Written by Julian Richards Nev Fountain Lizbeth Myles

Starring Colin Baker, Mark Strickson and Nicola Bryant

Originally released : April 2026

Listened to: April 2026

Context: not much to add here other than looking forward to more time with the sixth doctor, and Turlough!

Episodes

1. The Reckoning by Nev Fountain

2. A Crucible of Queens by Lizbeth Myles

3. The Curse of the Duergar by Julian Richards

THE REVIEW

What I thought

The Reckoning by Nev Fountain is a reallly great episode, introducing us to Turlough as a member of the 6th Doctors TARDIS team. It is a great story for Turlough, and his clashes with the 6th Doctor are really great in this one. There are a whole series of interesting conversations with Peri as well, so cool Peri musing on the doctor’s personality after a regeneration and why he changes so much, it’s a great explanation, that can live in my head canon, no problemo. The story itself is fun, starts out as one thing and then changes to another thing, with a return of Marlowe, sort of, and then a return of the (SPOILERS) Black Guardian, again not really. Makes for a great episode, and then finishes a story as something that the TARDIS has done to try to protect the Doctor against Turlough as it sees him as a threat! Fantastic way to introduce this new/old team, and lots for the main cast to do, very much enjoyed this one.

A Crucible of Queens by Lizbeth Myles is a step back in history, with the team in 16th-century France, directly after the battle of Agincourt. The team rapidly gets embroiled in French court politics, the doctor trying to help out the mad French King, Charles, with Turlough, the Dauphine, and Peri with various players in the French court. I got a little lost pretty quickly, to be honest, in terms of what was exactly going on; however, that didn’t matter too much as I caught up and started to really enjoy the story pretty quickly. A nice pure historical, with some nice poignant moments. Good stuff.

The Curse of the Duergar by Julian Richards is a strong final episode for this boxset, with a Norse setting (pretty cool), with a quest, a mystical weapon and some space dwarfs behind it all, which cause no end of issue for the TARDIS team. The really cool thing about this episode is that the 6th Doctor ends up sliping back into the 5th Doctor, hence returning to some of the themes from the first adventure in the boxset. This change to an earlier persona is very, very well written, played so well by Colin B, and so well acted against by both Peri and Turlough. The latter has some great stuff to do at the end of the episode, bringing the themes started in episode 1 to a satisfying conclusion, i.e., Turlough coming to terms with this new doctor. Lovely ending, and I hope this means we get more of this team in future boxsets.

Rating: 4.3 out of 5 odd crystals: great fun, brilliant new dynamics in the TARDIS for the 6th Doctor, lots for the companions to do and a nice mix of genres across these three episodes. Great stuff.

What am I left thinking?

• Where next for this TARDIS team?

Memorable bits

• The ‘return’ of the Black Guardian
• Turlough in general
• The Duggar are cool adversaries, more Norse myuthiogy crossover stories please
• The 6th Doctor returning to the 5th Doctor