Audiobook - Dark Shadows: The Creeping Fog

Dark Shadows The Creeping Fog

It all becomes a bit foggy for Susan Omand as she reviews the next Dark Shadow story, The Creeping Fog...

Carrying on from the previous story, London’s Burning, this tale starts with Quentin Collins in a pub on the Embankment in London in 1941, grieving the loss of Rosie, when a man bumps into him and spills his drink. Irritated, Quentin pays for the drink and leaves the bar, only to be followed by the man, who returns his forgotten wallet, left on the bar, and starts talking about the fog, and how Quentin should be scared of it, before leaving. Walking home, Quentin starts to get paranoid as he feels someone following again and this time he is attacked.

Coming to, he finds himself in a museum, along with the mystery man, John Cunningham, who says Quentin had a fall. Quentin starts to get his bearings in the dark and looks at the cabinets in the museum. He finds a prehistoric carved piece of bone, part of a skull, and feels that he has seen it before. John explains that the markings are probably part of a religious ceremony but they don’t know the true nature of the piece.

Quentin and John discuss the fog, Quentin’s accident and his presence in London, with John convinced that he is some kind of spy or agent sent by the Americans to help fight the war. Quentin insists that he is neutral and just happens to be passing through but John argues that it is not possible to be neutral. After the argument, Quentin makes to leave and John starts to lock up but Quentin starts to hear something yet again, voices in the fog, drawing him out until he is injured by it, his hand being aged so dramatically it looks like he is burned. They retreat back to the safety of the museum and are trapped where they start to discuss what the fog is. John suggests it might be ghosts or something else other-worldly and they start to discuss rituals and if there’s anything in the museum that will fight it?

Why was Quentin attacked? Is John right that there is something supernatural? And is there anything that will stop the advancement of the creeping fog?

Rather than being horrific, this was a spooky two-hander, with a tense, claustrophobic feel as John and Quentin are trapped in the museum and it plays a lot on the psychology of the mind playing tricks as they are waiting for something to happen. The writing by Simon Guerrier is very clever, building the idea of an amorphous enemy that is not purely ghost-like, and the discussions between John and Quentin did not seem forced or unnaturally clunky while still managing to explain the entity and the twists, when they come, are wonderful. David Selby again is strong as Quentin Collins and is equally matched in this episode by Matthew Waterhouse as John Cunningham.

A very entertaining, and suitably spooky story as stealthy as the fog itself.

Image - Big Finish.

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