Blogtor Who: AUDIO REVIEW: Destroy The Infinite

The colony planet Delafoss is occupied by the army of an alien force known as the Eminence. These slave armies of terrified humans are commanded by the dreaded Infinite Warriors. The Doctor and Leela arrive expecting to find Earth’s most successful, unspoiled colony. Instead, they are confronted by a planet choked by industrialisation and war.

Destroy The Infinite is a real boy's own adventure, a war story; that pits our favourite Time Lord against a Big Finish original enemy, the Eminence. This is the third appearance of the ruthless Eminence, but it is chronologically the first. The new baddie race first appeared in the Colin Baker story Time’s Horizon and then again alongside Paul McGann’s Doctor in Dark Eyes II: Eyes of The Master; however it was Destroy The Infinite that was actually penned first. This dichotomy works well in playing with our expectations of this new menace, but the gaseous evil, whom are portrayed as even worse than the Daleks, are best established and implemented in this chronologically first outing.

The real strength of this story comes from its narrative and archetypal style. Director and writer Nicholas Briggs is clearly a big fan of classic British war stories and nicely captures the feel of the genre whilst satisfyingly bringing it into a future setting. Briggs also succeeds at making Leela’s character more savvy whilst staying true to her character. There are also some fairly shocking twists and turns that break certain Who memes.

Tom and Louise are both on particularly good form and there are some excellent guest performances from Clive Mantle and Hywel Morgan. Destroy The Infinite is a worthy introduction to the Eminence and stylistically a great offering.