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 | Reviews for Doctor Who Unbound: Full Fathom Five |
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There are 5 reviews so far. To add a review of your own for this item, visit the voting page.
| By: | Phil Ince, Highbury, London |
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| Date: | Sunday 28 December 2003 |
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| Rating: |   1 |
... if it wasn't so witless. A bafflingly crude piece of humourless, teenage jizz. Shows an almost autistic lack of comprehension of human behaviour. Way beyond awful, this is an insult to the intelligence. Crud.
| By: | SeverusD, Reigate, Surrey |
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| Date: | Thursday 5 February 2004 |
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| Rating: | 9 |
A controversial piece because the Doctor's character has been quite dramtically changed. It works wonderfully, though, and Collings' performance is truly exceptional.
| By: | Stephen Carlin, Bangor, Northern Ireland |
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| Date: | Wednesday 12 May 2004 |
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| Rating: | 9 |
I must admit to not being a great fan of the Big Finish productions. Usually they are bland and uninvolving.
This Unbound story grips from the start. David Collings demonstrates how good an actor he really is. Although I enjoyed Sylvester McCoy's dark Doctor, David Collings how well a dark Doctor can be done. There can be no accusations of ham or "r" rolling. His performance is subtle and intelligent.
As to the story itself - the build up is excellent as the Doctor, stranded on Earth for many years, prepares to dive beneath the sea and return to an underwater facility he escaped from all those years ago. The Doctor's overriding urge to return to the TARDIS and escape Earth is very reminiscent of the early Pertwee stories - with that added Cartmel era twist.
And that's where the controversy starts and it seems that some people have misunderstood the principle of the Unbound stories - to go beyond the expectations of the series. Collings's Doctor is definitely not bound by the expectations of the TV Doctor - as I said, here is a truly dark Doctor and yet it is easy to understand his resentment.
Only the ending disappoints - without giving away too much, I refer to the confrontation between the Doctor and the entity in the underwater base. The reaction of the Doctor's companion is perhaps harder to understand and begs more background to the prior relationship between this companion and the Doctor. Evidently it was strained - think of Ace constantly forced by the Doctor to confront her fears (a la Ghost Light).
Overall - a sterling effort, generally well written with a brilliant performance from David Collings.
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| An interesting experiment |
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| By: | Siskoid, Moncton, NB |
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| Date: | Saturday 15 October 2005 |
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| Rating: | 6 |
This Unbound plays with the Doctor's personality ("What if he was a right bastard?") and probably feels like the least Whovian of all the Unbound stories. It is the lesser for it, though I do appreciate the experiment.
Part of the problem is that the story, though well told through two timeframes, is rather unartful. There's nothing really new about it, it doesn't really refer to anything else in Who, it's just... average. Furthermore, you get some of the most repetitive musical cues ever in Big Finish. Unartful remains the best word to describe the whole package.
David Collings does a good job with the role, don't get me wrong, and I sometimes think it's worth a listen for the eye-popping last scene, but the buck stops there.
Overall: It's not Doctor Who, and though that's the point, the story around the idea doesn't quite elevate it enough.
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| Excellent and well realised |
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| By: | Matt, London |
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| Date: | Friday 9 November 2007 |
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| Rating: | 10 |
Well done Big Finish! I have to admit to getting a little bored of the DW audios and so I wanted to find something to temporarily replace my interest. Thank God for this one. The Unbound series is such an excellent concept and this CD is a good twist to the mythos of DW. No spoilers here - just get it and trust me, you'll enjoy it.
