will be breaking into the Sydney Opera House later this evening, creeping under the stage where Pauline Hanson is speaking, and set off a huge thermonuclear bomb.

"Don't worry, everyone, I'm sure there will be some survivors. And wrecking the Opera House will finally get rid of that eyesore that the Great Architect slaved over and was thoroughly disappointed by.

It's 3:00, I'm the Doctor and remember: Speak of the Devil and three will come along at once."



Part Two

The next day, a rather singed Doctor begins the second 'The Seventh Doctor Segment'.

"Well, firstly I'd like to say that the construction of the Opera House is really a lot sturdier than I was expecting. That bomb hardly shook the rafters, now I come to think of it. Excellent workmanship, yes, excellent.

I did listen to what Pauline Hanson had to say: 'I urge God-fearing white folk to speak up against those who would destroy their traditional values... Blah, blah, blah'. Let Andrew Denton give her freedom of speech, that rhetoric has been cleverly calculated to get the crowd feeling, instead of thinking! And what they are feeling is a hunger for fish and chips!

What is needed to destroy the Fishmonger is a pre-programmed force field to crush the Fishmonger out of existence. Luckily, I just happen to have one in my pocket. I suppose I could tune to a wavelength so it left the host unharmed, but that all depends on the radio poll.

Ring up with your views. Should Hanson survive or should she kark it?"

The switchboard goes wild, but fifteen are wrong numbers and most of the rest are just music requests. The Doctor is forced to play Bad Moon Rising by the Reels before asking the public again if he should slaughter Hanson.

The reaction is overwhelmingly positive, but the Doctor isn't sure if he made it clear enough that he was talking about PAULINE Hanson and not the BAND Hanson. Upon explaining this, he gets even more phone calls suggesting he wipe out the band just to be on the safe side.

One of the callers, a Mister David Olefield, demands to know why UNIT's unofficial scientific advisor is now trying to destroy the One Nation Party.

"Isn't it obvious?" the Doctor asks, confused.

The next caller is Paul McDermott, complaining that a young woman in a badge-covered jacket has just burst into his flat, claiming to be a would-be assassin on the verge of a nervous breakdown and insisting that Pauline Hanson's ethnic cleansing agenda can no longer be tolerated and must be "blown into sloppy green bits".

Frankly, Paul agrees with Ace, but dislikes the teenage arsonist currently raiding his fridge and requests they play some Doug Anthony All-Star tunes to get him some royalties quick smart.

With a shrug, the Doctor plays I Want To Spill The Blood Of A Hippy before a wrong number asking for a chicken tikka with pilau rice comments there is a crackling blob of electric, psychic energy hovering in mid-air. It wants to use the phone box pretty soon.

Indeed, the very next caller is said electric, psychic blob which explains as it has been a floating energy being for the last fifteen years and assures listeners that the actions of the Fishmonger are in no way representative of such beings as a whole.

The Doctor thanks the blob for its comments, and the blob begins to defend Hanson's political stance, claiming that she has good points to make even if she does go over the top with them.

The Doctor points out that people only makes it easier for her by refusing to listen to the things they don't want to hear her saying. "That's my boy," says the blob proudly, hanging up.

The Doctor begins a long, pompous speech admitting, yes, he could stop the whole situation by travelling back a few years and killing Hanson as a baby, but insists that he had interfered in Earth's history far too much already. He then plays a remixed version of the announcement of the death of Pope Jean Paul II from April 2005.

Olefield rings up again and points out that the Doctor has been seen consorting with the United Front, an extremist organization that began when a Dubbo recreation of the French Revolution got a bit out of hand.

Olefield gleefully points out that he now has enough evidence to hold the Doctor as a suspected international terrorist until after the election is over...

"Mr. Olefield, if I do have connections with a ruthless, mass-murdering terrorist organization... why the hell are you annoying me?"

Olefield takes the point and hangs up.

"Actually, come to think of it, getting the United Front to help isn't such a crazy idea. They're more ruthless and certainly more efficient that UNIT... Yes, just give them a few beryllium laser rifles and we're laughing. Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha-hahah.

Well, it's 3:00, I'm the Doctor and remember: One straw doesn't make the one-eyed man a camel."



Part Three

Today's installment of 'The Seventh Doctor Segment' is live from the hospital where Ace is now lying unconscious from being shot through the lung. The Doctor is rather annoyed her Time Lord healing powers haven't already kicked in and believes Ace is just faking.

"For all of you wondering just how Ace got shot, well, what can I say? I really should have made sure those terrorists were good shots before I started handing out energy weapons that are banned on every civilized planet. I'm a fool. But what are YOUR opinions?"

The first caller is the energy blob, who believes the Fishmonger is a coward for not arranging an interview with the Doctor itself.

The second caller is Alex McDonald, leader of the United Front, who explain their attempt to fire-bomb Hanson's house has failed – they forgot to add the Molotov cocktails and have been instead hurling empty bottles at the flat, hoping for the best.

"OK, I'm sorry, that's just pathetic. I refuse to work with you any more until you get at least some kind of credibility together."

Just then, Hanson/the Fishmonger rings up, agreeing to make an appearance on the show. The Doctor agrees and instantly returns to studio in a cheap editing effect.

Hanson arrives, not realizing she is sitting in the lethal force-field bug-zapper the Doctor has built to destroy the Fishmonger. The Doctor laughs maniacally and activates the switch...

...but he's forgotten to plug the bastard machine in and so it's useless. Mortified, the Doctor awkwardly tries to turn the conversation onto the weather as the evil Fishmonger begins to summon its powers.

A caller rings up and abuses the Doctor for not asking any really challenging questions. Annoyed, the Doctor realizes it is, in fact, Ace heckling him from her hospital bed.

The Fishmonger uses its evil powers and riots begin across the country as the mobs begin to search desperately for fish and chips.

Back-peddling, the Doctor offers to take the Fishmonger out for dinner, maybe a movie, anything to prevent his hideous bloody murder.

The Fishmonger requires an insane, power-mad hypocrite to survive inside, and thus it leaps to the best candidate around – the Doctor.

"He-heh. It's that time again, listeners. It's 3:00, I'm the Fishmonger and remember: A rolling stone is as good as a locksmith."



Part Four

The Fishmonger is now the presenter of 'The Seventh Doctor Segment' where it regularly suggests listeners burst out of their houses on a machine-gun rampage, between John Denver songs.

Ace and Pauline Hanson have teamed up and are now the Fishmonger's guests as riots rage across the country. The Fishmonger is woeful as a radio presenter, trying to fill dead air by juggling and making endless comments on the sexuality of the radio station bosses.

The latest caller is Alex McDonald, who's just joined the One Nation Party as he believes they are professional and fanatical enough for his purposes. The Fishmonger cackles insanely and plays Girls Just Wanna Have Fun three times in a row.

Hansen explains that the Fishmonger angle was just a publicity angle – and a rather fucking stupid one at that. But, at the time, the idea of a political leader being possessed by an Evil From The Dawn of Time seemed kinda cool. It explained any screw-ups she made, and gave her an edge on the Greens and the Democrats.

Just then, Kim Beazley rings up claiming to be possessed by the Lardmonger, but is cut off.

The Fishmonger is ready to destroy the Earth and consume the souls of all across the globe. After a few station idents, promotions and an add for a Mother & Son DVD.

However, with an orchestral choir, the crackling energy blob bursts out of Ace and confronts the Fishmonger. For this is the Chipmonger, and their battle across time and space must now come to an end!!

Hansen tries desperately to narrate the apocalyptic battle between these two dying gods, but she doesn't have much of a gift for oration.

Finally, the two battling energy beings cancel each other out and the extremely dazed Doctor and Ace vow never to get caught in talk-back radio ever again.

The Doctor lets Hansen take over his radio show while he and Ace depart for the TARDIS. They have no idea where Mr. Jones has got to, little realizing he has gone back to his own disc-jockeying.

Get it? Alan Jones? Huh? Oh, please yourself.

"Goodbye then, everyone. It's been fun, listeners. It's 3:00, I'm the Doctor and remember: ... Nope, it's gone."


Book(s)/Other Related - Doctor Who Goes For Fish And Chips
Doctor Mysterio ia Shocko-Jocka
Emperors of the Airwaves by Dilbert Wilkins

Fluffs - Sylvester McCoy seemed a little fishy in this story.

Goofs -
There are no goofs in this story. Any Doctor Who story featuring assassins out to get Pauline Hanson are above reproach in my opinion and it's my guide, you socialist bastards!

Links and References -
The Doctor boasts that he hasn't been as amorally genocidal and xenophobic since Rememberin' to Take Out The Dustbins. But he tries. God knows, he tries.

Untelevised Misadventures -
The Doctor once stood helpless as the Lustmongers were forced into an entirely separate universe – and he will encounter them again in the Eighth Doctor adventure 'The Lust'.

Groovy DVD Extras -
The cut sequences showing just what Cat Molester Jones was up to during episodes two, three and four. Scarier than Margaret Thatcher naked.

Dialogue Disasters -

John Laws: If you've got something to say, why don't you just come out and say it?
Doctor: I love you, John. I have worshipped you from afar since the moment we first met.
John Laws: On second thoughts, let's all shut up and be vaguely cryptic from now on.

Ace: What is the Fishmonger?
Doctor: It's a Fishmongoid from the planet Fishmongos, Ace. Please, try and pay attention!

Doctor: Do you want a dangerous fugitive staying in your flat?
Paul: Well, of course not!
Doctor: Well then, don't upset her and she'll be a NICE fugitive staying in your flat!
Paul: I don't want any type of fugitive staying in my flat!
Doctor: Oh... I don't suppose your neighbor would be up for a dangerous fugitive flat mate, then?

Dialogue Triumphs -

Doctor: I'm not talking about politics! I'm talking about something more fundamental. Something evil. I'm talking about fish. Fish! Fish... FROM THE DAWN OF TIME! And the women who sell them!

Doctor: Just for once I'd like to come up with a very good plan that doesn't involve lots of last minute rewiring. But it would have to be a very cunning one. A plan that so cunning it could sneak up on a fox about to rob a chicken coop and steal his trousers without him noticing...

Doctor: No-one ever needs to know I'm here unless you talk to me. It's a bit of a drawback, but that's audio for you.

Olefield: Ah, Doctor! Isn't this the point where you usually arrive in the midst of chaos and sidle into the good graces of the authority figures when they're not paying attention?
Doctor: I don't need a prompt, Olefield! I know what to do! I'm not William Hartnell for crying out loud!
Olefield: Sorry, just thought a cue could come in helpful...

Doctor: I know where talking gets you, Ace. It's listening you might like to try.
Ace: I don't need dating tips from you, Professor.

Doctor: And now... A Walk In The Black Forrest.

UnQuotable Quote -
Hanson: Please explain?

Viewer Quotes -

"If there is one thing that can be said about The Fishmonger, it is that it fits into the McCoy era perfectly. There is a disturbingly realistic quality to the tale, which adds greatly to the story as a whole. What is unsatisfying is the ending – Pauline Hanson survived!" - Dave Restal (2000)

"The Fishmonger highly enjoyable and giving us a glimpse of what Season 27 could've been like. If everyone involved were paranoid schizophrenics with severe personality disorders out to destroy mankind. But without Julia Sawalha taking over halfway through. Yes, this very easily could be the opening story for the often hypothesized Season 27. If you had no idea about what would happen in Season 27 and never listened to this, ever." - Duncan Johnson (2001)

"The Doctor's a socialist? KILL HIM!!!" – Father James O'Malley (1999)

"So Alan Jones was a cat molester all the time? Hah! Told you so!" - Stan Zemanak (2000)

"Pauline Hanson, eh? I slept with her once. No, tell a lie. Twice. It's not something I'm proud of. Indeed, it's one of the few things I'm actually ashamed of. Man, she looks rough first thing in the morning. When I tried to break it off with her, she just kept asking me to explain. Look, Pauline, YOU'RE DUMPED! That enough for you?!" - Nigel Verkoff (1998)

Psychotic Nostalgia -
"The story could be described as a 5 parter where we don't get to see part one. It isn't, really, but it could be described as such. By someone retarded. Incidentally the closing line is just plain shit."

Sylvester McCoy Speaks!
"I don't really know what to think of Big Finish. Fan-based projects can be a bit, well... chaotic and amateurish. I mean, this might be fun for Gay and Jason, but when they start discussing stuff about '12 regeneration limits' work often stops for days or more while they argue all the time. For Christ's sake, it is just a television show. Chaining Jason to the wall like that for mentioning The Brain of Moby was just childish and stupid... But, er, as Gay seems to be listening, I think I shall agree whole-heartedly with his argument if not his way of expressing logical victory. Excuse me, is that the exit behind you?"

Rumors & Facts -
For a few short months in 1990, the BBC realized that no one was prepared to make a Doctor Who TV Movie and considered making another TV series instead.

John Satan-Turner offered a set of obviously forged accounts proving that, although performing abysmally in ratings, ludicrously expensive to make, a key cause to the collapse of Western civilization and with a fan base that make Jim Jones look calm and composed, Doctor Who WAS a program that the BBC couldn't be arsed to cancel for the last 26 years.

The BBC thus decreed they would consider another fourteen-episode season for Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred as the Seventh Doctor and Ace if certain specific requirements were met in the stories of the season.

The demands were that every story of Season 27 would focus on a prime-time game show with the Doctor and Ace competing against some of the cheaper alien menaces spawned over the years.

Satan-Turner, Mark Plate and Ben Aaaaronovitch set out to work on the season and came back with a workable outline.

Season 27 would begin with "Live Aid", where the Doctor, Ace and Monty Python would appear in a Comic Relief version of Stars In Their Eyes.

Ace would be written out in "Nice Time", where should variously fall in love with an Ice Cream Vendor, move to Paris, take over Gallifrey and explode while the Doctor tried to guess the correct price.

Aldred's replacement, the glamorous Kate Tollinger, game show host, would join the Doctor in the next story, "The Sale of the Century".

The final story was "Addiction (to 'What's My Line?')", where the Doctor fought with the evil, despicable BBC Manager of Drama (a role Bob Monkhouse had been born to play).

The season would end with the Doctor straight-jacketed and forced to watch Coronation Street for hours. This horrible fate would destroy the Doctor's mind, and trigger his regeneration.

It was at this point, JST discovered that the BBC wanted the Eighth Doctor to be played by Richard Griffiths. True, the cost of a costume and larger TARDIS prop not to mention widescreen cameras would be exorbitant, but would be balanced by the reduction in catering services as it was widely known Griffiths could live for centuries on the fat in his cheekbones alone.

Unfortunately, Griffiths had been offered the role by Alexei Sayle in 1981 and his view of Doctor Who had been scarred for life.

This proved to be the final nail in the coffin of televised Doctor Who, and only the pilot episode "Search Out Science" was filmed. The Doctor Who Production Office was vacated in five minutes, burnt to the ground in ten and Season 27 remained unfilmed.

Later, when Big Finish were considering plots for Seventh Doctor and Ace stories, former script editor Andrew Cartmel suggested they reuse his abandoned Season 27 scripts. He was laughed out of the room, despite his claims his scripts were not the rumored game show plots of legend...



An Unauthorized Programme Guide EXCLUSIVE!

Andrew Cartmel SPEAKS!

"Yeah, when the 26th season finished, I was already tearing up newspapers and throwing words onto the floor in the vain hope story lines and character development would appear out of the void.
Doctor Who always stands or falls – well, mainly falls – on the strength of your current Doctor and we were stuffed at the time. Sylvester McCoy was maturing nicely, like a very runny cheese, and we were stuck with him for the next nine seasons apparently. When Jonathon Powell won that bet he could shove a whole xylophone up his arse, he had us over a barrel, really. We had to do anything he said.
Sophie Aldred was getting quite a fan base at the time and was considering leaving Who so she could bring down the government with the hordes of teenage masturbators who followed her wherever she went. But, instead of just introducing another companion in the usual way, I decided we would get this new one while Ace was still in the stories. Then we could dump whichever one was more annoying and STILL have some gratuitous girl-on-girl action in those vitally-important first few episodes.
Who would she be? Definitely a she. Hermaphrodites don't work for me. Another young woman, though older than Ace – a posh, nefarious, feline and Machiavellian heroine. Witty and sophisticated, champagne and silk, aristocratic young female cat burglar. Her names? Rain Cunningham.
The first story of the season was a pub-crawl-gone-wrong story to trump all others called The Girl Who Hung Around Bars. I was in love with the notion of writing this introductory story myself, and drunk copious amounts of alcohol in an anti-social manner to scare off the contenders Big Ian or Mark Plate.
The next story was Hellhound of Fargo, which was going to return the Dustbins and also Starship Troopers. I remember JST wasn't so confident, and pointed out the budget would probably be around 8 pounds for the entire battle sequence when the Dustbin Hive turned into a million Dustbin drones and individually slaughtered a contingent of armored troopers from the inside out. I was utterly convinced that there were new video effects technology to provide some kick-ass space combat! And you know what? I WAS ABSOLUTELY RIGHT! Sadly, the technology cost in the realm of 897 million pounds, which JST thought was being a wee bit too hopeful.
Who was going to write Hellhound...? Me of course. Though I had to do some serious monkey impersonations to scare of Ben Aaaaronovitch, who was begging to do a sequel to Remembrin' To Take Out The Dustbins. It wasn't fair, apparently, me doing all the work. Yeah, well get this, Ben! LIFE ISN'T FAIR, BUSTER!!!
Of course, by now the entire production team were begging me to let someone else write a story – something with more gratuitous philosophical speculation rather than action adventure, specifically gratuitous philosophical speculation that cost somewhere in the region of thruppence. I decided that I could do that and shot Graeme Curry in the kidneys so I could write my cosmic detective story, Panther Man.
Panther Man would reveal that the Doctor, was, in fact, Hare Krishna and go around encountering a sequence of deities throughout time and then killing them. It would have investigated the very notion of the need for gods amongst humans and then ruin it forever. Rain and Ace were given a good role, machine-gunning Zoroaster in ancient Persia and dousing the Christian deity in petrol along the way.
There was no danger of controversy, I thought. We were out to show that ALL belief systems are equally stupid and inherently vulnerable to the gun-totting companions of a time-travelling immortals. I remember Colin Brake screaming at me, "There are easier ways of killing this show, but there are none more certain!" Tut. Hasn't the bloke ever HEARD of relativist liberal fashion? Good, because I haven't either.
To round out the season, a new writer called Tony Etchells suggested a story called A Tool for Glory. It set during the horror of trench latrines in World War I, a real period piece the BBC could do (and often would do) blindfolded. I told him very politely that it was a good idea, but I'd already accepted a submission from myself called No Man's Land, which, oddly enough, was also set during the horror of trench latrines in World War I.
And, beyond Season 27? There were plans to introduce more writers new to the show, but I put a stop to that damn quickly. There was Robin Mukherjee suggesting a story of LSD-drinking monks riding giant cockroaches in this story called Addiction; Ed Young had this Shining-type thriller set in an isolated university in a blizzard called Night Thoughts; Neil Penswick had an Alien vs. Predator story called Hostage, and Colin Brake was offering himself as a replacement script editor.
A pity, really, as I was already confirmed as script editor for the next sixty years and had already accepted submissions from myself about cockroach riding monks, universities under siege and extra-terrestrials called Elixir of Doom, University Challenge and The Pit respectively.
Indeed, I single-handedly managed to create a brand new series of Doctor Who that very day, where the Doctor and Raine resourcefully save the multiverse in weekly adventures on the small screen. It started in 1990 and it's still going to this day! Unfortunately, the bastard BBC won't let anyone apart from me see it!"

"Now, Andrew... that's complete and utter bullshit, isn't it?"

"... A bit. Yeah."


--------

Originally, the fourth release was to be Paul Carnell's The Thingamajig, picking up where Survival ended and linking up with the Doctor Who TV movie of 1996.

Gay Russell agreed to let Jonathon Blum write this story with a suitable New Adventure-type flavor. He stipulated that the story not be historical, feature werewolves, returning monsters, deep angst or be involved with Blum's awful homemade Season 27 story Time Piss.

As you can imagine, Russell was not impressed when he was given Time Piss 2: This Time, It's Personal, featuring the Doctor fighting the Cybermen in WW2 Poland as Ace discovers she is, in fact, half-Snotaran to her deep depression.

Dude, this story was so bad not even Nick Briggs wanted it to be made for the introduction of the Nick Briggs Doctor. That's how crap it was.

Luckily, Russell's intense hatred for Sylvester McCoy had meant that, instead of being directed to the Big Finish studio, he had ended up on Devil's Island for recording, allowing sufficient time to re-write the whole thing top to bottom.

The experience left Blum sobbing like a baby man. Especially when Russell popped round with a bottle of red wine... and smashed it over Blum's head, swearing if he ever went near Big Finish again he would be fed to Rob Shearman – the same thing applied if he ever tried to submit an Eighth Doctor story.

Blum got the hint.

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