Doctor Who: The Infinite Quest (2007)

In preparation for this morning's 10 o'clock screening of the complete Dreamland on BBC2, I revisited the BBC's previous animated Doctor Who adventure: The Infinite Quest.

Having thwarted an attempt by the intergalactic despot Baltazar (voiced by Anthony Head) to conquer Earth, The Tenth Doctor (David Tennant) and Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman) are tricked - assisted by their own passion for excitement - into going on a quest to find the three missing data chips that, with the one they've already found, will lead to a legendary lost spaceship called The Infinite.

Finding The Infinite is said to grant you your heart's desire.

As much as I like comic books, and having a passing penchant for Japanese anime, I don't find cartoons - including Doctor Who ones - as engaging as live-action, but writer Alan Barnes still managed to set tiny little geekgasms tingling down my spine when he gave The Doctor a speech about The Infinite's history which talked about it being an object that "predated our reality" and came from the Dark Times when "creatures like the Racnoss, the Nestene and the Great Vampires rampaged through the void".

Their episodic quest - a far more convincing execution of the trope than the shambolic Keys Of Marinus - takes them to three 40th Century planets: a desert planet populated by walking oil rigs and pirates in sub-sand craft; a jungle planet where a reptilian arms trader is helping insectoids defend themselves from human "invaders"; and finally to the ice prison planet of Volag-Noc - where The Doctor is immediately arrested for more than 3,000 crimes (including 18 counts of planetary destruction) and sentenced to two billion years in prison!

On each of the planets our dynamic duo run across a shady character who has come into possession of one of the fragments of the Infinite's flight recorder and whose path had crossed Baltazar's on Volag-Noc.

With The Doctor seemingly stranded on Volag-Noc, Baltazar kidnaps Martha and The TARDIS and heads off to find The Infinite... and gain his heart's desire (which happens to be mountains and mountains of money).

Because The Infinite Quest is first and foremost a children's cartoon (it was first shown on the BBC's Totally Doctor Who in 12-parts), it's full of fast edits and simplistic resolutions, but that doesn't mean the script is patronising.

For instance, throughout the quest, The Doctor is as concerned about the well-being of those trying to do him harm as he is about those he is defending.

The backstory for The Infinite, elaborated on towards the end by The Doctor, is actually quite Lovecraftian with its talk of "a Great Old One" and the ship's special ability being an echo of its power.

I'd certainly like to know more about that...