Line #35 Recap/BigFinishDoctorWho013TheShadowOfTheScourge


1	This episode, written by Creator/PaulCornell, was the first Creator/BigFinish audio to explicitly take place in the ''Literature/DoctorWhoNewAdventures'' timeline rather than the Big Finish timeline (specifically, it and "[[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWho042TheDarkFlame The Dark Flame]]" are set between [[Recap/DoctorWhoNewAdventuresAllConsumingFire "All-Consuming Fire"]] and [[Recap/DoctorWhoNewAdventuresBloodHarvest "Blood Harvest"]]). It's also the first AudioPlay/BigFinishDoctorWho episode to star Professor Literature/BerniceSummerfield, who had already had her own Big Finish series for a few years.
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5	The Seventh Doctor takes Bernice and Ace to a hotel where three conventions are held: one on aerospace engineering, one on new age channelling, and one on cross-stitching. The aerospace scientists have developed a new technology that might, one day, lead to time travel. The leader of the new age cult, Annie, is a charlatan who's tricking her followers into believing she can contact "The Great Ohm". She's very confused when it turns out she's actually psychic and "Ohm" is really an EldritchAbomination called the Scourge, which uses the new technology to transport the entire hotel into a space/time void.
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7	The Scourge turn out to feed on despair, and have inspired much of human religion (most notably the idea of hell, which is ''very very real'' and full of hungry Scourge). They've enlisted the Doctor as their servant. Seven tries to play cat and mouse with them, but they manage to transform him into one of their own, sending his morphed body into a deep coma and absorbing his mind into their collective consciousness. Benny and Ace are forced to work together with people from all three conventions in order to contact the Doctor and withstand the Scourge. The Doctor is part of the Scourge, the Scourge are part of the humans they possess, the humans are inside the hotel, the hotel is inside the void and the void is part of the Scourge's mind. Like nested Russian dolls trying to eat each other. While Bernice jumps into the Doctor's mind (with Annie's help) to drag him back to reality, Ace makes herself immune to the Scourge's words by ''having someone [[DisabilityImmunity destroy her ear drums]]'' and sets about getting the hotel back into the regular universe. In the end, the Doctor manages to work one of the organisers of the cross-stitching convention like a ventriloquist's doll, uses the guy's body to manipulate the TARDIS and contain the Scourge's dimensional meddling, and starts TalkingTheMonsterToDeath. ThePowerOfFriendship saves the day.
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9	!Tropes
10	* AnotherDimension: Where the Scourge come from.
11	* AuthorAppeal: Creator/PaulCornell briefly mentions owls, focuses on the reveal of characters being in relationships with each other, teases the Benny/Eight ship a bit, and references his own most famous Seven line by having him state he's what the monsters are afraid of.
12	* BattleInTheCenterOfTheMind: Throughout the episode. Seven notably kicks Bernice out of his mind when things get too dangerous, and she reponds by ''jumping right back in''.
13	** The Doctor gets an awesome one fighting off a Scourge though.
14	* CareBearStare: Once discovered what they really are and do.
15	* CasualTimeTravel: The Scourge can potentially easily move through the fourth dimension, as 8th dimensional beings.
16	* [[PhraseCatcher Phrase]] [[CatchphraseInterruptus Catcher Interruptus]]: "It's bigger on the...!" "Yeah, yeah, not now!"
17	* ClosedCircle: The hotel gets locked down so no one can get in or out.
18	* ContinuityNod / DiscontinuityNod: The EverybodyLaughsEnding has the Doctor say [[Recap/DoctorWhoTVMTheTVMovie he's only half human]]...
19	* CompellingVoice
20	* ContinuityNod: Bernice sees a mirage of the Eighth Doctor in Seven's mind, and instantly fancies him, even jokingly asking the Doctor if he plans on regenerating soon. He's a bit weirded out by it, and teases her mercilessly about it later. In the novels (which is the continuity this episode is set in), Bernice is ''heavily'' implied to eventually sleep with the Doctor when he's in his Eighth body.
21	* CrystalDragonJesus: Ohm is a golden man with blonde hair in disguise.
22	* {{Cult}}
23	* {{Deconstruction}}: The story works as a deconstruction of the Seventh Doctor's most extreme ChessMaster stories: He waltzes into a catastrophic situation without a care in the world with a plan set in place to take care of everything -- Only to discover at a crucial moment that his preparations had been discovered and ruined, and apparently he was so confident in himself he didn't bother double-checking beforehand. From there he has to act more like other Doctors, relying on his [[XanatosSpeedChess quick thinking]], [[HeroicWillpower willpower, strong morals]] and [[ThePowerOfFriendship his friends]].
24	* DemonicPossession: The Scourge taking over has a bit of this.
25	** InvertedTrope as well The DOCTOR takes over a Scourge at one point, when his body is out of comission.
26	* {{Determinator}}: When Ace realises that the Scourge talk people into despair and manipulate people with their words, she has someone ''destroy her eardrums''. She knows the TARDIS medbay can fix her up, so she spends almost half the story completely deaf and bleeding heavily from her ears. And she's not even bothered.
27	* DisabilityImmunity: Intentionally invoked. How does Ace get around the Scourge's CompellingVoice? Easy! Just have somebody shatter her eardrums!
28	* DoingInTheWizard: See FireAndBrimstoneHell.
29	* DyingAlone: Old Man Will triggers the plot this way.
30	* EldritchAbomination
31	* ElevatorFloorAnnouncement: Horror, tragedies and mysterious deaths!
32	* EmotionEater
33	* EvilSoundsDeep
34	* FateWorseThanDeath
35	* FireAndBrimstoneHell: Apparently the Scourge home dimension is the inspiration of the Christian concept of Hell.
36	* GoMadFromTheRevelation
37	* GoodEyesEvilEyes
38	* HarsherInHindsight: The Doctor's explanation of how the Scourge are eight dimensional beings causes someone to realise "We can look down on a world of flat circles and do anything." Cue the 2014 episode [[Recap/DoctorWhoS34E9Flatline Flatline]] and it turns out no, no we really can't.
39	* HiveMind: The Scourge have a PsychicLink with each other in order to spread their EmotionEater ways.
40	* HumansAreFlawed
41	** HumansAreSpecial / HumansAreGood
42	* IKnowYoureInThereSomewhereFight
43	* ImAHumanitarian
44	* InsectoidAliens
45	* LampshadeHanging: "You know, I'm getting tired of running up and down corridors." "[[OnceAnEpisode You should try doing it professionally.]]"
46	* MarkOfTheBeast
47	* MeatPuppet: Gets ''namedropped''.
48	* [[MultiversalConqueror Multiversal Conquerers]]
49	* NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: The ''Scourge''.
50	* NoIndoorVoice: Ace at one point gets deafened (on purpose). This is the result.
51	* NotQuiteDead: The Doctor.
52	* OneWingedAngel: The bodies that get taken over slowly reassert themselves into the Scourge.
53	* OtherMeAnnoysMe: Inside of the mind of the Doctor there's the occasional other regeneration of the Doctor (future and past), but he states they have no influence on him but turn up their noses.
54	* PhlebotinumAnalogy: [[BuffySpeak The things inside the Russian dolls]]. ItMakesSenseInContext.
55	* PowerEchoes: A slow reverb for the Scourge.
56	* PuppeteerParasite
57	* ReadingsAreOffTheScale
58	* SanitySlippage: The Doctor.
59	* SayMyName: "Ohm. Ohm. Ohm. Ohm. Ooooooooooooohhhhhm."
60	* ShapeshiftingSound: The Scourge quickly [[TransformationOfThePossessed alter their human hosts to match their true selves]], accompanied by a sickening series of crunches and pops as the new arms, eyes, and other appendages sprout.
61	* ShutUpHannibal: Bernice delivers one.
62	* SoftGlass: [[SubvertedTrope Subverted]]. The windows were made with terrorist bombings in mind.
63	* SpannerInTheWorks
64	* SpookySeance
65	* SufficientlyAdvancedAlien: Ohm.
66	* TalkingTheMonsterToDeath: Seven, as per usual.
67	* TheChessmaster: Seven. So, so much.
68	* TheFool: The Doctor states he acts like this every now and then in order to entertain his companions.
69	* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech
70	** ShutUpHannibal!
71	* TheTramp: Old Man Will, who's dead as the story starts.
72	** TheUndead
73	* TheTrickster: The Doctor.
74	* ThinkHappyThoughts: Inside of the Doctor's mind.
75	* TrueCompanions: How the Doctor defines himself.
76	* UnusuallyUninterestingSight: The Doctor, Bernice and Ace don't think twice about a deceased person, it bothers the {{Muggles}} though..
77	* WeirdnessCensor: Under the thrall of the CompellingVoice, humans only see the original human hosts instead of the Scourge.
78	* WhoWantsToLiveForever: People stuck in the Scourge home dimension [[FateWorseThanDeath will. Not. Die.]]

Context Recap / BigFinishDoctorWho013TheShadowOfTheScourge