Posted in: Audio Dramas, BBC, Doctor Who, TV | Tagged: big finish, doctor who

Doctor Who: The Ninth Doctor Met the Sea Devils in Old-School Story

For The War Between the Land and the Sea premiere week, we look back at the Big Finish audio where the Ninth Doctor met the Sea Devils.

December 2025 is Sea Devils Month, which is more Doctor Who than you might get as the BBC pushes The War Between The Land and The Sea. The BBC, under Russell T Davies, is offering up the original story "The Sea Devils" as this year's re-edited and remastered feature-length episode, cut from six half-hours down to 90 minutes with an updated soundtrack and some effects to bring it in line with the spin-off series. Doctor Who Magazine and Big Finish got in on the act by offering readers a free audio drama episode, "The Season of Titan," where the 9th Doctor (Christopher Eccleston) met the Sea Devils. The first hit of the Sea Devils, as they say, is free.

"The Seas of Titan" is an episode from 2022, Eccleston's second season of his return to the role of the Doctor in audio form. It takes place before The Ninth Doctor met Rose, finding things to keep himself busy after the Time War. Many fans may have purchased it already when it was first released, but many more may not be aware that audio dramas featuring the modern Doctors exist. It was released in the same year as the Thirteenth Doctor special "Legend of the Sea Devils" was released. The interesting thing is they're not called the Sea Devils in this audio drama. You only know it's them from the cover art. It's a curiously old-school Doctor Who story, closer to the types of stories you get on TV in the 1970s than the modern era.

A Typical Doctor Who Story, and a Typical Sea Devils Story

It's the future, and the Doctor pops in on a human colony on Saturn's moon Titan that's in trouble. He joins a scientist on her submarine as she explores the oceans of Titan and discovers an entire world of Sea Devils who settled the seas of the moon millions of years ago after they left Earth. The human colony is dying from a mysterious disease while getting no support from Earth, even as they're poisoning the alien civilisation under the sea by mining the ocean. The same old story ensues, as both humans and aqua start threatening war, with mutually assured destruction on the cards, unless the Doctor can talk sense into everyone. Eccleston's Doctor makes more speeches here than he ever did in the TV series. In fact, he makes the types of moral speeches that The Doctor always made in the 1970s.

In that sense, it feels like a placeholder script for Any Doctor. The whole point is this became pretty much an archetypal Sea Devils story as established by their original creator, Malcolm Hulke. That archetypal story goes like this: humans pollute the sea, Sea Devils threaten war. The Doctor stops it. It doesn't work when the Sea Devils don't have a point. This is the same plot as The War Between the Land and the Sea, except it's about what happens when The Doctor isn't around to save everyone. "The Seas of TItan" has a happy ending where nobody dies and everyone's favourite Time Lord goes about his merry way. In fact, the Doctor has been benignly manipulating both sides towards peace in ways we never saw him, the Ninth Doctor, do in the one season of his TV series. Placeholder Doctor in a generic Doctor Who script that hits all the cozy notes, only it's fun to hear Eccleston play it. In many ways, it's a typical Big Finish episode: a cozy, typical episode that doesn't rock the boat. And knowing Russell T Davies, it's pretty likely The War Between The Land and The Sea is not going to be so cozy.

Doctor Who: The Seas of Titan is available from Big Finish. You should buy a copy of the latest Doctor Who Magazine to get the free download code. The War Between the Land and the Sea will be on BBC One and iPlayer in the UK only. Disney+ has not yet announced a premiere date.

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