Skip to main content

The Rotting Deep


The Sixth Doctor Adventures: Water Worlds 1.1


An SOS coming from a mobile phone attached to the TARDIS takes The Sixth Doctor and Mel to an oil rig in the North Sea. Things are not good. Attacking gulls, several staff have disappeared and they’re out of food and fresh water.


This introduces Hebe as a companion - a marine biologist. Played by Ruth Madeley, perhaps better know for playing Shirley Ann Bingham in Doctor Who and The War Between….


The oil rig’s future is uncertain and Hebe is there is make a decision. Its a two part story (30 minutes each) and a base under siege type - a bit reminiscent of Horror and Fang Rock. And filled with stock characters. 


I went to Big Finish day last year (2025) and bought one of the Water World sets for Colin Baker to sign, so I’ve finally got round to listening. 


I found it enjoyable. Though I have to admit it isn’t particularly original. There’s a little bit of mystery, danger, peril, the usual stuff you expect for a Doctor Who story.


Hebe is the most interesting part of the audio, a wheel chair user, whose maybe a little hypersensitive about how’s she’s treated in that respect.


As a side note, when Hebe see there Tardis se describes it as a blue box with Police written on it, rather than a police box. Its only due to Doctor Who that people would know what one was.


There is a nice call back towards the end regarding the SOS that was sent which was nice for long term fans.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The Last Days of the Powell Estate The Ninth Doctor Adventures 4.2 The Doctor and Rose find themselves in the future, 2036 , to be exact. Though, when Rose discovers that the run down, derelict building they’ve arrived at is what left of the Powell estate , she starts to worry about her mother… It feels like quite a wait since the last episode. I’m not one for binge listening, but with Chris and Billie back together, you just want more. They meet a guy doing a video about strange places who tells the Doctor and Rose about an entity dubbed ‘ Mr Fingers ’. People feel a hand on their shoulder but when they turn round no ones there, feel it twice and you’re gone. The idea would make quite a nice horror film. It has the ingredients, the empty building, the sense of something unreal, people disappearing. The fact that once there felt the hand, if they turn around next time, they’re a goner.  The entity exists both in Roses time and the future, so we get Jackie and her friend in 2006...
The Skeleton Quay                        Jago and Litefoot 6.1                                 Jago and Litefoot arrive back in their own time and are immediately accosted. The Queen needs their services. Ghosts are seen at a village lost to the sea. So if you didn’t know or had forgot, J&L spent the last series in the 1960’s. Here they are back where they belong, but we don’t get to catch up with Ellie , Sgt Quick etc. As they're off straight away. So the village of Shingle cove was washed away by the sea during a storm, but something would seem to be amiss as J&L start to see ghosts and visions of how the village was, and someone is out to stop them. Its does fall into that trope of small town by the sea, 73 yards does it, the Stuff of Legend also. Not that its necessarily a bad thing, but it sets the tone for the episode. The sea, cli...
Doctor Who : The Lost Stories  8.2 - DeathWorld When this came up as a deal/discount along with Operation Werewolf it was too hard to turn down. I’ve enjoyed Tim Treloars 3rd Doctor and likewise Micheal Troughton’s 2nd. These two Doctors work well with each other so its great to have more. This was the idea that later evolved into the Three Doctors. With Frazer Hines unavailable and William Hartnell too ill to take part fully this is a chance to experience what could have been. Each of the first three doctors are facing their own problems, when they come together on Deathworld, the enemy? Death themself.  Katy Manning and Frazer Hines are the only original cast members playing Jo and Jamie. It is a little odd with the rest being played by new people. For me its Stephen Noonan who I’ve not really got to know. No-one has ever really ‘got’ the first Doctor, they seem to forget his nice side. Stephen’s version isn’t quite there, he does have some of the mannerisms, whether he’ll g...