Even without the costume, you can somehow tell this is a much earlier Eighth than the Lucie, Dark Eyes era (for want of a better description) and the Time War. Having shaken off the events of both the novels and comics (in my headcanon), he's the slightly tigerish, adventurous figure who doesn't yet have the weight of the multiple deaths and estrangement that he experiences in the audio years on his shoulders and still very willing to collect passengers, especially, as Audacity is here, in dire need of saving. It just shows you what an asset McGann is that he can recreate all of these subtly different versions of the character.
Of course, he's intrigued by Lady Audacity Montague, of course he is. Apart from her gung-ho, fearless, feminist attitude, she's from a period before technology which means he's able to impress her with future technology and other kinds of spectacles, to impress her, as she calls him on early in their second episode together. She's in the lineage of companions that includes River, Lady Christina, Trix and Fey, the kind who can get along perfectly well without him but take a shine to the Time Lord and his magic box for whatever reason and find a mutual understanding, if not love.
The Devouring
Follows the Rose/Storm Warning playbook of introducing the companion first and whatever madness has been let loose with the Doctor's gradual introduction. The Devouring, an alien species obsessing over another being who happened to look in their direction is perhaps a metaphor for stalkers and how they can consume a person's whole life. Writer Lisa McMullin has RTD's facility for sketching in but making meaningful side characters which means the scenes in the foe consumers everyone Audicity's been in contact with are even more horrible.
The Great Cyber-War
Good, bold title as the Doctor finally visits a period which has been hinted at throughout the franchise, notably TV's Revenge of the Cybermen apparently at random (although we know it is really the TARDIS taking him where he needs to be). Now we have an explanation for why gold of all things was so damaging to Cybermen, why they sounded so emotional in the 80s episodes despite saying that they'd drained themselves of emotion and how Voga ended up orbiting Jupiter. It's all about as convincing as these grace notes usually are and it won't be the last time the Doctor finds himself making history.
Writer Tim Foley doesn't shortchange the action either, this is a six-episode (in old money), multi-location, cast of dozens epic with rich characterisation across the board, which also knows that all most of us really want or need from a Cyberman story is for one of the metal monsters to clench his biker-gloved fist and say "Excellent" with a mid-Atlantic accent as though they have bucket on their head and for the Doctor to shout "It's a cyber mat!" when required. It's all good, clean tremendous, straightforward fun I'm glad we're hearing more of it in these releases.
Placement: Ha, well. As I said in the introduction, I was all ready to drop this before Shada, but then Charley appears at the end in Tibet, the Doctor having dropped her there for a bit, much as he did with Sam at Greenpeace and my brain turned to soup and began pouring out of my ears. Assuming this is chronological, Charley sounds more mature than in her first season so I'm assuming this is supposed to be somewhere close to the start of the second season unless more information comes to light, like all of this is actually set after The Girl Who Never Was or the Doctor's jumped back into his own past and selfishly picked up Charley before an earlier version of himself was supposed to.
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