REVIEW: Doctor Who: Peace at Last

Rutans vs Sontarans finishes on both a high and a low, with an unambitious finale that nevertheless packs emotional punch in its final scenes

Big Finish’s Rutans vs Sontarans comes to a close with Doctor Who: Peace at Last. Though the three previous episodes have focused on the Fugitive, the Second and the Sixth Doctors, the Eighth has lingered on the edges throughout. Now he takes centre stage as the series, which began with the very origins of the vendetta between Sontarans and Rutans, concludes with what may be its final days.

Theirs is a conflict which has raged across tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of years. Now, at long last, it seems there might be – now, must be – peace between the Sontaran Empire and the Rutan Host. And, obviously, the Doctor (Paul McGann), and his companions Charley (India Fisher) and C’rizz (Conrad Westmaas), will do whatever they can to help bring the bloodshed to an end.

After tens of thousands of years of fighting, and trillions dead, the mutually genocidal vendetta climaxes with a handful of characters bickering about trade deals

An exploration of what an end to the Sontaran/Rutan War might look like is perhaps long overdue. After all, Robert Holmes originally created them to satirize the proxy wars fought between the United States and the USSR. Gung ho, single-minded militarists on the one side, sponsoring coups on ‘primitive’ worlds around the galaxy for their ‘own good.’ On the other the insidious green menace they imagined hiding under every bed on every planet, insidiously corrupting their societies from within. So, forty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Peace at Last explores space glasnost.

It’s this aspect of Peace at Last that’s most disappointing. The scope of this war is so vast it almost defies human understanding. On such a scale that even wiping out all life on Earth in The Sontaran Stratagem is simply a matter of supply chain logistics for the actual fight. Peace at Last, however, makes it all feel rather small. Recent devastating losses on both sides have brought Sontarans and Rutans to the negotiating table. But while it may sound stone-hearted, those casualties: 35 million Sontarans and twenty thousand Rutans, would surely be just a drop in the ocean of blood spilled so far.

The negotiations themselves seem similarly twee. There’s a small space station in the middle of nowhere and only a couple of representatives on each side. The very fact C’rizz and Charley are able to wrangle jobs as aides also feeds the small stakes feel. By the time the Rutan Ambassador is wittering about trade routes, it all starts to feel more like an argument about the parish cricket green. Even the script describes the setting as like “a bad school disco.”

Peace at Last waits far too long before introducing Rutans vs Sontarans’ recurring Rutan anti-villain Monmoth, whose by far its most compelling character

The audio drama has two additional problems, though. Inevitably, factions who see peace as weakness seek to sabotage negotiations from within. While that takes up a significant amount of the run time, the identity of the traitor is obvious long before anything even happens.

Peace at Last’s other issue is that this is final part of the four episode Rutans vs Sontarans series. Yet it’s only towards the end that it acknowledges that ongoing plotline of Monmoth, the ancient Rutan who was there at the start of war, torn away from the communal mind of the Host ever since, and desperate to return.

It’s a shame, as when Monmoth finally does reveal themselves, it makes from the most compelling scenes not just of Peace at Last, but the whole Rutans vs Sontarans series. Their pain, loneliness and rage are beautifully portrayed. In addition the Eighth Doctor’s popping up in previous episodes to steer events gets a clever payoff as the Doctor and Monmoth engage in a timey wimey chess match of post hoc rationalizations. Exactly what the Time Lord was up in those scenes is decided by the two theorizing and arguing about it, including some very dark options indeed. It’s a satisfying novel way to bring those strands together and wrap them up.

The climax deals with the temporal puzzle of the Eighth Doctor’s earlier appearances in a novel and fun way, before a devastating reminder of his own role in the war

The final scenes also circle back around to Betrayal at the House of Sontar’s most devastating revelation – that it was Jo Martin’s Doctor who triggered the war in the first place. It places McGann’s incarnation in a position of well-meaning, but witless, hypocrisy as he tsks and tuts about the two other species’ war-mongering ways, completely ignorant that all that blood is also on his hands. The fact that Monmoth, his equally amnesiac former partner at Division, is the only living being who could possibly identify him for his war crimes, adds to the edge of danger and tragedy.

So Rutans vs Sontarans ultimately ends on both a low and a high. Overall, Peace at Last is the weakest of the four. But those final few scenes where it re-engages with the arc plot are the most emotionally powerful and most cleverly structured in the whole run.

Doctor Who: Peace at Last

On the precipice of peace it stands…

After the destruction of a major stronghold, the Sontarans propose something extraordinary. More extraordinary still, the Rutans say yes. The Doctor, Charley and C’rizz are on hand to watch history being made.

Yet history has other ideas. A plan that has taken centuries is about to come to fruition. The Melmoth is returning.

Doctor Who – Rutans vs Sontarans: Peace at Last is now available to purchase for just £9.99 (as a digital download to own) or £14.99 (download + collector’s edition CD), exclusively here. Please note: the collector’s edition CD is strictly limited to 1,500 copies and will not be re-pressed.