#25 Fourth Doctor Adventures: Trail of the White Worm

Bernice and company have been through the looking glass, and now I part ways from them and return to my Randomoid Selectortron...

Fourth Doctor Adventures: Trail of the White Worm


Starring: Tom Baker as the fourth Doctor and Louise Jameson as Leela
Format: one full-cast CD (or download) containing two half-CD episodes
Silly? Somewhat, but within the range of TV Doctor Who silliness.
Standalone? This is the first half of a story released as two separate titles, concluding in The Oseidon Adventure.
Recommended? Yes, but probably not at full price.

My reactions to this story contain spoilers for it.

Before listening

Previously, when random selections were the second disc of a two-disc story, I've manually adjusted the selection to also include the first disc, since just reacting to the second disc wouldn't be fair to it. This is the first time I've randomly selected the first disc of a two-disc story. I've decided that, since there was a gap of a month or so between when The Trail of the White Worm came out and when The Oseidon Adventure came out, it is not unreasonable to react to just The Trail of the White Worm on its own, much as I've reacted to just the first stories of four-story boxsets on their own.
I have almost no conscious memory of this story, but I did listen to the entire season it's a part of. I think I remember this one being on Earth and its final cliffhanger involving a gateway to another planet, and I think I remember the secret villain responsible, but I don't remember much else. I think I've liked all the Leela audios I've heard, so I must have liked this one.

After listening to episode 1 of 2

This episode goes out of its way to be English. It's unclear exactly when it's happening, but it's the latter half of the 20th century. A legendary monster is allegedly stalking the countryside and a party with hounds and guns are pursuing it in the belief that it's taken a teenager. Anytime a party with hounds and guns are chasing around, it's almost inevitable the Doctor and companion will end up on the receiving end, and things move along in that fashion at a nice pace. Before the Doctor gets a chance to pacify the pursuers, he and Leela split up, and Leela finds herself on the estate of an upper-class twit hunter who has a minefield and drives a remote-controlled tank around his property.
The teenager is found, but meanwhile in the twit's basement Leela encounters a quite unexpected turn, leading to her endangerment and the closing theme music.
This was a good Doctor Who episode in a traditional TV-style mode, leaning towards the comedic slightly but no more so than many TV episodes. Leela had good lines, the Doctor had good lines, the action was easy to follow and eventful, and the local color was engaging. I am looking forward to picking it up from the episode cliffhanger.

After listening to episode 2 of 2

The upper-class twittery continues. While not outside the range of silly characterization classic Doctor Who had on television, it is closer to The Chase, The Romans, or Kinda than to what one typically expects from Doctor Who characterization. The Master is taking advantage of the hunter, possibly not even bothering to actually hypnotize him.
This is at least one of two Doctor Who audios in which wormholes in space-time are made by literal worms. The other one involved tequila worms, so of the two this is probably the more grounded.
The story is set in the UNIT era, not that this affects events much. The Doctor and Master seem to be meeting in order, with the Master having disguised but not necessarily halted his decay as seen in The Deadly Assassin.
The worm has an upper-class British woman's voice, and there is a scene in which she is talking to the Doctor and Leela while they are in her stomach. I doubt anyone in the production had vore fetishism in mind, and I feel bad that the scene reminded me of it.
The ending cliffhanger is a bit vague about the nature of what's going to come next: the Master has succeeded in getting his desired wormhole open, and he is gloating as he waits for his alien allies to come through it. Given the title of the sequel and my faint memories about it, the wormhole leads to Oseidon, a planet that was in the TV series. Given the Master's track record during the UNIT era, it seems reasonable to expect his alien allies to betray him.
This was a good two Doctor Who episodes, and while the story isn't over at the end of Trail of the White Worm, there is a clear act break that makes a reasonable stopping point. I look forward to The Oseideon Adventure coming up as a future random selection, but I feel comfortable having just heard Trail of the White Worm by itself for now. Given the premium pricing on Fourth Doctor Adventures, I wouldn't strongly recommend a purchase of Trail of the White Worm unless it gets a good sale price and The Oseidon Adventure is also on sale.