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Sarah Jane Adventures Season 2

Enemy Of The Bane – Part 2

The Sarah Jane AdventuresSarah, Luke, Rani, Clyde and the Brigadier – with Mrs. Wormwood in tow – hide from UNIT at the flower shop. But, as Sarah suspects, it’s all a double-cross: Mrs. Wormwood has allied with Kaagh the Sontaran, and their plans for the Tunguska Scroll have nothing to do with saving Earth. Luke agrees to go with Mrs. Wormwood to keep Sarah and the others alive, but while he is her hostage, he learns that the Scroll will summon a cybernetic organism called Horath, furthering Mrs. Wormwood’s plans for conquest and revenge. When Mrs. Wormwood tries to tempt Luke with the Scroll, he takes it and makes a run for it until Kaagh stops him. At Sarah’s home, Major Cal Kilburne of UNIT is waiting to reclaim the Scroll as well, but the Brigadier discovers that Klburne’s mission isn’t exactly part of UNIT’s charter. Still held hostage by Kaagh and Mrs. Wormwood, Luke is taken to an ancient burial site that hides a dimensional portal leading to Horath – and he has no choice but to open it for them.

Get the DVDDownload this episodewritten by Phil Ford
directed by Graeme Harper
music by Sam Watts / title music by Murray Gold

Guest Cast: Mina Anwar (Gita Chandra), Ace Bhatti (Haresh Chandra), Alexander Armstrong (Mr. Smith), Samantha Bond (Mrs. Wormwood), Nicholas Courtney (Sir Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart), Anthony O’Donnell (Kaagh), Simon Chadwick (Major Cal Kilburne)

Notes: The White Barrow site at the episode’s climax is real, though there isn’t actually a Stonehenge-style stone circle there. The end credits of both parts of Enemy Of The Bane give credit to writers Robert Holmes (creator of the Sontarans) and Henry Lincoln & Mervyn Haisman (creators of the Brigadier).

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Star Trek Star Trek Fan Films Starship Farragut

Crew Logs: A Rock And A Hard Place

Starship Farragut

This is an episode of a fan-made series whose storyline may be invalidated by later official studio productions.

Stardate 4901.2: Investigating dilithium readings on an otherwise unremarkable planet, Captain Carter and geologist Dr. Bishop find indications of vast mineral wealth both promising and dangerous – not only is starship-powering dilithium abundant, but so is tricobalt, an ingredient for destructive weaponry. And it turns out that the planet’s mineral riches haven’t gone unnoticed by the Klingons…a fact that almost escapes Carter as he and Bishop – who were an item earlier in their Starfleet careers – enjoy a romantic moment. Not only are the Klingons killing the mood, but they might kill a Starfleet captain as well.

Watch Itscreenplay by John Broughton
directed by Mark Hildebrand
music by Hetoreyn

Cast: John Broughton (Captain Jack Carter), Michael Bednar (Commander Tacket), Holly Bednar (Lt. Commander Smithfield), D.D. Hatcher (Dr. Angela Bishop), Jamie Hanna (Klingon Commander), Eddie Lao (Borok), Jake Azachi (Akiva), David Sepan (Baker)

Review: A bite-sized 17-minute chunk of adventure that requires a little less investment of time than a full episode, with slightly less story as a result, Rock And A Hard Place is a neat little adventure, highlighting both the strengths and weaknesses of the Starship Farragut project as a whole.

Categories
Clone Wars Season 1 Star Wars

Lair of Grievous

The Clone WarsOn the trail of the escaped Trade Federation Viceroy Nute Gunray, Jedi Master Kit Fisto and his former padawan Nahdar Vebb find themselves not in the Viceroy’s hiding place, but the home of the leader of the droid army, General Grievous. While Vebb is eager to take down the General, Fisto realizes that the best outcome they can likely hope for is escaping alive.

written by Henry Gilroy
directed by Atsushi Takeuchi
music by Kevin Kiner / original Star Wars themes by John Williams

Cast: Phil LaMarr (Kit Fisto), Olivia d’Abo (Luminara Unduli), Ashley Eckstein (Ahsoka Tano), Tom Kenny (Nahdar Vebb / Nute Gunray), Dee Bradley Baker (Fil / Niner / Bel), Corey Burton (Count Dooku), Matthew Wood (General Grievous / Battle Droids), David Acord (A-4D), Terrence “TC” Carson (Mace Windu), Tom Kane (Yoda / Narrator)

LogBook entry by Philip R. Frey

Categories
Phase II / New Voyages Star Trek Star Trek Fan Films

Blood And Fire – Part I

Star Trek: Phase II

This is an episode of a fan-made series whose storyline may be invalidated by later official studio productions.

Stardate not given: After a pitched battle with a Klingon cruiser, the Enterprise is left battered, but a distress call from the U.S.S. Copernicus prevents Kirk from putting in for repairs. The Enterprise limps to the Copernicus’ aid at a low warp speed as a result of the damage, but what the crew finds is almost beyond explanation: the Copernicus is adrift, only a few hours away from sliding into a stream of matter connecting a binary star system. The Copernicus will be destroyed, but it appears that something has already killed the crew. As Kirk selects a boarding party to find out what happened on the Copernicus, he carefully omits his nephew, the recently-arrived Ensign Peter Kirk, from the mission. This draws a note of caution from Spock, and an anguished protest from Peter: if the crew feels that he’s receiving preferential treatment keeping him out of harm’s way, Peter will have to request reassignment. Peter wants to be treated as just another member of the crew – and that includes requesting that Captain Kirk officiate his upcoming wedding to another crewman, medic Alex Freeman. Kirk accedes to both requests, assigning both Peter and Freeman to the Copernicus mission. Soon after arriving, they both wish they’d stayed on the Enterprise: the Copernicus is infested with Regulan bloodworms, a life form so fast-speading and deadly that Starfleet has only one protocol for dealing with them – the immediate destruction of any ship found to be infested. With both his nephew and Spock aboard the Copernicus, Kirk has no plans to follow that order, but it may be too late to save his boarding party anyway, as they’re surrounded by swarming bloodworms.

Watch Itwritten by Carlos Pedraza & David Gerrold
directed by David Gerrold
music by Fred Steiner

Cast: James Cawley (Captain Kirk), Ben Toplin (Mr. Spock), John Kelley (Dr. McCoy), Bobby Quinn Rice (Ensign Peter Kirk), Evan Fowler (Alex Freeman), Charles Root (Scotty), Jay Storey (Kyle), Kim Stinger (Uhura), Ron Boyd (DeSalle), Andy Bray (Chekov), Megan King Johnson (Rand), Nick Cook (Hodel), Paul R. Sieber (Ahrens), Patrick Bell (Xon), Debbie Huth (Fontana), Jeff Mailhotte (Sentell), Joel Belucci (Bren), Phil Koeghen (Admiral Koeghen), Scott Danni, Rich Lundy, George Wilhelm, Gwen Wilkins, Rick Bruns, Danielle Porter, Robert Mauro, Dan Wright, Melissa Wright, Elizabeth Peterson, Mabel Vilagro, Greg Schnitzer, Betsy Durkee, Jeff Collingsworth, Brian Holloway, Pat Heward, Amanda Root, Ralph M. Miller, Joe Nazzarro, John Hermann, Jessica Mailhotte, Glenn Smith, Ed Abbatte, Giovana Contini, Ron Gates, Ryan Storey, Jerry Storey, Paula Bailey, Erik Goodrich, Tom Brown, Howard Huth, Riva Gijanto, Carol Mazur, Howard Miller (Extras), Majel Barrett Roddenberry (Computer Voice)

Notes: Blood And Fire was originally written by David Gerrold (writer of the classic Trek favorite The Trouble With Tribbles) as an episode for the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation, allegorically dealing with AIDS, the search for a cure, and its effect on the gay community. In many an interview and convention appearance, Gerrold has said that Gene Roddenberry verbally agreed to pursue these issues in the then-new show, but would never approve Blood And Fire for production, which eventually lead to Gerrold’s departure from the writing staff. It has also been adapted into a non-Star Trek novel. Fan writer Carlos Pedraza, previously a writer on the fan series Star Trek: Hidden Frontier (which prominently featured gay characters in a way that Paramount’s officially produced episodes and series never addressed), adapted Gerrold’s original script for the Kirk era. This is the first episode to carry the “Star Trek: Phase II” banner, though the opening titles still display “New Voyages” before “beaming” in “Phase II.” (Phase II was a semi-official subtitle applied to the aborted late ’70s TV revival of classic Trek, as chronicled in the excellent book of the same name by Judith & Garfield Reeves-Stevens.) Early publicity indicated that Blood And Fire would feature an original score by Neil Norman, the producer behind many Star Trek soundtracks released on CD in the 1990s by his father’s GNP Crescendo label, as well as a composer in his own right, but the finished episode instead features original series music by composer Fred Steiner.

Review: For years we’ve been hearing about Blood And Fire and how great it would’ve been in the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and after a while it’s natural to wonder how much of the hype is warranted. But after seeing the episode itself, and finding that about 2/3 of the way in I was on the edge of my seat, I think it’s safe to say that this is New Voyages/Phase II firing on all cylinders with no casting gimmicks to use as a crutch. It’s just a good story, told and acted well, with one hell of a cliffhanger.

Categories
2008-2009 Specials Doctor Who New Series Season 04

The Next Doctor

Doctor WhoThe TARDIS lands in London, 1851, at Christmastime, but before the Doctor can even be serenaded by carolers, someone is calling his name. He discovers a woman in an alleyway, but even though he’s arrived to save the day, she doesn’t stop calling for help until another man shows up – another man claiming that he is the Doctor. Some sort of Cyber-converted creature bursts out of a building, leading both Doctors on a wild goose chase until they lose track of it, but then the Doctor – and the Doctor who was already on the case in 1851 – encounter real Cybermen, apparently escaped from the Void. Curiously, this other Doctor remembers nothing of his tenth incarnation, who then discovers why: this Doctor isn’t the man he says he is. But why does he think he’s another incarnation of the Doctor, and what monstrous plans are afoot that involve the Cybermen enslaving the children of London?

Order the DVDDownload this episodewritten by Russell T. Davies
directed by Andy Goddard
music by Murray Gold

Cast: David Tennant (The Doctor), Davis Morrissey (Jackson Lake), Dervia Kirwan (Miss Hartigan), Velile Tshabalala (Rosita), Rauri Mears (Cybershade), Paul Kasey (Cyberleader), Edmund Kenie (Mr. Scoones), Michael Bertenshaw (Mr. Cole), Jason Morell (Vicar), Neil McDermott (Jed), Ashley Horne (Lad), Tom Langford (Frederic), Jordan Southwell (Urchin), Matthew Allick (Docker), Nicholas Briggs (Cyber voices)

The Next DoctorNotes: While Peter Davison reappeared as the fifth Doctor in Time Crash, and Human Nature‘s Journal of Impossible Things showed sketches of all of David Tennant’s predecessors in the role of the Doctor, The Next Doctor marks the first time that actual footage from the original series or the 1996 TV movie have been incorporated into the new series, with a brief clip of each Doctor. The potential inconsistency of the alternate universe/”Cybus” Cybermen having information about the Doctor’s prior regenerations is avoided with the Doctor’s conjecture that these Cybermen stole the information from the Daleks in the Void, which also explains why few if any of the clips are from Cybermen stories (though they’re not necessarily from Dalek stories either).

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

Categories
6th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

Return Of The Krotons

Doctor Who: Return Of The KrotonsThe Doctor and Charley arrive in the far future, on a far-flung human colony world. What they find there is troubling: the colony’s command structure is breaking down, and the colony’s leader is directing all of his attention toward the hunt for an elusive but valuable mineral called K7…even to the point of disposing of those who question his all-consuming obsession. When the Doctor and Charley show up asking questions, they find themselves at the top of the shortlist of people likely to disappear without a trace. An attempt to dispose of them via a convenient (but, of course, regrettable) underground explosion doesn’t kill them, but instead reveals a spacecraft that’s been buried on this planet for centuries. The spacecraft’s technology is crystalline, much like K7, and only then does the Doctor realize that he’s up against not only a despotic colony leader, but a very old enemy indeed.

written by Nicholas Briggs
directed by Nicholas Briggs
music by Nicholas Briggs

Cast: Colin Baker (The Doctor), India Fisher (Charlotte Pollard), Philip Madoc (Rag Cobden), Matthew Burgess (Ned Gillespie), Susan Brown (Eleanor Harvey), Glynn Sweet (Professor Lyle Woodruff), Ian Brooker (Romilly), Andrew Dickens (Security), Nicholas Briggs (The Krotons)

Timeline: after Brotherhood Of The Daleks and before The Raincloud Man

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
6th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

The Raincloud Man

Doctor Who: The Raincloud ManThe Doctor abruptly whisks Charley away from an otherwise pleasant breakfast on urgent business: he’s just read about incidents in Manchester that he suspects are caused by alien activity. A reunion with D.I. Menzies proves to be uneasy for all involved: despite the fact that he helped her solve (and indeed survive) her last brush with alien activity, the Doctor isn’t a welcome sight for Menzies, since trouble seems to follow him. For her part, Menzies seems to have become the go-to investigator for any crimes that have a whiff of paranormal or alien activity about them, and she’s developed a few contacts to help her, including a time-sensitive who can instantly detect the twisted timeline of one Charlotte Pollard. Her secret is out – at least to Menzies – and even though the detective inspector isn’t certain what the implications are for the time-traveling duo, she considers Charley a murder suspect when her time-sensitive informant turns up dead. All leads point the Doctor and friends to a riverboat casino – one which has apparently traveled much further than just downriver. Two alien races converge on this location, prepared to wage the latest battle in a seemingly unresolvable war, and the stakes of the betting have never been higher. The Doctor has to rally his allies around him to save Earth from the carnage and try to stop the bloodshed – but he finds himself increasingly suspicious of his own traveling companion.

Order this CDwritten by Eddie Robson
directed by Nicholas Briggs
music by Andy Hardwick

Cast: Colin Baker (The Doctor), India Fisher (Charlotte Pollard), Anna Hope (D. I. Menzies), Michael Fenton Stevens (Brooks), Aidan J. David (Lish), Octavia Walters (Carmen), Simon Sherlock (Kelsa), Jeremy James (Tabbalac Leader), Steven Hansell (The Bouncers), Andrew Dickens (The Cyrox)

Timeline: after Return Of The Krotons and before Patient Zero

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
Doctor Who Doctor Who Unbound

Masters Of War

Doctor Who Unbound: Masters Of WarThe TARDIS brings the Doctor and his companion, retired Brigadier Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart, to the ravaged planet Skaro, devastated by centuries of war and left with only one habitable city. The Doctor and Alistair almost immediately run afoul of a Dalek-imposed curfew; they’re only saved by members of the Thal underground resistance that seeks to overthrow their Dalek rulers. The Doctor and Alistair get a crash course in local history: due to the first Doctor’s intervention during his first visit to Skaro, the Thals rose up and effectively drove the Daleks away from Skaro. The Daleks spread into space, but then abruptly returned to Skaro to enslave the Thals anew. Having helped to change Skaro’s history enough to create the present situation, the Doctor feels a responsibility to change the planet’s destiny again. Alistair relishes the chance to lead the resistance fighters in their fight against the Daleks, but in the background, the Doctor notices repeated propaganda broadcasts focusing on a being he has never heard of before: Davros, the creator of the Daleks, attempting to instill a messianic fervor into his creations. But Davros left Skaro long ago, his destination and his mission unknown, and the Doctor is able to use that mystery to turn the Dalek-Thal conflict into a Dalek civil war. When another invading force arrives – this time neither Dalek nor Thal – the Doctor realizes that his actions have played into the hands of another race that wants to rule Skaro.

Order this CDwritten by Eddie Robson
directed by Jason Haigh-Ellery
music by Martin Johnson

Cast: David Warner (The Doctor), Nicholas Courtney (Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart), Terry Molloy (Davros), Nicholas Briggs (The Daleks), Amy Pemberton (Nadel), Sarah Douglas (Gillen), Jeremy James (Delt), Christopher Heywood (Toloc)

Timeline: after The War Games and after Sympathy For The Devil

Notes: This adventure features the alternate third Doctor played by David Warner and an alternate Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, both of whom were introduced in the previous Doctor Who Unbound story Sympathy For The Devil. Where the previous range of Unbound stories marked the 40th anniversary of Doctor Who, the release of Masters Of War coincides with the 45th anniversary of the first broadcast episode of Doctor Who. As this story presumes that the Doctor’s life has taken a different path from the Doctor accepted as the central hero of the “main” timeline, Davros has never met the Doctor. Given the different “origin story” of Davros’ horrific injuries, this is also a different Davros than the one heard in the I, Davros audio spinoff series.

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green