So here is our penultimate diversion for the black and white era! I have to say, after listening to both, I think I made some pretty good choices, but I'll not spoil my review of the second just yet.
I thought that this was a very strong story. The only flaw of it, really, is that it's very short. The Companion Chronicles range is restricted to about 50 minutes normally, so this one has to do a lot of work to pack all of its chronological intricacies into two parts. Accordingly, it is a little dense, but certainly still a worthy story.
The Jigsaw War is basically a character piece for Jamie, who really gets put through the ringer here at the hands of the Side. What gets presented to us at first like another "companion gets captured by suspicious human colonists" plot gets smartly subverted by the end of the audio, where we learn that we were instead witnessing the Side trying to manipulate Jamie by showing him pieces of potential futures out of context. It turns out that Side is one of the "gods" worshipped by the natives, who has been using humanity to "cull the herd" of his own followers to keep them from getting smart ideas about overthrowing him. It's a ghastly plot, and we're glad to see Jamie sort it out at the end.
I notice a strong parallel in this story to The Evil of the Daleks, in two specific ways, both relating to our leading man here. As in that story, Jamie is compelled to complete a series of "trials" or puzzles, and crucially, his relationship with the Doctor is tested. This audio story bookends that televised one pretty well, in my opinion. The Evil of the Daleks is rather early in Troughton's run, and despite the fact that Jamie had been around for a few stories, it was really the first point where he actually becomes the Doctor's companion. He doubts the Doctor and calls him out in that serial more than once, because their relationship is still new. But in this audio, positioned toward the very end of this Doctor's life, we see that even when presented with (false) evidence to the contrary, Jamie trusts the Doctor completely. The love and friendship shown between the two of them in this story is just wonderful.
As another interesting note, even though Side is a slimy bastard who is raising the possibility for his own ends, he does bring forth the interesting question of whether the Doctor always picks the right side when he lands in a new location. I had to think about it for a little while, as I don't think it's really happened up to this point in the series. There was plenty of moral ambiguity where it comes to "sides" in a local conflict back in the Hartnell days, but then, the Doctor didn't really choose a "side" in those instances; more often than not it was a matter of survival for the TARDIS crew, who would simply try to escape. The Troughton era has had a much more stark morality to it (black and white, if you will) and while there are obvious exceptions, it's startling how much things have shifted to place the Doctor in the "hero" role. I'll be interested to keep a closer eye on this question from now on.
For assorted other bits and pieces of commentary: I thought Moran was a nice side character for our lead to play off of, and his repartee with Jamie was tremendous. My favorite moment was the one where he asks Jamie how he and the Doctor 'work', and Jamie's riposte is "However we like!" Also, I was tickled by Moran correctly guessing that the Doctor stole the TARDIS, though neither he nor Jamie knows as much.
This is a very strong audio, for certain. I'd happily recommend it for anyone looking for more Frazer Hines, or Moffat-y time travel plots (with less snogging).
Daughter of the Gods is next.
(Modified from the original posted at Gallifrey Base on 18 March 2021.)
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