Originally posted here at Anime Radius.

Charley Pollard, self-proclaimed Edwardian adventuress, is back and with the Doctor – except the Doctor is two regenerations too early to meet her. This wibbley-wobbley timey-wimey scenario kicks off a murder mystery of spooky proportions in The Condemned, the first in a series of audio plays concerning Charley and Six. For people expecting them to get on like white on rice . . . consider your hopes dashed. The Doctor is extremely suspicious of “Charlotte Smith” and suspects the girl is lying about a lot, which only raises his interests in the girl. As for Charley, it’s looking like the Doctor is her only way home, even if it’s the wrong one, and she’s doing everything she can to make sure she doesn’t screw up her past and his future – although, to be honest, Charley is a terrible liar, probably because she finds it hard to outright tell falsehoods to the man that will become her own respective Doctor.

Entering the scene for the first (but not last) time is DI Menzies, no-nonsense policewoman who, as the Doctor finds out the hard way, is hard to shake in the face of alien technology – although to be fair, her reaction at seeing the murder victim’s “transformation” is fair enough for just about anybody who isn’t the Doctor. She acts as the perfect foil against the Sixth Doctor – who is in excellent form in this audio. Seriously, Colin Baker should have gotten a pay raise after his performance in this. Meeting Charley for the first time, finding the dead body as well as the abandoned kitty in the room, the interrogation scene with Menzies and later showing her how he landed in the locked room to begin with, not to mention his short stint as a red-skinned alien risen from the dead, the Doctor is pretty much the most quotable and most fun character to listen to in the entire audio.

The story itself, once it gets going, really gets full marks for being creepy and haunting. Charley, separated from the Doctor, takes it upon herself in natural companion fashion to explore what is going on in Ackley House, guided by a chap named Ben who contacts her through the phone. It soon becomes clear that the inhabitants of Ackley House are off their rockers and that it’s all connected to the dead alien in the locked room. India Fisher does a wonderful job at playing out Charley’s reactions to the things she finds in the House, especially in the basement scene.

A combination of top voice acting skills and a subtle yet effective soundtrack optimizes every ominous scene to the maximum; this is certainly an audio worth listening to in the dark, when every gasp and bump is another chill across the viewer’s heart. It’s a shame, however, that these wonderfully creepy scenes require on occasion a scene in which characters are forced to explain to others what exactly is going on so the story can move forward on all fronts; once the Doctor and Charley meet up again, these scenes pretty much peter out into nothing. Putting these minor flaws aside, The Condemned is a great intro into a series of audios about Charley and an earlier Doctor, filled with both humor and suspense and some wonderful original characters like the pragmatically candid DI Menzies and the mysterious Sam. It will certainly have listeners looking forward to seeing how the Doctor will unravel the mystery of the girl who calls herself Charlotte Smith. ( )

Law & Order: Special Alien Unit. Charley and Six make a neat pair in this false accusation/whodunnit story. ( )

Charley Pollard returns to the Tardis in The Condemned, but with the Sixth Doctor rather than the Eighth. They end up in contemporary Manchester, tangling with Anna Hope's D.I. Patricia Menzies who discovers that her beat appears to be a combination of Torchwood and Men in Black. She is great, and the plot had some good chilly horror moments, but I felt the story was just a little contrived and depending on coincidences. ( )