Yap
Audio Productions, 2012
Back to an audio drama, the first episode of which I reviewed earlier on this year. Matters have now gone from
bad to worse: a group of people are now holed up in a car park in Fife, Scotland, trying to protect themselves in a world
where everything has changed. People have been transformed from human beings into beasts, living in a world devastated
by chemical explosions.
What
was more interesting about this episode was not its post-apocalyptic content but the ways in which individual members of this
fortunate group learned to co-exist with one another. Desperate attempts were made to set national differences aside,
but they kept getting in the way: Dr. Harrison (Julie Hoverson) still found it difficult to cope with her Scottish cohorts.
No real criticism of national identities was actually intended; rather Cudmore and McLean wanted to show just how difficult
it can be for a group of individuals thrown together in adversity to learn how to co-exist.
Aftermath has a strong cast comprised of stalwarts of the
online radio drama community - as well as Hoverson, it boasts Jack Kincaid, Michael Hudson and Neil Colquhoun. Quite
how Cudmore and McLean managed to assemble this cast is anyone's guess; but the experience proved a pleasurable one.
