Doctor Who:
The Tenth Doctor Adventures 2.1:
The Sword of
the Chevalier
written by
Guy Adams
I was
nervous going in to this one. I mean, its a story featuring an
actual, historical nonbinary person. That's pretty untested territory
for Big Finish even with as good as they've been getting actually
representing LGBTQ+ people every now and again.
First, a
word on language. Whenever I've heard of the Chevalier D'Eon they've
been discussed in terms of being nonbinary, hency my use of the term
above. In this play the Chevalier is treated as a trans woman. Its a
legitimate matter of debate and so I'm going to simply refer to “the
Chevalier” through out rather than use gendered terms or even the
singular they (recent events in US politics having taught me how
gender neutral language used to refer to trans people is often meant
as an act of aggression). Given the period the Chevalier lived in its
not like the contemporary language is any help, either, so I am
respectfully bowing out of adjudicating on this one and leaving it
for other, wiser and more educated voices not belonging to a cis man.
Anyway, the
Doctor has brought Rose to Slough in the year “half past Blackadder
series three” or, in other words, the Regency to see William
Herschel's 40-foot telescope. Rose, unimpressed, wanders off and
discovers a fencing match going on involving the legendary Chevalier
D'Eon.
Now, I
rather like the portrayal of the Chevalier here especially in the
fact that the Chevalier is... well, a bit boorish: constantly telling
tall tales about people met and battles fought in. Rose, of course,
finds the Doctor's exasperation with this hilarious. Being a
celebrity historical, of course, the Chevalier gets some wonderful
moments including a couple of sword fights which might not be that
impressive on audio but you could hardly expect the story to do
without them. On a more audio-friendly note, the Chevalier is getting
on in years here and wondering if there's anything left to do.
The alien
baddies (sorry, folks, we're still lacking a New Series pure
historical) are a bunch of slavers from Consortium Of The Black Asp,
a sort of loose confederation of alien gangsters. They're an
interesting idea, not only in this specific case but as an idea and I
hope they get used somewhere else. Doctor Who is
oddly light on alien organised crime, now I think about it.
Also,
not to spoil anything but this story has absolutely the best take on
the psychic paper I've ever heard even if Guy Adams does slightly
wuss out on the punchline.
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