Destiny of the Doctor: Smoke and Mirrors Review

I'm doing a series of reviews on the Destiny of the Doctor 50th anniversary audio range. The month's adventure, Smoke and Mirrors, is written by Steve Lyons and read by Janet Fielding & Tim Beckmann. It stars the fifth Doctor, Adric, Tegan, Nyssa, & Harry Houdini.

I'm glad they finally took the opportunity to bring back a recurring villain for this adventure. Having monsters of the month is fun, but it's not really Doctor Who unless you bring back a villain like the Master. His presence makes possible storylines that don't really work with other villains. It's also refreshing having another adventure with him, since I've watched almost all of Anthony Ainley's episodes.

This is also the first Destiny of the Doctor story that's a proper historical. One of the things that makes Doctor Who Doctor Who is the ability to have episodes set in the far future, but also venture back in time and meet historical figures, in this case Harry Houdini. I think any set of Doctor Who stories needs to have a historical, and this certainly fulfills that purpose.

The thing happens again. The spoilery thing. It's happened in every adventure so far. I have no idea what it's building towards. Obviously, someone's in trouble, but I can't figure out the relevance of the various items in each of the stories.

If you haven't already purchased these stories, I would definitely recommend them. It's always nice to see old Doctors in new stories, and it will help bide the time until the 50th anniversary.