Mr Hunt and I have been playing an implicit game of Chicken. Who would crack first and write about Zagreus. It looks like I blinked first.

I hadn't intended to write about it until I could think of something constructive and interesting to say but I don't think that day will ever come. And when I read his quote in DWM about how he’s disappointed some people didn’t have faith in him re the Divergent Universe arc I knew I had to say something.

Zagreus wants to be an epic story, worthy of celebrating forty years of Doctor Who. Its aims are clear for all to see. They are to use as many old actors and actresses as they could, bung in some stuff about Rassilon, use Nick Courtney to fill any gaps and try to turn the ending into something of a "new beginning". Oh wait, that was the Five Doctors. A story regarded as something of a joke by fandom (if such a diverse group can be lumped together for the sake of convenience) but which is rather enjoyable with a glass of wine (to come over all Discontinuity Guide for a moment). Zagreus should never be entertained while under the influence. An altered mental state might confuse you and leave you thinking you'd just heard a work of genius.

Let's take a look at just a few of the things Zagreus offers the unwary listener.

A Jon Pertwee cameo which is impossible to understand.

Sylvester McCoy as "Uncle Winky".

A war between mechanical animals which isn't as good as either the Marilyn Manson album of the same name or the Red Dwarf episode with the celebrity waxwork war.

Some fanwank about vampires.

Nicholas Courtney as the voice of the Tardis.

The Tardis being melted down and turned into a sword.

Revelations that Rassilon fashioned the whole of creation in his own image to explain away the old sci fi cliché that most aliens look like people.

The words "Alice", "in" and "Wonderland" being bandied about as a pre-emptive excuse for none of it making sense.

It's mostly virtual reality anyway.

Yes - the old dramatic device of illusionary adventures. Nothing saps the drama out of a story better than knowing that none of it is real. The Matrix scenes in The Deadly Assassin aside, virtual reality is a poor substitute for proper story telling. The beauty of the Land of Fiction is that we never knew whether it was "real" or not. In Zagreus we don't even get as far as the Matrix - everything happens inside the Tardis. On the evidence of this (and the Edge of Destruction) the old girl must be the worst communicator since Sir Humphrey Appleby.

Why is it that we have to sit and listen to dull, pointless and at times rotten stories just because they happen to feature characters voiced by people we know? They – and by they I mean Russell and Alan Barnes who together penned a script which one hopes Russell would’ve tossed in the bin had he been wearing his objective hat – seem determined to do anything but a standard anniversary tale. Because we’ve had too many of those – two in forty years is more than enough for anyone.

I don’t hate Zagreus – I really don’t – I just don’t like it. Big Finish’s Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Doctor stories (and quite a lot of their Eighth too) are good, solid and acceptable stories for “television Doctor Who”. Neverland, Zagreus and, I fear, The Next Life are trying to be “book Doctor Who”. Anyone who has read an EDA knows that it is different to the telly series. Not necessarily better, more grown up or less enjoyable but just different. Zagreus is different – not necessarily better or more grown up but in my opinion definitely less enjoyable than “real” Doctor Who.

Post script - To this day the first thing I think about when I hear the name "Zagreus" was posting the following in complete ignorance a few days before its release. Sometimes I scare even myself.

"My mole also told me that Gary Russell was seen in WHSmith buying several Navy Lark CDs and muttering to himself "Nick'll be able to craft a Pertwee cameo out of this little lot. Mwahaha"