Mrs Constance Clarke has faced perils on many planets, but now she finds herself in the most dangerous place on Earth. A place like home, yet terrifyingly different, where ordinary decent folk might hand her over to a dreadful fate. And as night falls, she and the Doctor realise that something is on the prowl outside, a creature darker than the dark. And hungry...
Doctor Who - Short Trips
8.7. Doctor Who: Short Trips: The Darkened Earth
Written by John Pritchard
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Music and sound designer David Roocroft tells us about crafting the soundscape for this unique tale: “The Darkened Earth marks the second time I’ve had the privilege of working on a John Pritchard-scripted Doctor Who story (the first being the recent Companion Chronicle, The Iron Maid), and once again, John’s gift for horror inflections have informed how I approached the music.
“Central to my work on The Darkened Earth was dividing the score into two distinct camps: when the creature is absent, and when the creature is present. “I felt it was important that the music reflects the creature's effect, here eliminating melody for the times it feeds. Consequently, there’s a big difference between the bright, more orchestral-leaning passages of the score and the sludgy, atonal sequences that denote the creature’s presence.
“I felt this was especially pertinent to emphasising the creature’s ‘otherness’ to Constance – in the absence of the creature, even when I’m attempting to evoke a sense of the approaching uncanny, the arrangements retain a footing in the kind of instrumentation that would have been recognisable to Constance, whereas the creature’s soundtrack would be distinctly ‘other’ and outside the auditory language of someone more used to life (and music) in the 1940s.”
Reviews
You come out of the other side of this story with either a newfound or an intensified respect for Constance Clarke, who keeps her head while letting her heart beat for the lives of others, and opening her mind to a broader way of seeing the conflict with which she’s so intimately involved.
Mass Movement
The Darkened Earth is another successful release for Big Finish and the Short Trips range. It boasts some excellent writing from John Pritchard, someone who it would be great to see a Main Range release from at some point. He has proved he is more than capable of handling any TARDIS team they throw at him.
Blogtor Who
- Narrated by Miranda Raison
- Cover Art by Anthony Lamb
- Director Lisa Bowerman
- Executive Producer Jason Haigh-Ellery Nicholas Briggs
- Music by David Roocroft
- Producer Ian Atkins
- Script Editor Ian Atkins
- Sound Design by David Roocroft
- Written by John Pritchard
- Product Format: 0-download only
- Duration: 36 minutes
- Physical Retail ISBN: n/a
- Digital Retail ISBN: 978-1-78703-001-5
- Production Code: BFPMSTDL44