It has to be said Katy Manning is fab, utterly wonderfully fab, whether playing, Jo Grant, Iris Wildthyme or just being herself, Katy is wonderful! She is without a doubt the nicest Who celebrity I have had the pleasure of meeting, coming out from behind her table at Memorabilia in November 2011 to make a great big fuss of my then 5 year old son. If you don’t follow her on Twitter then why not? Her tweets will brighten your day!!
So why all this Katy love? Well, Katy narrates this months Short Trips release – Time Tunnel. Set during the Third Doctor’s era, sometime after the Daemons, Katy tells the story of an encounter UNIT had with a literal Time Tunnel, a real tunnel for a train that is having problems with time. People who go in come out the other side dead – dying of malnutrition as time flows differently in the tunnel.
Katy captures the era perfectly, from her ditzy Jo to her stern Brig, to her pompous and exasperated Doctor, she really captures the essence of these characters. As this is a Short Trip, it is self contained within one half an hour story, but the story has a definite beginning and a middle, I am not sure if it really has an end. Now, this could be Big Finish being really clever and foreshadowing a future story, and I may be missing the point, but it doesn’t seem to end properly, only with a vague soliloquy about an alien rescue mission on its way. So, a wonderful performance by Katy, an intriguing build up but an ultimately unsatisfying story -I give this 6/10.
Written by Ed Watkinson
SYNOPSIS:
Reports are coming in to UNIT of trains emerging from a railway tunnel in Sussex, their passengers and drivers dead. The Doctor elects to drive a train through the tunnel himself, but when he emerges Jo sees to her horror that he is covered in ice. Something in the tunnel has driven him close to the point of death. What can it be?
CAST:
Katy Manning (Narrator)
Producer Michael Stevens
Script Editor Michael Stevens
Executive Producers Jason Haigh-Ellery and Nicholas Briggs
Written By: Nigel Fairs
Directed By: Lisa Bowerman