Doctor Who: Industrial Evolution

With this story, we reach, rather thankfully, the final departure of Thomas Brewster, the untrustworthy companion who has appeared in both Fifth and Sixth Doctor stories. It's also, more sadly, the last published story to feature long-running BF Sixth Doctor companion Evelyn Smythe, although not the last in her internal chronology. (Actress Maggie Stables retired due to ill-health not long after this was released, and died in 2014).

The story is set in 19th century Lancashire - one internal clue hints at the 1860s, but it's never stated explicitly, and the author seems to have been aiming for ‘generic Victorian'. The theme is the growing march of industrialisation, shown both in the relatively mundane scenes with the factory workers and their employers, and in the nature of the villain's scheme. The latter is, at least to my mind, somewhat let down by the fact that the villain itself is somewhat obscure; it's not entirely clear what it is, or why it thinks what it does.

Brewster has been written somewhat inconsistently throughout the course of his stories, which have veered from the excellent (his first appearance) to the rather dire (Time Reef), but have generally been on the weak end of the spectrum. Here, he is more sympathetic than usual for much of the story, which, unfortunately, has the effect of making it seem like he isn't really the same character we've been seeing up until now. Yes, it makes him more bearable, which is good, but at the cost of making the arc less cohesive, which isn't.

Evelyn, of course, is excellent, and there are some good supporting characters, too. At times, it's a little hard to visualise what's going on, although the Victorian industrial atmosphere is well-evoked. Overall, I'd have to rate this 3.5 stars, rounded down to 3.