Before continuing, please be aware that all of this content is made possible by the goodwill and support of my backers on Patreon. If you enjoy the work on this site, please consider supporting the creation of more content like this by clicking the button.
The Death Collectors & Spider’s Shadow drops you into two very different tiny nightmares, both starring Sylvester McCoy being quietly baffled while the universe mutters awful things behind his back. First up is The Death Collectors, a proper three-parter that smells faintly of rot and brilliant ideas. The Doctor arrives at a spaceport above Antikon where scientists are poking at a disease called Decay and a crew of grotesque scavengers called the Dar Traders treat corpses like antique china. It turns out the rot is not just illness but a sentient alien wanting to say hello via decomposition. Yum.
Right away the audio design grips you by the throat. The labs hiss, alarms whine, someone somewhere always says the word death in a voice that crawls down your spine. Katherine Parkinson as Danika Meanwhile gives the human anchor you need she is terrified and furious and real and you care about her in a way that makes the creeping horror matter. The concept is deliciously nasty. The idea that language and contact could be mediated through rot is properly chilling. The script toys with Big Ideas. The first two episodes genuinely made me lean forward and mutter “oh please do not let this go badly.”
Then the third act arrives like a tired magician who has to get to the next gig. The neat, gnarly logic of the Dar Traders and the decay gets binned off in favour of plot mechanics that feel hurried. Resolutions happen off screen. The Doctor’s clever move is gestured at rather than played out dramatically. All that earned dread deflates into tidy wrapping paper. It is irritating because everything else had been so carefully set. You can hear the ambition trying to run faster than the scripting allows, and it trips.
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 rotten space oranges you keep meaning to throw away but then forget until the kitchen smells weird.
Spider’s Shadow is the one-parter sibling, a quick time loop on a planet that hates itself and is being eaten by spider armies. Two princess sisters, identical moping, time caught in a loop, McCoy trying to untie the knot. It is pulpy and perfectly adequate. The spiders are cliché. The princesses have the depth of a stage prop. But McCoy gets to be nimble and the loop structure is fiddly enough to be fun. It never scares you. It never haunts you. It does what it promises and then asks you to move on.
What both stories share is strong atmosphere and occasional teeth followed by an inability to fully chew through the philosophical meat. The Death Collectors wants to be cosmic horror and ends up procedural. Spider’s Shadow wants fairy tale menace and ends up a neat little TV dinner. Still, the soundscapes, McCoy’s sly panic, and Parkinson’s fierce humanity keep the set from slipping into outright disappointment.
Rating: 3 out of 5 dust covered spider webs you keep meaning to vacuum but never do.
Final thoughts:
Great ideas, great sounds, mixed execution. The first story lingers in your head like a bad smell you cannot place. The second is harmless spider yarn.