The Chaos Pool [AUDIO/2009.3.?]

★★☆☆☆

  I would call The Chaos Pool a letdown in practically any other situation, but when it's the third and final installment of a very middling monthly range... well, it's hardly a break from the norm by being rather boring, is it? Peter Angelides is given the unenviable task of tying together the various loose threads of the Key 2 Time trilogy, and the result is that Chaos Pool is hardly given any time to be its own beast before acting as the janitor for all the mess that went on before it. 

  Some good is to enjoy from it, though; for instance, I love how Big Finish pulled the rug from under us by making us assume Lalla Ward is playing Romana with all the president schtick before revealing that it was Astra all along. It's the kind of surprise return that makes perfect sense within the narrative and gets you knocking on your head thinking why you didn't see that coming in the first place. Amy (Abby) and Zara may not be the most interesting of characters, but their concept carries through soundly enough. Furthermore, I'm far more partial towrads the final episode than the first three because it shows a heap of imagination and playfulness that the majority of The Chaos Pool lacked. Sadly, these elements I like about it are overshadowed by some really egregious padding throughout the first three parts. For most of its runtime, I felt incredibly bored by Chaos Pool, and I was also let down by the rather underwhelming ending. Make of this next statement what you will, but I believe The Chaos Pool to have approximately 20 minutes of really good stuff surrounded by a heap of boring material. I guess the Key 2 Time saga was a fun experiment, but it needed much more conviction (and imagination) than it got to be truly memorable.