In the conclusion to the Ravenous series, the Doctor, Liv and Helen have to stop the new alliance between the Eleven and the Ravenous turning the entire universe into the Ravenous' feeding ground, and their only assistance is in the form of three different Masters and an ancient Gallifreyan scientist.
Tropes
- And This Is for...: When the three Masters shoot the Eleven. Missy admits hers is For the Evulz.
- Ax-Crazy: The Masters, obviously. In the end their motivation for undoing the Eleven's plan is because they rather like killing people, and a universe of eternally regenerating would-be victims takes all the fun out of everything.
- Back for the Dead: At the very end, the Decayed Master is resurrected by his future selves so he can finally regenerate, after centuries of body stealing and trickery to extend his life. He gets about one sentence in before he goes.
- Borrowed Catchphrase: After helping the Burned Master to regenerate into the Bald Master, Missy greets him with what will become his standard catchphrase: "Hello, you".
- Broken Pedestal: Averted, for a change; while the Doctor has grown used to Time Lord legends like Rassilon and Omega letting him down when he meets them, Artron proves to be a genuinely good man who ultimately sacrifices his life to undo his mistake.
- Call-Back:
- In part 2, Liv has the Master at gunpoint, and he figures she won't shoot. However, after what happened in "Whisper" and "Planet of Dust", she's much more willing to shoot.
- The War Master echoes the Decayed Master while the latter is about to fully regenerate, this time without possession; "A new body. At last."
- Continuity Nod:
- Missy shrugs off questions about what happened to the future Earth because it's had more than a few apocalypses (and she notes some of them have even cancelled others out).
- On how to deal with the timeline problems, Missy notes that she nicked a means of Laser-Guided Amnesia off of River Song during their encounter.
- Destination Defenestration: Arton nearly does this to Helen, throwing her from his tower 40 stories up, but recognizes her from "Fairytale of Salzburg" and suspends her in midair instead.
- Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Missy knocks out Arton, reality-warping Time Lord legend, with her stun gun.
- Disability Immunity: As well as the Eleven's established immunity to the Ravenous due to his condition, the "Deathworm" Master is also immune to them, as his current state, stuck in a stolen human body, has tainted any remaining regeneration energy so that the Ravenous find him unpalatable. Granted, they considered his future self particularly delectable once he was out of the Bruce body.
- Distracted by My Own Sexy: Missy freely admits she's spent the odd occasion just staring at herself all day in the mirror.
- Distracted by the Sexy: Missy is preoccupied with how attractive her Eric Roberts incarnation is to the point that both he and the War Master have to threaten to kill her so that she'll pay attention to their plan. She pouts, rather. The fact this doesn't count as the above trope is because she stole that body when she was him.
- Even Evil Has Standards: At the very end the "Deathworm" Master is uncertain about messing with the laws of time to revive his future self. The War Master figures it's not a problem.
- Evil Wears Black: Liv disdainfully notes that the Master's all-black TARDIS is "a bit on the nose".
- Fate Worse than Death: When the Master discovers that Liv has been given the ability to regenerate, apparently without limit, he elects to throw her out the nearest airlock For the Evulz, as she'll suffer in agony in the vacuum of space, die... then regenerate again and again and again and again, until the end of time. Liv, understandably, is absolutely horrified by the idea.Liv: That's... that's pure sadism.War Master: My dear, I do believe you've forgotten whom you're dealing with.
- Fish out of Temporal Water: Helen, in a sense. She's from the 1960s, so when asked to identify a large tower in London can only identify the BT Tower, which in her time was only just built. Missy rattles off some that a 21st century person would recognise, like the Gherkin.
- For the Evulz: The War Master shoots Liv to see whether she'll regenerate. She notes that he shot her twice, before he knew about the regeneration, shooting down his claims it was For Science!. Moments later, the "Deathworm" Master shoots her before his future self can stop him.
- Good Thing You Can Heal: Once Liv gains the power of self-regeneration, she gets lethally shot and fed upon by the Ravenous a disturbing number of times.
- Grand Finale: Features the final showdown against the Ravenous that has been driving the entire arc, and also finishes off The Eleven, who has been a recurring antagonist since the beginning of Doom Coalition.
- Handwave: At the end, the War Master acknowledges the usual threat of temporal paradoxes probably aren't an issue for him, given as he comes from the Time Crash that is the Last Great Time War.
- Help Yourself in the Future: For the "Deathworm" Master, the youngest Master to appear; the story ends with him assisting the War Master and Missy in stopping the Ravenous, and he later directly accompanies them as they give the "Burnt Master"- established as the immediate future self of the "Deathworm" Master- a new regeneration cycle.
- I Hate Past Me: The War Master regards "Deathworm" Master as an idiot.
- Is This Thing On?: Missy, trying to contact the Eleven, spends several seconds wondering whether the line's open, and probably would've gone on for longer if he hadn't interrupted.
- Killed Off for Real:
- After centuries of possessions and transformations and countless other methods of cheating death, the Burned Master finally dies and is given a new regeneration cycle by his other selves, being reborn as the Bald Master.
- This story also finishes off The Eleven once and for all. While we don't get to hear his next incarnation, we already know that he becomes the much more stable, female Twelve, who survives into the Time War.
- Mistaken Age: Arguably applies to the War Master, after he meets Liv Chenka; while Liv realises he's the Master, the Doctor doesn't meet this Master directly, so never realises that he's older than the Masters he's familiar with, Liv's description being vague enough to apply to other incarnations of his enemy.
- Mistaken for Special Guest:
- Liv initially assumes that the War Master is a Time Lord agent responding to her distress call, unaware that she's currently on a Time Lord space station that the Master claimed for himself. Later, after noticing his psychopathic tendencies, she then momentarily believes he is a past incarnation of the Eleven. The Master is less than amused.
War Master: I am not a number!- Learning that the Master is working with a Time Lady, the Doctor assumes that the female is the Rani rather than realising that she's the Master's future self.
- My Skull Runneth Over: To save the Doctor's life Arton takes the natural power of the Kolstani into himself and gains near-abolute control over reality. But he also goes a bit loopy thanks to the energy coursing through his brain.
- Never Speak Ill of the Dead: After the death of the Burned Master at the hands of the Ravenous, The Doctor strongly admonishes Liv for making flippant remarks about him. No matter what The Master had done, The Doctor still has a lot of respect for his oldest friend in the universe.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: To a degree; Artron's actions result in the Kolstani being transformed into the Ravenous when the Master forces him to drain their energy, but he could have made things worse by giving that energy to the Master rather than keeping it for himself.
- Noodle Incident: Missy briefly talks about the time she was "on a beach, completely…". She doesn't bother to finish the sentence but the last word would most likely have been "naked".
- Nothing Personal: The Eleven says this about setting the Ravenous on the Master. Missy feels otherwise, since it was pretty darn personal on her end.
- Other Me Annoys Me: The "Deathworm" Master is notably annoyed when Missy flirts with him. In fact, Missy's somewhat... loose grip on sanity serves to irritate her two younger counterparts to no end. Despite her being the oldest of the three present incarnations, there's no question that the War Master is the one centred enough to take charge.
- Pass the Popcorn: As the Eleven's plans go belly-up, the Masters watch. Missy has somehow acquired popcorn from somewhere.
- Shoo the Dog: Before heading into the Before Times of Gallifrey, the Doctor leaves Liv behind... which inadvertently leaves her to meet the Master.
- Shout-Out: Missy rattles off a few, including referring to the Eleven as "Numberwang".
- Small Name, Big Ego: While the Eleven is dangerous, the Masters consider him this, dismissing the idea of him as the Doctor's "other" arch-enemy and shooting the Eleven after he proposes an alliance between them.
- Stable Time Loop:
- The Doctor creates the 'wish-granter' Liv encounters in Salzburg when Artron draws power from the Kolstani and gains the ability to warp reality, with the Doctor even giving Artron the rules he will use in his future and the Doctor's past.
- At the audio's conclusion, the "Deathworm" Master, the War Master and Missy all contribute to the "Burnt" Master gaining a new cycle of regenerations, which for the War Master and Missy has already happened.
- Suspect Is Hatless:
- When Liv escapes the clutches of the War Master (whom the Eighth Doctor hasn't met yet), the Doctor asks her to describe him so they can pinpoint which incarnation they're dealing with. He notes her (accurate) summary of "bearded, urbane and a bit sadistic" doesn't really narrow it down much.
- Turned around when Missy tries to identify Helen, and can't do better than "has eyes and hair".
- Talking to Themself: Even more so than usual, the Eleven takes it up to Eleven. As he begins to regenerate, he has a brief conversation with himself instead of one of his ten other personalities, the final sign that he has become just another of the voices in his own head, before he becomes The Twelve.
- Timey-Wimey Ball: Invoked in terms of the Doctor's encounters with the Masters in this narrative; having met the "Burnt Master" in the preceding story (Planet of Dust), as well as encountering the "Bald Master" during the Dark Eyes series, the Eighth Doctor now meets the "Deathworm" Master from shortly after the TV Movie, and indirectly contributes to the events that will lead to him reverting to his burnt state before becoming the "Bald Master".
- Two Lines, No Waiting: Part 1 has the Doctor with Artron and the "Deathworm" Master, Missy and Helen, and Liv and the Master. The lines merge again during Part 2.
- Unexplained Recovery: When Liv realises she's trapped with the Master, she notes that she'd just watched his past 'Burned' incarnation die in front of her. His response:War Master: Well yes, but I got over it.
- Ultimately explained at the audio's conclusion, when the War Master works with the "Deathworm" Master and Missy to restore that version of himself to life with a new set of regenerations.
- Villainous Breakdown: The Eleven suffers one as he begins to regenerate from his wounds, he’s crying at realization that he’ll be trapped inside the Twelve’s head alongside his other voices for the rest of their lives.
- What the Hell Is That Accent?: Missy's attempts to imitate the Deathworm Master's American accent range from a hokey Southern caricature to equally hokey Australian.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?: Basically applies as the Doctor, his companions and the Masters have to stop the Eleven's plan to give the entire universe the ability to perpetually regenerate, but this is mostly because the universe will become new food sources for the Ravenous if they aren't returned to normal rather than anyone objecting to the immortality on its own (although the Masters muse that they would lose the ability to threaten anyone if nobody could die).
- Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?:
- The War Master has no trouble at all with shooting Liv. After she recovers, she is happy to return the favour.
- He also admits he knows about the Doctor's Baker Street house, but won't bother attacking him there because there's no sport in shooting a sitting duck.
- You Wouldn't Shoot Me: The Master surmises that, as the Doctor's companion, Liv doesn't have what it takes to actually shoot him. Liv responds by pointing out she was recently in the same predicament with the Eleven, who went on to unleash the Ravenous on the universe... and so she's happy to start with shooting the Master in the arm as a warning.
