It’s 60 years since Peter Purves arrived alongside William Hartnell’s Doctor Who as Steven Taylor, and to celebrate, Big Finish have released two brand-new Doctor Who Short Trips audiobooks. Performed by Peter Purves, these two audiobooks are available to download completely free.
Peter Purves performs these two new adventures (as he has many times before), which are set during Steven’s time with the Doctor. Both stories, written by Jacqueline Rayner, are 40 minute long tales and will have Steven see an alternate life and get caught in an exceedingly dangerous game.
In the first adventure, titled A Forest of All Seasons, the Doctor, Steven, and Vicki arrive in a strange forest where time has seemingly come to a stand-still. When Vicki disappears, Steven must face the strange mystery that involves an alternate version of himself and all the inhabitants of a nearby village trapped in an endless cycle.
The Doctor’s Gambit takes the Doctor, Steven and Dodo to an alien world, where they are drawn into a mysterious and dangerous contest. Each move the trio make could be their last, and with the person in control being invisible, who knows what could happen.
Peter Purves said: “I like both these Short Trips. It was an extremely generous idea of Jacqueline when she wrote it to explore Steven’s romantic side. It’s an aspect of Steven that hasn’t been shown before.”
Writer Jacqueline Rayner added: “I love the character of Steven. Even when he was fitted into not-quite-Steven-shaped holes in the scripts in the 1960s, Peter Purves made him a distinctive and very human – and realistically flawed – character. It’s a great joy that Peter is still bringing Steven alive and still finding new depths in him all these years later – it’s a great testament to him as an actor.”
These two new Doctor Who Short Trips are available for free now, exclusively from the Big Finish website.
