The Enigma Dimension [AUDIO/2017.2.23]

★★☆☆☆

  In typical Nicholas Briggs fashion, The Enigma Dimension bookends the Casualties of War boxset with a lot of Dalek shouts, moral debates and the War Doctor refusing to be called the Doctor. At least something original happens with it this time around and he actually threatens to kill Ollistra if she ever called him Doctor again, in a fit of barely controlled rage. However ridiculous some of the lines end up being, I love that I get to hear the late great Sir John Hurt put his entire heart into the material. He was such an amazing actor.

  The eponymous Enigma Dimension makes an interesting first impression, but not a lot of interesting things are done with it that makes it memorable. It's a shame Briggs wants to turn the Time War into a WWII war movie so bad that he is compelled to make a surreal, weirdo concept somehow cut away to the most generic Dalek-Time Lord shootouts. I truly think something like the Enigma could have, in another life, been an interesting concept explored in detail in another range; as it is, all it ends up being is a half-baked nugget of an idea hardwired to be a convenient get-out-of-jail-free card for Briggs to let the Doctor defeat the Daleks at very last moment. Talk about wasted potential. It still says a lot that the Eighth Doctor Time War range was more willing to be more surreal and bolder with its concepts than the actual Time War range with an actual Time War Doctor. It's a shame, that, because his Doctor's a joy to listen to at this point. He, Jacqueline Pearce and Louise Jameson are the three redeeming factors of this audio drama. The rest of it is utterly forgettable drivel.