Sympathy for the Devil (audio drama)

Sympathy for the Devil

Big Finish Productions audio drama
Series	Doctor Who Unbound
Release number	2
Featuring	David Warner as the Doctor Nicholas Courtney as the Brigadier
Writer	Jonathan Clements
Director	Gary Russell
Producer	Jason Haigh-Ellery John Ainsworth
Executive producer	Jacqueline Rayner
Production code	DWUN2
Length	1 hr 14 mins
Release date	June 2003

Sympathy for the Devil is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. The Doctor Who Unbound dramas pose a series of "What if...?" questions.

Plot

What if... the Doctor had not been UNIT's scientific advisor?

The Doctor arrives on Earth for his exile, not in the 1970s but in 1997, on the eve of Hong Kong's handover to the Chinese government. He finds a world that has faced some three decades of alien invasions and other incidents without him to help, and old friends and enemies bitterly transformed.

It is revealed that under the alias Ke Le, The Master defected to China and used a machine with alien parasites (as in The Mind of Evil) to brainwash political prisoners into the zombie-like Ke Le Division soldiers.

Cast

The Doctor — David Warner
The Brigadier — Nicholas Courtney
Colonel Brimmicombe-Wood — David Tennant
Ke Le — Sam Kisgart (an anagram of "Mark Gatiss", designed to conceal that actor's presence in the story before its release)
Ling — Liz Sutherland
The Abbot — Trevor Littledale
Marcus — Mark Wright
Captain Zerdin — Peter Griffiths
Adam — Stuart Piper

Other parts played by members of the cast.

Continuity

Tennant's character Colonel Brimmicombe-Wood reappears in UNIT: The Wasting.
Without the Doctor being UNIT's scientific advisor, several stories in this alternative universe had different outcomes, mentioned in passing in dialogue. The Auton invasions of Spearhead from Space and Terror of the Autons were dealt with by the "plastic purges", which caused a shortage; Captain Mike Yates took a UNIT team back into the past with several nuclear warheads to prevent the Silurians from awakening, and half of present-day London suddenly became a crater; the "Probe 7 fiasco" lead to a line of radioactive craters across America; lives were lost whenever UNIT provided security at a peace conference (Day of the Daleks, The Mind of Evil); and Stahlman's Gas is considered a hot investment tip.
A sequel to this audio, named Masters of War, was released in December 2008. It featured David Warner's Doctor, the Brigadier, Davros and the Daleks.
In 2005, David Tennant became the tenth actor to play the Doctor on television.
David Tennant would be reunited with David Warner for the Tenth Doctor animated story Dreamland.
This is the first audio drama to feature a Time Lord regenerating.

External links

Big Finish Productions - Sympathy for the Devil

Reviews

Sympathy for the Devil reviews at Outpost Gallifrey
Sympathy for the Devil reviews at The Doctor Who Ratings Guide

UNIT audio plays

UNIT	The Coup Time Heals Snake Head The Longest Night The Wasting

Doctor Who	The Paradise of Death The Ghosts of N-Space The Spectre of Lanyon Moor The Fires of Vulcan Death Comes to Time The Blue Tooth Old Soldiers The Doll of Death The Magician's Oath Shadow of the Past Find and Replace A Death in the Family Animal Tales from the Vault The Many Deaths of Jo Grant Serpent Crest The Valley of Death Binary Trail of the White Worm / The Oseidon Adventure The Rings of Ikiria UNIT Dominion

Torchwood	Lost Souls Submission

Unbound	Sympathy for the Devil

Doctor Who: The Master television stories

Roger Delgado	Terror of the Autons The Mind of Evil The Claws of Axos Colony in Space The Dæmons The Sea Devils The Time Monster Frontier in Space

Peter Pratt	The Deadly Assassin

Geoffrey Beevers	The Keeper of Traken

Anthony Ainley	Logopolis Castrovalva Time-Flight The King's Demons The Five Doctors Planet of Fire The Mark of the Rani The Ultimate Foe Survival

Eric Roberts	Doctor Who

Derek Jacobi	"Utopia"

John Simm	"The Sound of Drums" / "Last of the Time Lords" The End of Time

Michelle Gomez	"Dark Water" / "Death in Heaven" "The Magician's Apprentice" / "The Witch's Familiar"

Minor appearances	The Caves of Androzani "Deep Breath" "Into the Dalek" "The Caretaker" "Flatline" "In the Forest of the Night"

See also	Doctor Who: The Curse of Fatal Death Scream of the Shalka Mister Saxon The Nethersphere

Doctor Who Unbound audio dramas

Bayldon's First Doctor	Auld Mortality A Storm of Angels

Jacobi's First Doctor	Deadline

Warner's Third Doctor	Sympathy for the Devil Masters of War

Weir's Third Doctor	Exile

Jayston's Valeyard	He Jests at Scars...

Collings' Doctor	Full Fathom Five

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