"Zagreus"
by Alan Barnes and Gary Russell

I'll be honest: it's really hard to know what to say about Zagreus. I've listened to it three times in as many days with the intention of reviewing it, but I'm at a loss for where to begin.

Partly, this is because it's a bewildering mish-mash of different characters, actors, situations and concepts; almost as if it's trying too hard to be described as "epic". There's so much going on, and there are so many different ways of looking at the play, that it's tricky to find a starting-point for a review.

But it's also hard because so much has already been said. Zagreus was released five years ago, and was probably the most highly-anticipated and -publicised Big Finish audio adventure yet. A lot of expectations were riding on the play, and a good number of listeners were disappointed, because of the huge difference between what they were expecting, and what they actually got. But some fans, on the other hand, ignore any pre-defined ideas they had, and adore the play for what it is.

So, what is Zagreus? It's a three-disc story (amounting to three episodes, each about seventy-five minutes long), which continues the adventures of the Eighth Doctor and Charley Pollard beyond the cliffhanger at the end of Neverland, in which the Doctor claimed he had become the eponymous monster, Zagreus. It's also a celebratory release for two reasons - it's the fiftieth audio drama in Big Finish's main range of Doctor Who plays, and its release date coincided with the fortieth anniversary of the television series. To mark these occasions, a large number of the show's former stars return - ex-Doctors Peter Davison, Colin Baker, and Sylvester McCoy being perhaps the main draws, alongside many of their screen and audio companions - as was made traditional with previous anniversary adventures like The Three Doctors and The Five Doctors. However, Zagreus differs from those stories, because the returning actors and actresses don't play their usual characters; rather than shoe-horning Doctors and companions in at random, the choice was made to have familiar voices as new faces.

The plot begins with Charley frightened and alone in the TARDIS, before being drawn into a world where she's a confused and disoriented child, being taken to the doctor's by her mother. But when her mother transforms into a rabbit, and the doctor in question turns out to be an illusion of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, she realises that things are not what they seem to be. The Doctor, on the other hand, is struggling to cope with his conflicting personality, and is guided through his ship by a mysterious voice from his own past.

The first episode, Wonderland, is not the most promising of starts. It begins with an over-long recap of the arc so far (which works as a refresher for people who have heard Neverland, but would probably be confusing for those who have not), which is then rendered redundant by the episode itself, which recaps the previous story at length. When things get going, we meet a few people from Charley's home life, including Elisabeth Sladen as her schoolteacher Miss Lime, who can always be relied upon for a good performance even when the material isn't up to scratch. Anneke Wills too, as Charley's mother, is thoroughly enjoyable.

Then, Peter Davison is introduced as a troubled Reverend Townsend, whose interest in science can't quite be reconciled with his faith, with a selection of his companions as colleagues and relatives. It's at this point that I started to lose interest - even though the actors and actresses are trying their best (and Nicola Bryant in particular is excellent value here), the "mini-story" about these new characters feels like a distraction away from the plot.

Moving on to Heartland, the second episode, I hoped that things would instantly shift back to Gallifrey, or that the Doctor and Charley would be reunited; I wanted the brilliance and excitement of Neverland to continue, but instead we have more sub-adventures that are really not very interesting. The performances aren't at all bad - Colin Baker is brilliant as Tepesh, and Sylvester McCoy is amusing (but perhaps for all the wrong reasons!), and Maggie Stables shines most out of all the companion actresses - but, try as they might, they can't lift the material they're given.

When Romana does eventually return, now joined by Leela and K-9, it feels like things are getting back on track, and that the adventure is moving in the direction it should have been for the last two hours, and their scenes are actually very enjoyable. The cliffhanger ending of the second episode is an unexpected twist, and honestly excited me in a fanboyish way about where this is all heading.

However, Wasteland, the concluding chapter, doesn't impress any more than the previous episodes did. The interaction between the Doctor and the TARDIS (as awkwardly voiced by Nicholas Courtney) is one example of a scene that lost my interest instantly. Only India Fisher's heartbroken performance as Charley, which is spot-on in terms of its emotional effect on the listener, was enjoyable. The end of the episode, which sets the direction for the rest of the Eighth Doctor's stories, is one full of promise, but after the disappointment of these three discs I'm sceptical about whether it can be pulled off.

Looking at the story as a whole, then, the decision to cast returning actors in new roles is a very original one, and it does remove the need for a contrived reason for past characters to come back. If you want a big epic multi-Doctor story, you can get a DVD of The Five Doctors; whilst it would be nice to see Big Finish's four regular Doctors doing something of that sort, the fact that a different approach has been taken is no real loss, and the originality of the idea is to be commended.

So that would all be fine, but the story isn't actually that good. If I had to write a detailed beat-by-beat summary of what happens in each episode, I think I'd struggle, despite having listened several times. Granted, Zagreus is trying to be a bit mysterious and enigmatic on purpose - at the start of Wonderland, the listener is supposed to be disoriented and confused, and the layers are then peeled slowly away; but there are very few moments of actual clarity. For all the padding and recapping, there's not enough exposition; or, at least, the exposition we are given is rarely satisfactory.

A bit of a mess, then. What you think of the story will, to an extent, be based upon how you approach it - members of the audience who tackle it as the next chapter in the Eighth Doctor's storyline, which just happens to have a cast of familiar guest actors, are likely to enjoy it more than those who want "The Four Doctors". I doubt, though, that many people will see this as the classic that it should have been; with only a couple of exceptions, the previous Paul McGann stories have been consistently better than Zagreus is.

Given how experimental and different - and controversial! - this story is, I'd recommend it to everyone. This story, more than any other, is one you need to listen to yourself to form an opinion. Personally, I found it to be messy and incoherent, and thought that it wasn't worth the hours I spent listening, but many would disagree.

I think the best example of why the play doesn't work is the appearance of Jon Pertwee. Thanks to some archive clips, he appears as the voice of the Third Doctor, which is a really lovely idea. However, the decision to distort his voice so that it's often incomprehensible is a dreadful idea. If you don't know about Pertwee's posthumous appearance, you'll struggle to recognise him here, let alone be able to hear what he's saying; this just seems disrespectful, and wastes the opportunity that Big Finish had. But it's representative of what's wrong with this play as a whole - the idea is great, the potential is there, but the execution is horrible. And because of this, Zagreus falls flat.