Welcome to Phantom
Who, a new feature designed to go along with the Earth Station Who
podcast, which I co-host. There I am known as “Dave” because
“Phantom Troublemaker” takes up too much room on the stationary.
Every other week there will be a new podcast discussing all things
Doctor Who, with a central discussion about a particular story.
For the first year
we are covering regeneration stories. Starting with An Unearthly
Child and wrapping up the current regenerations with The
Eleventh Hour, we’ll be covering the first and last stories of
each of the first eleven Doctors.
The Doctor had
been exiled to Earth by his own people – the Time Lords – after
being forced to regenerate. After agreeing to help UNIT – the
United Nations Intelligence Taskforce – out with an alien invasion
the exiled Time Lord stayed on as their Scientific Advisor.
The Doctor would
go on to save the world many times over with UNIT while always
working to restore the functionality of his TARDIS. He was quite fond
of the Earth and its’ resilient human population, but chafed at
being stranded. Eventually he stopped another exiled Time Lord –
this one evil – from conquering or destroying the universe and won
the Time Lords’ favor. They allowed him to repair his TARDIS and
move about time and space once again.
The Doctor had
been talking about visiting a planet called Metebelis 3 throughout
his exile. Once the TARDIS was repaired he made this his first trip
and took a souvenir in the form of a native Blue Crystal.
Unfortunately this Blue Crystal was fairly important to the giant
spiders that ruled Metebelis 3 and Doctor Three’s final adventure
revolved around returning it to the planet. He received what would
have been a lethal dose of radiation to any other humanoid life form
and barely made it back to Earth.
Once there –
back in UNIT headquarters – he collapsed and once again took on a
new form with the help of yet another renegade Time Lord (they’re
all over the place). Intrepid reporter Sarah Jane Smith and UNIT
commander Brigadier Alistair Lethbridge Stuart witnessed firsthand as
the Doctor’s familiar aristocratic face and silver hair transformed
into a younger countenance that was once described as “all teeth
and curls”…
Robot opens
exactly where Planet of the Spiders left off.
The Doctor is
laying on the floor of his UNIT laboratory with the Brigadier and
Sarah Jane looking on. They watch as he pops up a couple of times and
spouts lines from old adventures, then the Brigadier summons UNIT’s
medical officer to the scene. We are introduced to Lieutenant Harry
Sullivan, a man who is as straightforward as the day is long. He
takes the Doctor under his care and the scene changes to another
locale.
It is night at the
Ministry of Defense and a mysterious intruder is breaking into the
facility. We get the ol’ Villain-Vision point-of-view that lets us
know that this being is not only tall but also has large, menacing
pincers for hands. In the process of the break-in a guard is murdered
and some presumably important paperwork is stolen. Also, a dog is
scared off but not killed. I don’t know if that’s really
significant or not, but it was certainly important to Lil’
Troublemaker, who was watching Robot with me.
The break-in at the
Ministry of Defense received a not inconsiderable amount of
attention. Back in the UNIT laboratory the Brigadier is telling Sarah
Jane all about it – perhaps more than he intended, as he’s used
to her presence and help with world-threatening situations by now. He
discloses a fact not released to the public – that the stolen
paperwork was actually design schematics for a new Disintegrator Gun
that the Brits are working on. Sarah Jane points out the Brigadier’s
seeming lapse of security and sensing a good moment for another
indulgence asks if he can arrange for her to visit the National
Institute for Advanced Scientific Research. The NIASR is a collection
of the very best scientists – a sort of Think Tank – that isn’t
exactly the most public of institutions. Obviously there’s a good
story to be had there. Sarah Jane may be helpful when the world
needs saving, but she’s still a reporter and has to earn a living.
The Brigadier tells
her it won’t be a problem at all and the two leave for his office
to arrange the visit.
As they make their
way down the hall, the pair just miss a certain Time Lord sneaking
back to the laboratory. Clad only in a dressing gown and a familiar
velvet jacket, the Doctor is carrying his shoes and doing his best to
not be seen. It seems he is quite eager to be on his way. He sneaks
into the laboratory and fishes a key out of his shoe. This is a nice
callback to Spearhead From Space, where it was revealed the
Doctor keeps the TARDIS key in his shoe and much ado was made over
the recovery of said shoes.
But just as the
Doctor is about to bail on Earth, UNIT, and everything; Harry
Sullivan pops into the laboratory and asks just what the heck is
going on. He tells the Doctor he is not fit to be out of bed and the
Time Lord contradicts him by performing a quick set of calisthenics
and a check that both hearts are operating normally. Harry is
unconvinced, so the Doctor grabs some nearby cable and starts
skipping rope. Just to prove his point he gets right up in Sullivan’s
face, forcing the UNIT medical officer to skip as well. As the Doctor
intones a somewhat grim rhyme to accompany them, we cut to the
Brigadier and Sarah Jane rushing down the halls looking for the
Doctor.
The Brigadier
assets that there is only one place the absent Time Lord could be as
they enter the empty lab. Confounded, they hear a clatter coming from
a supply cabinet. Sullivan is upside down inside, with his feet bound
to a hook near the top. Just as he starts to explain what happened,
the TARDIS starts to wheeze from its spot in the corner. Sarah Jane
panics and rushes over to bang on the door. The wheezing stops and
the Doctor leans out, an innocent and questioning look on his face.
A, “Hello there, can I help you? I was just about to fly away in my
police box,” kind of look. Sarah Jane explains that UNIT once again
needs his help and the still discombobulated Doctor finally
recognizes her and the Brigadier, whom he addresses as “Brigadier
Alistair Gordon Lethbridge Stuart.”
The Doctor agrees
to stick around and lend a hand, but needs to put on something a
little more practical than his current ensemble. He disappears back
into the TARDIS and reappears moments later in a full-on Viking gear
– complete with a horned circlet, sword, and shield. The sword
struck me as a bit odd given the Doctor’s pacifistic tendencies,
but maybe this incarnation was going to be even more hardcore than
his Venusian Aikido-utilizing predecessor (just kidding – we all
know better). The Brig points out that they might want to keep a low
profile and that a Viking stomping around town would probably call
some attention. The Doctor agrees and steps back into the TARDIS,
emerging moments later in a costume that appears to be based on the
royalty from a deck of cards. It’s even more garish than the
previous getup. Sensing the disapproval of his friends, the Time Lord
changes again, this time returning in a (opera clown) costume,
complete with face paint. Obviously this one’s no good either and
the Doctor pantomimes an exaggerated sad face as he turns and opens
the TARDIS door.
And then returns
one final time with a huge grin on his face and a now-familiar scarf
around his neck.
Elsewhere, the
mysterious intruder is at it again. There’s another
Villain’s-Eye-View as some sort of mechanical components are
stolen. UNIT arrives on the scene soon after. The Brigadier and his
men examine the area and come to the conclusion that it must have
been a small squad of specialized enemy troops. The Doctor,
meanwhile, is very interested in the local flora; much to the
Brigadier’s irritation. Specifically, the Doctor is examining a
crushed yellow flower. Pulverized, in fact. He surmises that whatever
did the damage must have been quite large and heavy and was probably
not several stealthy soldiers. The Time Lord then blows the flower
remnants at the Brigadier and states that somebody must be stealing
parts to make a Disintegrator Gun and tells the Brigadier UNIT had
darn well better make sure the last piece was well guarded.
While all that is
going on, Sarah Jane Smith is paying her visit to the National
Institute for Advanced Scientific Research. The two administrators
going to greet her do not seem at all pleased. A severe-looking woman
named Winters and a guy named Jellicoe that you wouldn’t trust to
watch a taco for you are en route to meet Ms. Smith and talking about
her lousy timing. They proceed to give her a tour of the facility.
When the trio come across a restricted area Sarah Jane just sort of
walks on in.
Side
Note: I find Sarah Jane Smith just as adorable as everybody else
does, but this struck me as being super rude. She’s not even trying
to be discrete – she just walks right into this area that clearly
says “No Admittance”. And it’s not like this place is
suspicious yet. Well, not in the story, anyway. We as viewers know
that Winters and Jellicoe are creeps and are totally up to something,
but Sarah Jane has no reason to think this. She’s totally abusing
the hospitality of people who – in theory – are working for the
betterment of humanity. Jerk move, Smith.
Obviously Sarah
Jane stumbled across a dark, sinister secret that linked the NIASR to
the series of high-level break-ins, right? Nope. She found a big,
empty room. Jellicoe and Winters are all huffy about their guest’s
bad form (and rightfully so) and inform her that this was once the
laboratory of Professor Kettlewell; who is known for having a name
that was almost as ridiculous as his hair. He worked in robotics at
NIASR until he left to pursue alternative energy sources. Sarah Jane
continues to be all snoopy until she almost slips, trips, and falls
in a puddle of mysterious fluid. Jellicoe and Winters sternly
recommend that they continue the tour.
While Sarah Jane is
busy being an unapologetic snoop, UNIT is setting up security around
the final component needed to build the Disintegrator Gun. Up until
this point Robot has been total Scooby Doo – lots of strange
goings-on, snooping around, and mysterious crimes. But now things get
all GI Joe, as a seemingly powerful military force uses the absolute
dumbest and most short-sighted methods possible to protect the final
element of a fantastic device of mass destruction. The Disintegration
Gun might as well be the Weather Dominator.
So UNIT sets up a
perimeter around an underground bunker where they have secured the
component in a metal box inside some impenetrable steel bars. There
is exactly one dude left inside the bunker guarding the component.
The Doctor shows up and is all like, “Hey guys, somebody could
probably drill up through the bottom of your little bunker there,
huh?” And sure enough when they all rush down to check it out
there’s a dead guard, huge hole in the floor, and the component is
gone. Sergeant Benton – who is actually one of the longest-running
tertiary characters on the show – finds a huge, deep footprint in
the ground where the tunnel comes out.
After a visit to
Professor Kettlewell himself yields nothing juicy for Sarah Jane to
write about, she returns to the NIASR facility and claims she left
her notebook. The guard – who is not the sort of doofus usually
left in charge of security in Doctor Who stories – is
suspicious and tells her to wait. And then leaves her at the
entrance. So he’s a different kind of doofus. Naturally Sarah Jane
sneaks back into the facility and finds Kettlewell’s old lab again.
After she enters, a giant robot lumbers out of the shadows
menacingly. Well, obviously it was menacing. It’s a giant
robot. It’s not like it was going to come mincing out of the
shadows asking about a spot of tea. Though I’d like to see that.
Sarah Jane runs to
the door and straight into Winters, who is looking all smug and
snarky. She and Jellicoe seem all pleased with themselves as Winters
explains that they saw Sarah Jane sneaking back in and thought they
would play a little joke on her using the robot, which is called K1.
Winters then orders K1 to kill Sarah Jane, but the robot cannot act
on the orders because it has programming (Asimov’s Laws) that
prevent it from harming humans. For the record, I am totally on board
with this plan. Sarah Jane is being kind of a jerk at this point.
Granted, her suspicions will be borne out; but for now she had it
coming.
So Winters has
proven that their pet robot can’t kill. Sarah Jane tells the NIASR
administrator that she felt her joke was a bit rude and then
apologizes to K1, which was so British it was painful – “Ever so
sorry you were ordered to kill me and not doing so caused you
discomfort!” Our intrepid reporter storms off in a huff and
Jellicoe tells Winters her little show was a terrible idea because
they had only just reprogrammed their giant, killer robot.
Sarah Jane reports
her findings to the Brigadier and company at UNIT. After they all
have a good laugh at her come-uppance, the Brig tells her that they
can’t really do anything about somebody using a giant robot to
scare nosy reporters. But he does agree to send Harry to NIASR
undercover. This doesn’t make a lick of sense, but it did give
Harry – who I like a lot – something to do. The rest of the UNIT
crew – the Brigadier, the Doctor, and Sarah Jane – go to
Professor Kettlewell’s laboratory to get some specifics about the
robot.
Professor
Kettlewell’s laboratory looks more like some kind of store. There’s
a window in front that gives it a very shop-like quality despite the
stereotypical mad scientist chemistry setup inside. He even has a
big, empty stockroom in the back that’s a perfect setting for a
killer robot chasing a Time Lord. But we’ll get to that.
The professor
himself looks like a gnome. I mean, exactly like a gnome. Not
the garden variety, but the tinker variety – like the ones in the
Dragonlance books. He’s got these thick, Coke bottle
glasses, he’s short, and he has crazy hair that stands up all over
his head. Actually, now that I think about it, he totally has
Wolverine hair:
When UNIT first
shows up the Professor has no interest in talking, but then the
Doctor works his “Ah, a fellow scientist!” magic and the guy
opens up. He tells them all about K1 and how it seemed to be getting
just a little too smart and a little too powerful and he ordered it
decommissioned. He says that there’s no way those twits Winters and
Jellicoe could have reprogrammed K1 for murder, and even if they had
it would make the robot all crazy. The Doctor and company exchange
looks because crazy giant robots are exactly what UNIT deals with.
They’re just usually from outer space.
Speaking of crazy
giant robots, K1 has killed again. Winters and Jellicoe sent it after
some Minister of something-or-other and it shows up at Kettlewell’s
laboratory having a full-on existential crisis.
Back at UNIT, it
has been discovered that several members of the NIASR are also
members of the Scientific Reform Society. The SRS are a bunch of
elitist science snobs who think that society should be run by –
guess who? – elitist science snobs. The Brigadier and the Doctor
pay the NIASR facility a visit to inquire about K1and also to get a
feel for the level of science snobbery, but Winters tells them the
robot has been dismantled and incinerated. The Doctor makes it
perfectly clear he doesn’t believe her and she makes it perfectly
clear that she knows he knows she is lying and what’s he going to
do about it, anyway?
Also, Harry shows
up to infiltrate the NIASR. This is not nearly as exciting as you
might think.
Harry – “Hullo,
I’m a doctor. I’m here to join your group.”
NIASR Guard – “Oh
– come right in. Tea’s on in the kitchen.”
When the Doctor
returns to the UNIT laboratory he receives a call from Professor
Kettlewell. The man is clearly upset and tells the Doctor that K1 has
shown up at his lab and is very upset. Not one to be perturbed by the
idea of an upset killer robot, the Doctor leaves a note stuck to the
TARDIS and heads over to Kettlewell’s in Bessie, his car.
Unbeknownst to our
Time Lord, Winters and Jellicoe – who seem to have no lackeys to do
their dirty work – busted into Kettlewell’s lab and acted all
sinister as soon as he got off the phone.
When the Doctor
arrived there was nobody there. Nobody, that is, except K1, who had
been ordered to kill the Time Lord on the grounds that he was an
enemy of humanity! The Doctor evades the robot in the spacious and
empty supply room for a good bit. But when the Doctor throws his hat
over K1’s head to blind it, the robot plays possum and then conks
the him on the head when he gets near.
Back at UNIT, Sarah
Jane has found the Doctor’s note:
“Sarah,
Professor Kettlewell tells me he has
the robot hidden at his house. I've gone to meet him.
P.S. - It is of course possible that
this message is a trap. If it is I can deal with it.
P.P.S. - I am leaving this note in
case I can't.”
Luckily for the
Doctor everybody assumes he can’t and shows up at Kettlewell’s
just in time to stop K1 from pulverizing him like a small, yellow
flower. Sarah Jane tells K1 to stop its murderous ways and that she
is its friend or whatever. The robot gets all confused because it
quite likes the tiny human woman. Just then the rest of UNIT shows up
and – true to form – start basting away. It turns out that K1 is
not only crazy and murderous, but also invincible. It easily escapes
from the situation, leaving behind frustrated UNIT troops and Sarah
Jane, who is tending to the Doctor. They find Kettlewell tied up in a
cabinet – much smaller than the one Harry Sullivan was tied up in –
and he tells them that the sinister NIASR admins did, indeed,
reprogram K1. Well, duh. Kettlewell also explains that K1 is made of
a living metal and would likely be vulnerable to a virus he had been
working on.
Just for the
record, Professor Kettlewell is a robotic engineer who is currently
working on alternative fuel sources and metal-eating viruses. Also,
he is the one who started the Scientific Reform Society, though with
more innocent intentions than the current regime.
Sarah Jane
convinces the man to take her to one of the meetings. Sergeant Benton
– who has showed up to serve tea, as he often does – thinks this
is a terrible idea. But since Kettlewell and Sarah Jane are not
actually members of UNIT he can’t do anything about them leaving.
The Doctor regains
consciousness some time later and has reasoned out that the Minister
of Something-or-Other that K1 killed must have been the Minister of
Something Pretty Darned Important. The Brigadier tells the Doctor
about an international plan that is, quite frankly, the stupidest
thing I have ever heard.
In order to ensure
peace, the Earth’s superpowers all wrote down the locations and
launch codes for their nuclear weapons. Then they stuffed them all
into a little envelope and gave them to Britain to keep an eye on.
Nobody else would have been trustworthy enough because, as the Doctor
slyly points out, they’re all foreigners. The Brigadier simply
affirms this, not catching onto the Doctor’s sarcasm. The idea here
is that if things got hot Great Britain would release the codes and
it would force things to settle down.
The Doctor points
out that the NIASR now has these codes and that could be a real
problem for anybody living on Earth. Sergeant Benton shows up with
some more tea and tells the Doctor and the Brigadier where Sarah Jane
and Kettlewell went and the Time Lord is suddenly very nervous.
As he should be,
because it turns out Kettlewell isn’t just a member of the
Scientific Reform Society, he’s also the president. After Winters
does an incredibly Hitler-esque rant up on stage about how smart they
all are and how regular people are too stupid to live without the
direction of awesome science nerds, Kettlewell gets up on stage and
talks about his great robot. It’s about that time the great robot
detects Sarah Jane’s presence. Kettlewell had her hide behind some
boxes when they arrived and the crazy killer robot is now stomping
over to expose the intruder.
Side
Note: Bad guys should not leave stacks of boxes around the places
where they have their evil secret meetings. The Doctor and his
friends always
hide behind stacks of boxes.
Outside in the
reception area of the SRS offices the Doctor has arrived and is
trying to convince a guard to let him in. The guard is no having it
and gets up to usher the Doctor out the door. However, the man has
unknowingly stepped on the Doctor’s new scarf and once the Time
Lord reaches the door he yanks the scarf out from under the guard,
knocking him to the floor. The Doctor rushes by into the meeting room
just as K1 knocks over the stack of boxes. He rushes the stage and
dances, does card tricks, and just generally draws attention away
from Sarah Jane. The guard from the front rushes in, but the Doctor
leans down to tie his shoes and the man dives straight over him. This
is easily the most impressive stunt seen on Doctor Who up to
this point.
The Doctor
confronts Kettlewell, who admits that he started SRS to bring more
order to the world. He claims that with the stolen documents he can
now force order on the world, but sounds a little unsure of the whole
plan. The Doctor tells him that the end never justifies the means and
then Winters orders K1 to kill him and Sarah Jane.
UNIT shows up in
the nick of time and starts blasting things. K1 barrels out the front
door and is almost done in by some stairs, but Jellicoe is there to
help it down. All of the SRS people use Sarah Jane as cover and
manage to make it to a truck and escape, proving once again that UNIT
soldiers are second only to Stormtroopers in the realm of being
terrible shots.
Meanwhile, Harry is
at the NIASR facility. He calls the Brigadier – who answers on an
absolutely hilarious portable phone – and tells him that all of the
scientists are evacuating to some sort of bunker. Then, in the grand
tradition of British straight men, he gets knocked unconscious.
Somehow or other
UNIT manages to locate the SRS hideout. It’s pretty ingenious, as
it makes sense for an underground bunker but must have cost nothing
for the show to construct. It’s essentially a door frame surrounded
by a fence. There’s a building in the background that may or may
not be a part of the setup. There are also machine guns… somewhere.
As the UNIT troops are preparing to rush the bunker, the Doctor stops
them and pulls out his sonic screwdriver. Aiming it towards the
bunker, he casually sets off several buried mines as the soldiers
look on, amazed.
As UNIT begins its
assault on the bunker, K1 appears with the fully assembled and
operational Disintegrator Gun and blasts a soldier. A tank rolls up
and K1 blasts it, too.
Stuff just got
real, y’all.
Side
Note: The tank is hilarious. It is clearly a toy tank and is
superimposed even more poorly than the rancor in Jedi.
As UNIT focuses its
collective firepower on the murderous robot, the Brigadier pops off
what is probably one of the funniest lines in the history of classic
Doctor Who:
“Just once I'd
like to meet an alien menace that wasn't immune to bullets.”
In the bunker,
Winters has informed the Brigadier – likely via his giant phone –
that they will blow up the world in thirty minutes. Much like the
group in Planet of the Dinosaurs, the SRS wants to reset
things with themselves in charge. Winters has Kettlewell link the
bunker computers up to the international defense computers –
because he is also a computer programmer; a jack-of-all-trades our
Kettlewell is – and sets the countdown in motion. The Professor is
becoming notably less satisfied with things.
He attempts to
disable the countdown, and just as Winters is about to stop him Harry
Sullivan and Sarah Jane Smith show up and take care of business.
Harry gives Jellicoe what-for and the sheer physical threat of the
five-foot-nothing Smith is enough to cow Winters. Professor
Kettlewell stops the countdown and escapes up the stairs with Smith
and Sullivan.
Unfortunately, K1
is at the entrance to the bunker. It turns, sees the escaping trio,
and threatens them with the Disintegrator Gun. Kettlewell attempts to
talk his creation down, but the robot – who is growing more
agitated by the minute – blasts him. It’s actually quite a sad
moment as the monster destroys its creator. K1 is so stricken that it
falls over onto Sarah Jane, who realizes that wasn’t supposed to
happen and does her best to act like a four-ton metal humanoid didn’t
just fall on her.
UNIT and the Doctor
make their way into the bunker, where Winters has restarted the
countdown because she is an evil jerk. She does the whole maniacal
laughter thing and claims they cannot hope to stop the countdown and
then the Doctor walks over, sits down, and stops the countdown.
Winters is understandably disappointed.
In all the fuss
over the world not ending everybody lost track of Sarah Jane.
Everybody, that is, except for K1; who grabbed her the moment nobody
was looking. The robot escapes inot the bowels of the bunker with his
captive, explaining how he still intends to carry out his final
directive of destroying the human race, but he likes her so she will
be spared. Awww.
The Doctor finally
realizes that Sarah Jane is missing and flips out on everybody.
Sergeant Benton pours everybody a nice cup of tea and tells the
Doctor about Kettlewell’s metal-eating virus. The two proceed to
the Professor’s lab to see what they can find.
For the second time
UNIT has left the bunker totally unattended, so K1 just walks in and
starts the countdown back up. But this time the international defense
computers are ready and halt the countdown unassisted. K1 has had
enough of this and exits the bunker with Sarah Jane in tow. She
manages to jump out of the way when the Brigadier unloads the
Disintegrator Gun on the metal behemoth.
But!
K1’s metal skin
is not like any other metal skin! It simply absorbs the
disintegration rays and starts growing! And growing. And growing.
The next several
minutes are total King Kong and there’s nothing wrong with that.
UNIT resumes its barrage on the now gigantic robot. Assault rifles,
machine guns, and even rocket launchers have no effect on the metal
gargantua. In the midst of the chaos, K1 finds Sarah Jane and picks
her up. It then turns and starts to make its way through the nearby
town, stepping on and knocking over building; leaving a wake of
destruction in its path.
K1 reaches the
center of town and places Sarah Jane atop a bell tower. Shortly
thereafter Sergeant Benton and the Doctor return in Bessie with a
pail of metal-eating virus. As Benton drives the antique car, the
Doctor hangs wildly out of the back with a yellow pail full of pink,
bubbling virus in hand. They speed towards the massive menace and
just as collision seems imminent, Benton turns the wheel and the
Doctor douses K1’s legs with the virus.
The robot starts to
shrink and moan as the virus destabilizes it’s molecules. The
Brigadier, the Doctor, and the rest of UNIT approach the fallen
monster as it returns to its normal size. As the Brigadier looks on,
he orders his men to incinerate the now incapacitated automaton. The
Doctor tells him not to bother and gestures towards K1 as it
dissolves before their eyes.
Sarah Jane feels
bad for K1 and the Doctor commiserates, pointing out that under
different circumstances it could have been a force for good rather
than evil.
Back in the UNIT
laboratory, the Doctor is preparing to leave and incites Sarah Jane
to come along with him. Harry Sullivan enters the room and inquires
as to what the pair are doing. He ridicules the idea that the blue
police box standing in the corner could be a spaceship, so the Doctor
invites him to step inside. Once all three are in, the TARDIS
dematerializes with a familiar wheezing sound. Just then the
Brigadier enters the laboratory and gets a bemused look on his face.
“I suppose I
shall have to tell Buckingham Palace the Doctor is going to be late
for dinner…”
Notes:
-As
far as I know the K1 robot has nothing to do with K-9.
-I
didn’t mention it above because I didn’t want to throw off my
dramatic recap, but the Sarah Jane that the gigantic K1 carries
around is a hilarious little doll. It looks extremely funny with its
little legs flailing around. Not as bad as the tank, but still
amusing.
-
This seems to be the fastest recovery time of
any regeneration. The Doctor almost always seems to take a very long
nap or be in a coma or something after he regenerates, right up to
the Eccleston to Tennant time. But in Robot
the Doctor only takes short naps and seems to be a bit more lucid and
vital each time.
-This
is the only instance of Doctor Four in Bessie; and the last
appearance of the car until The Five
Doctors.
-Doctor
Four’s sonic screwdriver is different from Doctor Three’s from
the very start. It is very similar, but the black and yellow spiral
that decorated Three’s is gone.
-This
also marks the first appearance of Doctor Four’s signature Jelly
Babies, as well as the first time somebody accepts one and then
appears frustrated that they had done so – at the very end the
Doctor offers them to Harry, who is busy disbelieving the TARDIS’
capabilities.
Come back next time
for Logopolis, which is the final story for Tom Baker, the
fourth Doctor! I have probably seen that story more than any other
and it has a lot of meaning to me as not only My Doctor’s last
story but also one that I very clearly remember watching when I was a
child. I’ll share those memories next time.
-Phantom
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