Torchwood: Save Our Souls

I have not really been a fan of these Victorian-era releases, but I have to say that this one is better than the others I have listened to so far. Admittedly, it has a similar flaw in that it's hard to see Queen Victoria travelling to a remote location with only a single bodyguard and no other retinue - even if her motive for coming at all is plausible this time around. But, if you can ignore that, it's a good story.

The set-up is that the Queen is visiting Flat Holm, the Welsh island from which the world's first over-sea radio transmissions were made in 1897. There are some minor differences from real history to accommodate the plot, but the radio experiments were real, and form the basis of the story here when they begin to pick up an apparently alien signal. With the Queen and four other people trapped on the island overnight, each tries to deal differently with the signal's message of apparent doom.

Those who like neat resolutions and answers are going to be disappointed, with much of the story shrouded in mystery. (For what it's worth, I found the Torchwood agent's explanation for events the most plausible, and there's little to contradict it... but nothing much to confirm it, either). It's clear from early on how things are going to unfold, if not necessarily how they'll conclude, but the story manages keep up the suspense as to how we're going to get there. The portrayal of Victoria is stronger than in the previous releases, making her more imperious but still sympathetic. With relatively little action, this is instead a psychological horror story exploring differing attitudes to the building sense of paranoia among the characters.