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Review: Voyage (Radio Series)

I thoroughly enjoyed his adaptation of William Gibson's Alien 3 script, even if the script itself was a bit ropey towards the end.

I was surprised that was possible with concepts like Space Commies and shopping mall space station.

At times was more reminiscent of Prometheus or Covenant which was... worrying.
 
I was surprised that was possible with concepts like Space Commies and shopping mall space station.

At times was more reminiscent of Prometheus or Covenant which was... worrying.

Maggs is, honestly, some kind of genius when it comes to these things. As @M_Kresal notes in the review of Voyager, he can do things to make it sound like you're actually in the same place as the cast. If you listen to the Alien 3 audio drama and close your eyes, there are times when the audio cues and effects sound like a real film
 
The growth of audible and podcasts does make me wonder whether we might be about to see a big revival in these sort of radio plays.

Although I kind of think we'd have seen it happen already this year as you'd have thought this would be the sort of thing you could socially distance a lot more.
 
The growth of audible and podcasts does make me wonder whether we might be about to see a big revival in these sort of radio plays.

Although I kind of think we'd have seen it happen already this year as you'd have thought this would be the sort of thing you could socially distance a lot more.

I think we've already sort of seen it, for a given definition of revival in today's atomised culture. In addition to the Gibson Alien 3 script adaptation mentioned by @Skinny87 there have been a few Alien spin-off audio plays on Audible - indeed were the only reason I ever considered getting Audible until I found out some things about them that put me off. Marvel have had a scritped podcast of Wolverine on the go since 2018 and of course the Big Finish Doctor Who series has been running for over twenty years by this point.

For original works you have stuff like Welcome to Night Vale and its related podcasts Alice Isn't Dead and Within the Wires - the original is done in the format of a radio show, Alice Isn't Dead is presented as a series of audio diaries and the latter is similarly an audio equivalent of epistolary books or found footage movies but mixes up the format a bit more. There's also The Truth from different makers which is an anthology.

Of course platforms like Spotify means its much easier to get a hold of older stuff too; there's one I follow called OTR Podcasts that does episodes of classic horror/thriller anthologies like Suspense, Escape and Inner Sanctum. I've also found a few albums of episodes of X Minus One on Spotify too.

So I think in that respect by virtue of a good scene of independent makers, large companies making content available for recognisable franchises, and archive stuff readily available. However, because of the atomisation of culture it might not be so big a revival in the sense everyone is talking about it. It's also much more of a thing in the US than the UK but the UK radio scene is abysmal in most respects so no surprises there.
 
I have, admittedly, just remembered that there's a Radio 3 Drama starring Peter Capaldi as Beethoven where, I think, it appears the conceit is a 21st century deaf woman somehow contacting him?

Also, Night Vale is one of those things I keep on meaning to actually catch up on- I've listened to the first few episodes a few times and loved it but I can't do my usual 'mixed focus' with it.
 
Maggs is, honestly, some kind of genius when it comes to these things. As @M_Kresal notes in the review of Voyager, he can do things to make it sound like you're actually in the same place as the cast. If you listen to the Alien 3 audio drama and close your eyes, there are times when the audio cues and effects sound like a real film

His Independence Day UK tie-in from 1996 is on YouTube and really impressive for budget. The planes go woooooooosh
 
Dirk Maggs keeps coming up in talk of radio scifi and adaptations

As he should, given he's been involved with some major stuff. Superman and Batman for BBC radio in the 1990s, and now Alien, X-Files, and The Sandman for Audible. Plus directing a lot of original stuff for BBC radio, including a 2013 drama on the creation of the UK's infamous Iraq Dossier that starred Richard E Grant. The man has range!

The growth of audible and podcasts does make me wonder whether we might be about to see a big revival in these sort of radio plays.

Although I kind of think we'd have seen it happen already this year as you'd have thought this would be the sort of thing you could socially distance a lot more.

I'd argue, as an audio drama listener, that there's been a big revival already, especially with the rise of podcasting. And, of course, there's been companies since the nineties producing stuff in the UK that went straight to CD or eventually download like Big Finish with their Doctor Who stuff as @RyanF mentioned. Indeed, Big Finish and being a Doctor Who is what got me into audio drama in a major way, having been a fan of OTR stuff when I was younger. But there's shows like the aforementioned Night Vale and the now finished ars Paradoxica that show that there have been some sizable revivals of the medium, but they haven't been big commercial ones. Largely, based on experience with some folks I know trying with various NPR stations, due to their not being a perceived American audience big enough to justify it. So the revolution has been streamed and downloaded, rather than broadcast.

Also, Big Finish in particular have made a big deal about recording productions during lockdown. They've released at least a couple of productions now (including the Fourth Doctor audio Shadow of the Sun) that was entirely recorded, edited, and given post-production work during the big spring lockdown. The guy who wrote that, Rob Valentine, is a buddy of mine and he was shocked/pleased by it as it hadn't been set for release until 2024 (they record sometimes years in advance) and luck had it that his was the next one to be recorded. So it got to serve as the proof of concept, to great success. I also know BBC Radio 4 recorded an adaptation of Camus' The Plague entirely during lockdown that was broadcast a few weeks back.

His Independence Day UK tie-in from 1996 is on YouTube and really impressive for budget. The planes go woooooooosh

Ah, ID4 UK! Maggs talks about in the extras for the Audible release of Voyage that it was the experience of doing that which made him want to do Voyage. Take what they'd learned from doing that, and applying it toward a more "serious drama setting," as I think Maggs put it. Of course, to be entirely self-promotional, I wrote about that a few years ago with the ID4 sequel was released!
 
Of course platforms like Spotify means its much easier to get a hold of older stuff too; there's one I follow called OTR Podcasts that does episodes of classic horror/thriller anthologies like Suspense, Escape and Inner Sanctum. I've also found a few albums of episodes of X Minus One on Spotify too.

Thank you, RyanF, for this excellent tip. I'm actually using Apple Music at the moment but I checked and hey presto, there's an album on there with 50 episodes. Wonderful stuff.

ETA: And I can order 'em up individually via my Echo! This is a great day. I think I might even have a couple of beers.
 
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