Big Finish has become resoundingly unfashionable. That's a sweeping, but by no means surprising, statement to make about a concept that has been with us for five long, uninterrupted years and in all that time (by virtue of its brief) has been unable to really "move on" anywhere. I point this out because "Neverland" is the most Big Finishy Big Finish of them all. Or at least it was, until "Zagreus" came along, but that's a story for another time.

Being epic never made Doctor Who popular, from "The Invasion of Time" to "The Ancester Cell", the series that touched our hearts always did so in small ways, and one does not dig for forgotten gems amid the boldest adventures. Like "Zagreus", it's easy to dismiss because of all the unfashionable Big Finish-isms it chucks at us - Gallifrey, unfathomable time paradoxes, very long episodes and McGann, now that most unfashionable of Doctors. His era is thought of as a bit rubbish nowadays, and thinking back it was "Neverland" that started all that.

Which is odd, because it's completely brilliant. Doctor Who fans are contrary creatures, wanting our series to be innovative but objecting to change, mocking it when it's cheap but scowling when it's too lavish. Possibly another "Zagreus" trap "Neverland" suffers from is having so much to say. The story moves quickly here, as surprise after surprise is pulled out the hat. In the space of the first hour alone, we've discovered a new Universe, encountered Rassillon again, and had to redefine our view of silly Charley as a walking, talking breach in the fabric of the web of time. It's no wonder fans of "The Marian Conspiracy" might gag, and that's quite a popular story.

At the other end of the scale, another complaint is the sickly sentimentality involved in the Doctor/Charley relationship. Again, we shouldn't expect companions like Dodo and Polly in this day and age, paper ciphers capable only of screaming and asking "why?", and yet deep down we just want Charley Pollard to be uncomplicated and unquestioning of things like her emotions. Most of all, we don't want our hero to show himself up over a girl. Yet the listener realises what the solution is at just the right point, just as Sentris announces the Never People have all bases covered but one. And then it becomes blindingly obvious what must happen. And, sure, it tugs at the stomach as much as the heartstrings, but these are Doctor Who fans making these things. Most of them are gay as geese so what do you expect?

Where "Neverland" succeeds is in its scope. It's like a feature film, painted with broad splashes of colour that evoke Twenty First Century Fox cinematic productions in the minds eye, and only very rarely are we unoblivious to the fact that it's all being fed to us in dialogue. I can still see the wreck of the Anti-peoples asteroid in my mind now, the twisted remains of a TARDIS console welded amid a steel forest and being showered by acidic, alien rain. This is what a Doctor Who film or season-closer WOULD have been like, had they been financed by Lucasfilm and not the BBC in the old days. And even putting aside the brassy concepts on display, it's barely possible to believe trusty old India Fisher is playing two parts here, she is that good. Rarely do you even acknowledge the fact.

If only "Neverland" knew where to stop. The cliffhanger may have been the icing on the cake back in the day, a final unexpected twist in a tale that had been hyped to buggery for a year beforehand, but now it only serves to remind us of what was to come - a long wait, followed by a muddled, rather overblown sequel. "Neverland" is so good at remembering how good Doctor Who can be when it's able to be spectacular, that it forgets it always finished with the Doctor somehow escaping to fight another day. Like the middle episodes of "The War Games" or a mid-nineties Michael Jackson album, this is a saga that is so drawn-out it's probably (and actually is) still going on somewhere. But we shouldn't let this prevent us from seeing "Neverland" as anything other than a well-rounded triumph.