Yes, the Ice Warriors are back!
Range producer, Noga Flaishon impressed us with Aegis, and as Big Finish’s The Thirteenth Doctor Adventures ploughs ahead, she apparently wanted to ground the action back in present-day Earth for the episode that would start the second half of the season — and the resulting Rochana Patel-penned audio story, The Hallamshire Incident, is a big improvement which is a very rewarding listen for fans of both the Thirteenth Doctor (Jodie Whittaker) era and long-time Big Finish customers.
The inclusion of the Ice Warriors and former Sixth Doctor ally Patricia Menzies (whose police rank has risen to superintendent in the decade since she last hung out with Doctor) were inputs from script editor Matt Fitton, and there is also Yaz’s sister Sonya heavily involved. By having familiar characters, it makes all the ingredients of the story work far better together than in previous releases.
A UFO crash kicks off proceedings, with the titles unusually coming in straight after within the first minute rather than the second part of the story set-up as Yaz receives a call from a Manchester police number and Menzies is on the other side of the phone summoning her back to work.
This story takes place in that unusual gap where both UNIT and Torchwood are inactive so people don’t believe most of the alien activity taking place, which is the entry point for Sonya Khan as she wants to expose the kind of action her sister gets involved in.
Both reunions — the Doctor with Patricia, and Yaz with Sonya — land well and far more focus is put on the latter through the episode. The Doctor and Superintendent Menzies mostly work to solve the day, while the Khan sisters split their time. Half of it is spent with an Ice Warrior, and the other half is them discussing their relationship and caring instincts for each other.
Kramer nails the sound design throughout, and because of proceedings playing out mostly in real-time it means his score takes a backseat most of the time. When the music scales up late on, it supports the action very well.
The Hallamshire Incident is a bit of a romp combined with emotional development, with the characters and listeners second-guessing on whether the Ice Warriors are villains or not, and the explosive threat of their crashed ship therefore doesn’t feel high stakes until late on when Whittaker shines with plenty of great dialogue in which her Doctor gets to be assertive. You can hear the strain in her voice, combining anger and sadness, which truly ramps up the tension after a lot of fun moments in the minutes prior. This includes an Ice Warrior that is “completely starkers!”
The comedy works, the two crashed Ice Warriors feel like distinct characters rather than monsters, and Gill is once again putting in the best performance as Yaz’s relationships with the Doctor, her sister, and her police work is explored.
When Vampire Weekend kicked off the Thirteenth Doctor Adventures in 2025, it showed the same level of potential as this episode and it had similar features: a contemporary setting, characters Yaz can immediately bounce off and trust (rather than reliance on the Doctor), and some Doctor Who lore. It successfully evoked this Doctor’s television era to a tee without using the larger TARDIS team.
The fall-out of Fugitive of the Judoon and the Thasmin sub-plot get plenty of attention in The Hallamshire Incident, both feeling like natural inclusions in the script unlike earlier in the series, and the ending is a super listen packed with references including the Doctor not remembering her past… with Charley Pollard…
The Thirteenth Doctor Adventures: The Hallamshire Incident is available now from Big Finish.
