From Newsgroup: rec.arts.drwho.moderated   
   From Address: jphalt@aol.com   
   Subject: Resistance (BF audio): my review   
      
   Big Finish Companion Chronicles, 3.9. 2 episodes. Approx. 61 minutes.   
   Written by: Steve Lyons. Directed by: Lisa Bowerman. Produced by:   
   David Richardson. Performed by: Anneke Wills, John Sackville.   
      
      
   THE PLOT   
      
   The TARDIS materializes in Vichy France during the waning days of   
   World War II. The Doctor, Ben, Polly, and Jamie have barely had a   
   chance to step outside before they are spotted by members of the   
   Milice (essentially, the French Gestapo). They scatter and flee, but   
   Polly does observe Jamie getting shot before she loses sight of him.   
      
   The Doctor and Polly manage to stay together, but they are cut off   
   from Ben and Jamie, who the Doctor suspects have probably been   
   captured. Their only hope to find their friends is to make contact   
   with the French Resistance. With Polly posing as a French girl and the   
   Doctor as an English spy, they manage to join a line of evaders being   
   escorted at great risk to Spain.   
      
   Among these evaders is a British pilot, shot down over France two   
   weeks earlier. As the man discusses his background with one of the   
   suspicious Resistance leaders, Polly has a startling realization: This   
   British pilot is her uncle, who was captured and eventually died in a   
   German POW camp in 1944!   
      
      
   CHARACTERS   
      
   The Doctor: Though there is no questioning his brilliance, Polly has   
   severe doubts about his practicality. The Doctor's actual actions seem   
   to belie these doubts, however. He spends most of the story keeping   
   Polly's nerves calm. He concocts a cover story for them to satisfy the   
   Resistance, and keeps Polly from giving them away when questioned by a   
   Resistance member early in Episode Two. His skills as a forger come in   
   handy, as well. Mostly, we see this Doctor's strong capacity for   
   compassion. He senses Polly's self-doubts, and takes the time to   
   directly answer them in a wonderful scene at the story's end. Anneke   
   Wills doesn't even attempt to mimic Troughton's voice (a good thing),   
   but she does imbue a certain gravelly quality to the Doctor's lines.   
   This, and a deliberately slower and gentler line delivery when the   
   Doctor speaks, conjures up the gentler aspects of Troughton's   
   characterization, making a good fit for this particular story.   
      
   Polly: Polly has significant doubts about her own usefulness. She sees   
   Ben as the pragmatic one, Ben and Jamie as being useful in fighting   
   the assorted monsters and villains they encounter, and the Doctor as   
   brilliant. But she feels that there's no real role for her, and   
   owrries that she hasn't truly made a difference. That's one reason she   
   latches so firmly onto the hope of saving her uncle. Anneke Wills,   
   whose voice has not aged much in the 45 years since she played the   
   role regularly, recaptures her 1960's performance very effectively,   
   making Polly's view of the story's events highly relatable to the   
   listener.   
      
   Ben/Jamie: Each of the televised stories featuring this quartet   
   reduces at least one of them per story to "glorified extra" status, so   
   it's appropriate that Ben and Jamie become glorified extras here. They   
   are really only glimpsed at the very beginning and end of the story.   
   Polly does spend a lot of time worrying about them, though. Not   
   surprisingly, most of her thoughts turn to Ben and his pragmatic   
   streak, to the point that she invokes his voice when trying to   
   convince herself to take some sort of action.   
      
      
   THOUGHTS   
      
   Resistance seems to be a story that splits listeners. Its detractors   
   dislike it for the reasons historicals are usually disliked by some:   
   It's slow-paced, with no real science fiction twists or elements and a   
   fairly predictable narrative trajectory. Additionally, some have   
   complained that a pure historical is out of place in Troughton's era.   
   Never mind that this could be said of any Doctor other than Hartnell!   
      
   As my Who reviews to date have probably shown, I'm rather a fan of the   
   pure historicals. I regret that they were curtailed so early in the   
   series' run, and I'm glad that Big Finish have redressed the balance   
   by producing several pure historicals for the various Doctors. It's   
   therefore probably not surprising that I'm in the other camp with   
   regard to Resistance: I thoroughly enjoyed it.   
      
   There are two things this story does very well. The story only really   
   has time to sketch out the setting of Vichy France, but it's a good   
   sketch. The pilot's narration lets us know that a British pilot   
   seeking aid from a random French civilian is as likely to encounter a   
   supporter of the fascists as a Resistance member. One Resistance   
   member has a cousin who is in the Milise. When the pilot asks if her   
   cousin would "turn a blind eye" given their family connection, the   
   girl shoots down that suggestion with a single look. The Resistance   
   members are paranoid with good reason, and there's a real sense of   
   them being under constant threat.   
      
   The other area in which the story succeeds is Polly's   
   characterization. She isn't given any over-the-top secrets or traumas   
   - This is very much the Polly on view in the late Hartnell and early   
   Troughton eras. But by filtering the story through her viewpoint, and   
   by making that story so personal to her, it gives her character that   
   extra dimension that was often lacking in the televised stories.   
      
   Also, while the pace may be measured, I never found it dull. Between   
   the details of the Resistance line and the sense of anxiety and   
   paranoia among the Resistance members, there was plenty in the   
   narrative to hold my interest. Writer Steve Lyons does an excellent   
   job of pulling the historical and character threads together, and I   
   found the final scene between the Doctor and Polly to be particularly   
   touching. Finally, Anneke Wills does a splendid job of reading the   
   story, effectively conveying all of the regulars without stooping to   
   mimicry, and at the same time giving a restrained yet highly emotional   
   performance as Polly.   
      
   Those who don't usually like historicals probably won't find their   
   minds changed by this story. But I found it thoroughly satisfying, as   
   enjoyable on this second listen as it was the first time around.   
      
      
   Rating: 8/10.   
      
   --- Synchronet 3.15a-Linux NewsLink 1.92-mlp   
    * Origin: http://groups.google.com (1:2320/105.97)   
   --- SBBSecho 2.12-Linux   
    * Origin: telnet & http://cco.ath.cx - Dial-Up: 502-875-8938 (1:2320/105.1)