Yes, someone needs to review it, but before that the package tests need to be fixed so they a) run and b) pass, reliably and repeatably. After that, either get the package maintainers to discuss the new version, or find someone to take over the package if they no longer want to or can maintain it. Doing an NMU for a package to upgrade it to new upstream release should be done very carefully, and it should avoid to override the maintainers unless it's critical.
I couldn't send a email to peter@p12n.org - his mail server says "552 Rejected due to spam content (#5.7.1)".
Are there any other ways of communicating to him?