Doctor Who: City of Spires
by Simon Bovey (Big Finish, 2010)
Colin Baker and Frazer Hines make for good listening, undiminished by the passing years. The story, while diverting enough, exists mostly to reunite their characters, the Overlord proving a paltry adversary even by Doctor Who’s standards of dim villains with dubious schemes.
Doctor Who: Mind of the Hodiac
by Russell T Davies & Scott Handcock (Big Finish, 2022)
This two-parter is rather too long for what it offers, though the female-centric plot is welcome and Colin Baker is once again a delight. Davies and Handcock capture the Sixth Doctor’s personality, yet (as usual) have him largely superfluous to the resolution.
Doctor Who: The Hoxteth Time Capsule
by Paul Davis; read by Colin Baker (Big Finish, 2023)
A neat enough premise but vague and unfocussed, with middling prose, a deus ex machina and exposition up the wazoo. The Doctor’s involvement is murky, his mission to Rajasthan making little sense given how he came upon George in the first place.
Doctor Who: Voyager
by Steve Parkhouse; ill. John Ridgway; colours Gina Hart (Marvel, 1985)
Frobisher is introduced, joining a more proactive, less bombastic Sixth Doctor in an adventure trippy enough to have rounded out The Trial of a Time Lord. A preponderance of dark hues serves to foreground the SF (and make Baker’s coat blend in!).
Doctor Who: The Last Adventure, Part 4: The Brink of Death
by Nicholas Briggs (Big Finish, 2015)
Colin Baker’s regeneration story. The Sixth Doctor is given the send-off he was denied in the 1980s. Indeed, he is compensated somewhat by being scripted a dual death—once knowing the underlying reasons, once not. Unsurprisingly, Baker puts in a character-defining performance.
Doctor Who: The Last Adventure, Part 1: The End of the Line
by Simon Barnard and Paul Morris (Big Finish, 2015)
Decent enough drama, up to the point where the Master comes in with a pointless and impractical evil plan, and the Doctor thwarts him by talking a rulebound functionary into acknowledging said Master’s manifest breaking of rules. Colin Baker impresses, as always.
Doctor Who: Conflict Theory
by Nev Fountain; dir. Scott Handcock (Big Finish, 2020)
A fun, frivolous story that, beneath clever execution, explores the more serious question of the Doctor’s culpability in exposing his companions to danger. Fountain’s script is spot-on. Colin Baker and Nicola Bryant revel in a character dynamic rarely done justice on television.
Doctor Who: The Feast of Axos
by Mike Maddox (Big Finish, 2011)
This remarkably non-gratuitous sequel tempers the Sixth Doctor’s usual bombast with UNIT-era realism and gives Colin Baker something to work with for once. The script verges on proper SF and the characters have reasonable motivations. Even the aliens are allowed some dignity!
Doctor Who: The Wormery
by Paul Magrs & Stephen Cole (Big Finish, 2003)
The experimental storytelling doesn’t always pay dividends, but at least the writers aren’t stuck on the bog-standard. Colin Baker holds himself in fine fettle (and is afforded an uncommon depth of character). Former Pertwee-era companion Katy Manning runs rampant as Iris Wildthyme.
Dr. Sixth
by Adam Hargreaves (Puffin, 2018)
Poor Colin Baker. Hargreaves captures something of the Sixth Doctor’s voice, and also his rather planless propensity towards grandiloquent bluster as a means by which to defeat evil (in this case, the Rani). Unfortunately, the illustrations in this volume are rather bland.