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Mission to the Unknown Format Reviewed: CD Review Mission to the Unknown is quite unusual and rather unique in the classic series of Doctor Who. Not only is this 'story' really part of the 12 episode epic 'The Daleks' Master Plan', but this prequel appears in the schedule before a fill-in story, 'The Myth Makers'. The other unique feature is that the entire prequel story does not contain the Doctor, TARDIS or any of the companions at the time. We do however have the the Daleks here to provide the continuity within the Doctor Who universe. The story sees Marc Cory investigating a sighting of a Dalek ship on the planet Kemble. His companions fall victim to Varga plants whose poisonous thorns turn the victim into Varga plants, but not before making them murderous. Varga plants are indiginous to Skaro and not found elsewhere, so that means the Daleks are on Kemble. The Daleks are meanwhile holding a conference of their allies, who are plotting to invade and take over our galaxy. Their instruments notice that there are intruders on the planet, and the Daleks track down Cory who has just recorded a warning to send off to Earth and kill him. The warning beacon is left by the dead body of Cory. As a teaser for the epic Daleks' Master Plan, Mission to the Unknown does a very good job. It builds up the story so that wthe viewer must have been so keen to discover what the Daleks were up to that the intervening story would have been more of a distraction really. As a stand alone story, it can't really be considered to be that good as all it really does is set up story lines and pose questions. As there are none of the regular cast appearing here, I will dive straight into the guest cast. The main protaganists are the Daleks, Edward de Souza as Marc Cory and Robert Cartland as Malpha. The Daleks are operated and voiced by a predictable group including John Scott Martin, David Graham and Peter Hawkins. The voices, surprisingly, don't seem to be that heavily modulated so don't really come off as well as they could. You can still tell they're Daleks though, so not a massive problem. de Souza does well as Cory though, but the real star is Cartland as Malpha. As this episode does not exist on videotape anymore, we have to reluctantly consider this as an audio adventure. There is much of this story that can be worked out in audio, but unfortunately episodes of this nature really do come up a bit short without the visuals. To truly live up to their reputation, you often need to see the expressionless features of the Daleks, and this episode is definitely one where that is the case. Overall, Mission to the Unknown is quite unique as it is a prequel to another story, but there is yet another story inbetween the prequel and main story of The Daleks' Master Plan. Taken on its own, Mission to the Unknown is not really a goog episode to listen to. Without the visuals, Mission to the Unknown lacks some of the sinister elements the Daleks give to a story. Taken however as purely the prequel to The Daleks' Master Plan it does a good job of introducing the epic storylines. Rating:  |