An Autist Reviews: Ship In A Bottle (The Eighth Doctor Adventures: Doom Coalition 4.1)

*This is an older review, it is not as detailed as my more modern reviews*

*All Reviews Are Spoiler-Free Aside From Any Spoiler Sections*

Trapped in a metal box, hurtling through the time vortex into a future that is increasingly not there, the Doctor, Liv, and Helen are in danger. The future has been killed, and the Doctor is getting increasingly fatalistic. How can you escape a liferaft, when all of its systems are not yet completed when everything you try makes the situation worse? Do you just give in?

I love a good ship in a bottle episode. This… this is a good ship in a bottle episode. This is a three-hander, no bad guys, no side characters, no twists or turns, just attempts to escape and save the day. I think this really shows a side of the Doctor that is rarely explored well, and that is that he is either at a 10 or a 1. When Lucie… y’know… *grrrk* he throws himself into eternity and nearly kills his own TARDIS, and here he is utterly defeated, he sees no way to win. The team goes through multiple escape attempts, and while the story itself is lovely, the writing is rather poor. Many parts of it feel as though they come out of nowhere and strong emotional moments get lessened by the fact that they seem forced and sudden.

In a three-hander, the acting MUST be top-notch… and boy oh boy is it. IT IS PERFECT. I can think of a handful of 9/10 acting moments, but there are not nearly enough to make this anything less than a 10/10.

The effects also are required to be top-notch in a three-hander, as you have fewer characters to narrate what is happening. Once more, the effects here ARE top-notch. The music is great and it heightens moments, it expresses the feelings of the characters, and from being synthy to classical, it hits all of the beats needed. The comm. unit voice effects are top-notch, but once more an annoying voice alteration near the end makes the voice rating plummet to an 8/10.

Is this a good story to listen to over and over? No. You won’t get more out of it and it will probably get boring and repetitive fast. That being said, it’s still a fun story to listen to every now and then.

All in all, a VERY good story. The acting is as good as possible, some with the effects. The music is very good, and the voice effects are pretty darn stellar. The story is very good, but it has some less than perfect writing that gets in the way of the story. You won’t find yourself wanting to listen to this over and over, but to say it’s bad is foolish. This is a very good story.

Total - 8

Plot - 8
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Story - 10
Writing - 7
Enjoyment - 8
Twists - NR

Acting - 10
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MCs - 10
SCs - NR
BGs - NR

Effects - 9
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Music - 9
Voices - 8
Actions - 10

Replay - 6
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Re-Enjoyment - 7
New Details - 5

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