Stop the Clock [AUDIO/2017.3.7]

★★★☆☆

  So here's the question: Doom Coalition being the mishmash of good and bad that it is, would the 16-hour epic come to a satisfying conclusion in the hands of John Dorney, former Big Finish golden boy and generally dependable writer at any given circumstance?

  The answer is... sort of, more or less. At least, I think Stop the Clock is as good as its preceding stories would ever allow it to be. Compared to Dark Eyes, I think Doom Coalition definitely intended to be more focused, but ended up feeling less so. Maybe it's because the double helming of John Dorney and Matt Fitton meant that two people were responsible for most of the sixteen parts, and therefore burnout was going to be more severe? All I can do is guess, but Stop the Clock feels like it should've been much more exciting, much more grand. When it comes down to it, the big bad scheme relies on a clock that requires bashing (in an admittedly cool way, with Helen ramming a TARDIS into it and flying off to another Big Finish boxset) for the heroes to save the universe. All a bit anticlimactic when I lay it out like this, but to his credit, Dorney makes it as exciting as possible, using every dependable finale trope (showing the gaslighted secondary villain that they're being used, impersonating one of the big bads and infiltrating Evil HQ, a companion's sacrifice, the list goes on). 

  The result is, I enjoy Stop the Clock, I really do -- but I wish it could've been something else., something more outside the box and exciting. At the same time, I know that it couldn't ever have been anything else, because the whole Doom Coalition series was so hell bent on tying up loose ends that they had to address all these elements somehow. I enjoy it for what it is, and I think it wraps up DC4 and the entire Doom Coalition saga in as neat a way as possible. Standout moment, though? Mark Bonnar acts in a scene as the Eleven, uncut, for two whole minutes practically growling about how he's going to kill a Time Lord who's holding him captive. Now that's acting.