The Nowhere Place [AUDIO/2006.7.?]

★★★★☆

  I know I can often be quite critical of Nicholas Briggs' usual work, but even I can admit that when he's cooking, there's scarcely anyone who cooks like he does. Looking back, he's always been good at cooking up an atmospheric story, and The Nowhere Place does it better than most of his penned works. There's a mysterious door on the hull of a spaceship, one that's billions of years old and leads to nothing and inside a 1950s British train at the same time. People keep getting hypnotised and drawn into the door, leading themselves into certain peril, and Evelyn starts to mutter something about a Time's End. Genuinely chilling stuff, this, especially with the revelations of the main evil force being a past inhabitant of Earth going with the 'the way of life dictates that humanity has to meet its end so others can thrive' rationale. 

  I always think an adventure is sold in large part by the commitment of the actor playing the Doctor, and Colin Baker delivers such a harrowing performance as a Sixth Doctor who, for once, doesn't know what's going on at all and is trying to keep his composure for the similarly troubled Evelyn. I wouldn't call The Nowhere Place the scariest Big Finish Dr. Who adventure, but I would rank it very highly in terms of dread and terror you cannot immediately place. Like the Doctor, we the audience have no idea where the story's heading until the very final moments (incidentally, this may be Briggs's most patience-requiring script due to the threat not becoming clear 'till the very end), and the expertly done atmosphere carries our intrigue and interest through. The haunting sound of the bell, the screaming people sucked into what lies outside the door, even the added spooky ambience to the Dominic Glynn theme at the beginning -- The Nowhere Place is something special, and something not very frequently talked about... and I think that needs to change. Genuinely, I'd call it one of Nicholas Briggs' best scripts.