Doctor Who: Scaredy Cat

Big Finish: Monthly Range #75

by Will Shindler, Paul McGann (Narrator), India Fisher (Narrator)

"Yaranaa - it means literally, 'the soul of the vengeful' - those whose lives have been cut short early and died with empty hearts"

Millennia ago, the people of the planet Caludaar pledged never to set foot on their sister planet Endarra. But what secrets does the planet hold? There are laws even the Doctor won't break. And while C'rizz learns that some tragedies can't be averted, Charley must decide who the enemy actually is.

For death walks on Endarra, and this time she won't be denied.

Genres: Doctor Who, Audiobook, Science Fiction, Time Travel

Audio CD

First published October 1, 2005

About the author

Will Shindler has been a Broadcast Journalist for the BBC for over twenty-five years, spending a decade working in television drama as a scriptwriter on Born and Bred, The Bill and Doctors.

You can currently find him every weekday on the radio reading the news headlines, whilst writing crime novels in the afternoon. Will has previously worked as a television presenter for HTV, a sports reporter for BBC Radio Five Live, and one of the stadium presenters at the London Olympics.

His debut novel, The Burning Men, will be published by Hodder.

Reviews

[H.K. · Rating 3 out of 5]

An okay audio play. A bit confusing at times, but I think it attempted some good moral lessons. It's good to see more emphasis on C'rizz's murderous nature and how important the Doctor is as a friend.

[Emilija · Rating 2 out of 5]

2022 52 Book Challenge - April Mini Challenge - 1) A Foolish Character

Wow this is one of the worst 8th Doctor audiobooks I've listened to. The child subplot was awful and the main plot wasn't much better.

The only decent thing (and how this book fits the prompt) is the Doctor and C'rizz arguing about what evil is and whether they should leave the planet to how history and time recorded what happened.

[Devin Harvey · Rating 2 out of 5]

Scaredy Cat was probably one of the most disappointing audios I have listened to, and one of the few eighth doctor audios I genuinely did not enjoy. The only parts that were able to grasp my attention were part 2 and 4, and even those were not great. The idea was great, and could have worked out much better if they had worked on the script and plot a lot more. It feels similar to The Twilight Kingdom but with even less interesting characters, and it's one of the only times I feel Paul McGann and his companions lacked with their acting. You could easily skip over this one and not miss out on anything, I hope no one judges any of the three main stars based on this audio as it is surprisingly bad, I really do not recommend.

[Gabriel Mero · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one wasn't too bad. I had hoped it would be more of a horror themed story given the title, though.

[G. Hoffmann · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow, people aren't fond of this one at all, are they? I for one think that it's a solid adventure, well paced and with all the elements of a good Doctor Who story.

The plot is great, really enticing stuff. The use of the morphogenetic fields theory (which is a real thing and I always found fascinating) if not ground-breaking, is at the very least ingenious. I really like the sci-fi concepts at work on this one. The characters are competent, although a little on the predictable side. The main antagonist, although presenting a solid menace, lacks some motivation, he reminded me of Meglos from the TV serial... "Meglos".

Charley, C'rizz and The Doctor are all in good shape, after a tumultous sequence of events that started all the way back in "Caerdroia". It's nice to have a more "basic" story, at last, after all the divergent universe craziness.

All in all, I think it's a great story, little to complain about it!

[Kelly McCubbin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Just terrible. If anything a worse mish-mash than "Terra Firma" or "Other Lives". It's as if they picked a title and tried to shoehorn a plot into it.
I understand that this was intended originally as a Divergent Universe script, but was pushed back when that line was shut down. One wonders why they didn't ust dodge that bullet and let this die.
Only gets the extra star for Paul McGann arguing about the nature of evil.

[Nicholas Whyte]

I'm afraid Scaredy Cat didn't leave much impression on me (and I've listened to it twice). It is in keeping with the duller end of the earlier Eighth Doctor audios. Various conceptual entities get incarnated as personalities and the Doctor, Charley and C'rizz eventually clean up the mess.

[Steven Shinder · Rating 2 out of 5]

After Terror Firma, this was pretty underwhelming. For a four parter with shorter episodes, one would think that it has tighter writing. But not much here is memorable other than "scaredy cat" getting repeated over and over.

[Sativa · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was ok and that's about it.

[Alyce Caswell · Rating 2 out of 5]

Shorter and less developed than other entries in the series. Lacking in other areas as well.

[Finlay O'Riordan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A mixed bag for me. The first half was pretty boring, the second half was more interesting but not exactly thrilling.

Flood and C'rizz are easily the two highlights of this story, and to that end, it was nice to have a proper spotlight on C'rizz and to see more development for him. Flood carries the story once he comes into fold in proper, but when he is just narrating the first two parts, his dialogue feels really forced and a bit cringeworthy, trying to be cryptic just for the sake of being cryptic.

The story is also the shortest in BF's main range, which is kind of a mercy because it meant I had to put up with the annoying 'scaredy cat' chant for less time, but it also means a lot of things are rushed such as the few scenes set in the past or exploration of Flood's character or what the Neanderthals were even about - where did they come from? Why didn't Flood use them to free him in the past 4 million years when he can control them?

It's fair for a cheap, quick listen, but don't go out of your way for this one unless you're a C'rizz completionist.

[Reggie A · Rating 3 out of 5]

While ultimately 3 stars is probably a fair rating, this has to be one of the most enjoyable stories I’ve listened to so far across Eight’s entire run.

The mystery kept me invested, the planet was cool, and I think the music on this one was top notch. I’d knock it up a star if the villain had been more interesting, but honestly he was fine. He filled the role well, he just didn’t have a WOW! factor about him.

I really enjoyed hearing C’rizz and the Doctor having their own little segment, it’s nice to see them bounce off each other without outside interference. The TARDIS Trio works really well in this story I think they’ve struck the right balance, and I the camaraderie feels natural.

The plot hook here being Evil Science and Possible Hallucination Girl were very fun, and felt very Doctor Who. Stories like this that manage to stay tense but drop the stakes a bit are very welcome to me.

This story is very much on my relisten list.

[Plingsben · Rating 5 out of 5]

Certainly not a horror Audio has name suggests but I'd say it's disturbing enough to be put on the same self has anything else horror. Lots of wonderful dark ideas that I would love to see covered on the show. This also has a character whose last name is Flood who could be the inspiration for or a relative of the new character Mrs Flood who has of time of writing just been revealed on the main show. Only time will tell whether or not this is a co-incidence but if so this would not be the first time that the show has lifted ideas and story lines from Big Finish.

[K · Rating 2 out of 5]

ドクター自慢のターディスの中に作った庭にケリスを案内するとケリスは庭なんて本物じゃないといってまったく感動しない。せっかくだからまだ人間や文明などにさらされていない星の自然をみたいとケリスがいったことで3人はまったく人間が立ち入ることのない惑星に向かう。

手付かずであるはずの惑星で、悪の遺伝子を特定する実験が行われていたことと、さらに昔、研究者が知らずに持ち込んだウィルスで先住民が殲滅したことが判明したりして、先住民たちが死なないようにケリスはワクチンをドクターに内緒で渡すものの、結局歴史は変えられないとか。 そういう話が展開しているのはわかるのが、何度きいてもイマイチ筋道がつかめず断念。



本来はこれも時間のない世界の話の一つだったはずが、TV放送がはじまったためドクターを元の世界に戻したので、それようにリライトしたとか。その際になにかおかしくなったのかな？

[Xander Toner · Rating 3 out of 5]

A definite step up from Will Shindler's previous story. Here, we see the Doctor in a much more studious and quiet mood, burdened with a lot of explanations and expositions throughout and especially in Part Four. 8, Charley and C'rizz are a classic TARDIS Team and I think I'll always enjoy stories featuring these three somewhat.

[Finn Chamberlain-Page · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not as bad as I thought it was going to be but doesn't quite scrape 3 stars as I wasn't really blow away by it either. 5.5/10

[Tabitha · Rating 2 out of 5]

It wasn't worth the listen.

[AccidentalStu]

Paul mcgann gets complimented very well this audio

[Zach · Rating 2 out of 5]

Messy and boring story

[Jack · Rating 2 out of 5]

5/10
Verdict: Optional

Literally one actor in this entire thing makes this an embarrassment to listen to. The actor for the child that repeats that stupid 'scardey cat' line 3 times an episode makes me cringe hard. It's a shame too, this would probably be a passable episode if the child subplot was replaced.

[Steven · Rating 2 out of 5]

Death walks on Endarra and, a thousand years ago, the people of Caludaar vowed never to set foot on their sister planet. While the Eighth Doctor does not intend to break the law, his companions have their own demons to grapple with.

[Debra Cook · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting story. The Doctor takes Charley and C'rizz to see a planet that is supposed to be a peaceful planet that no one is supposed to be on but murder and mayhem is going on. Can the doctor fix the problem which was started in the past?

[David · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF

Did not finish. Was really bugging me. Skipping over this one.