The Dalek Protocol [AUDIO/2021.4.13]

★★★☆☆

  To be brutally honest with you, I was seriously considering giving The Dalek Protocol a lower score. The first three episodes of it were quite bland for my taste, with the usual Nicholas Briggs checkbox-style pervading their entirety. Events in themselves are intriguing to a degree, but I can't remember the last time a Briggs script genuinely got me excited about the sum of its parts. It's an ongoing nag I have with his style of writing; I have nothing against him as an invaluable contributer to Big Finish, and his love for Doctor Who is palpable in every one of his installments... but there's a limit to how much fun you can have when every new story shares the same basic by-the-numbers storytelling and structure. This seems to be particularly egregious when Daleks are involved, and I found myself yet again casually listening to The Dalek Protocol, feeling quite average about most of what it has to offer.

  I'll give it this, though; underneath the familiar Dalek shenanigans and blazing guns, there's a genuinely meaty undercurrent of Anya Kingdom meeting her Doctor out of sync. All credit to Jane Slavin, who is the most engaging out of the entire bunch of actors and brings alive the dilemma her character faces. This factor brings me to conclusively give The Dalek Protocol three stars, which means I definitely didn't dislike it, and found it to be an overall mildly entertaining experience. 

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ  

  Actors playing multiple parts has always been common practice in Big Finish, but Nick Briggs was everywhere in this story! It felt like half the characters were him in various accents and human/non-human voices. Don't consider this a complaint, since this was pretty fun to listen to and mentally point out. You can't say he's not dedicated to his job!