Geek Syndicate
role. Baker switched perfectly from high humour to simmering anger. While appearing the fool, any villain crossing him (especially during these years) did so at their peril.
Robots of Death is many things, but if you boil it right down
to its core elements, it’s a futuristic murder mystery. To
summarise it as such is perhaps a disservice, as Chris
Boucher brings together several elements into a fantastic
story of intrigue. There’s murder mystery, Asimov’s laws of
robotics, espionage and even a sideways glance at classbased society. All this comes together in a brilliantly coherent manner.
The story is set aboard a Sandminer on an unnamed planet. The mobile mining platform is crewed by nine humans
and a veritable army of robots. The robots are divided into
three classes: Dums which are mute work drones of the
most basic order, Vocs who perform roles which interact
with the human crew more and a single Super Voc co-ordinator robot. The three classes of robot are identifiable
by their colouration and identifier pre-fix (D, V or SV) and
the differences between them is important to the plot’s
development.
While Robots is a great story, there is one stand out scene
for me. It comes very early on in the first episode and
features the Doctor and his new companion Leela. Introduced in the previous story (also written by Boucher and
one of my contenders for this spot), Leela is an intelligent
savage from a society that has devolved back to almost
stone age values. The scene in question starts with the girl
concentrating on making a yo-yo go up and down. She is
convinced this action is vital to the TARDIS’ operation and
Louise Jameson performs this simple dedication superbly.
Immediately after, the Time Lord explains to Leela how
the TARDIS is bigger inside than out, using two boxes. The
outcome of the explanation? An exasperated “that’s silly!”
from the warrior woman!
I’ve always been a fan of Leela as a companion and since I
started reading Doctor Who novelisations when I was six or
seven, it’s not because she generally wandered around in
a leather vest / skirt combo. The character is one of those
slightly different companions that we don’t tend to get
these days. She’s intelligent and physically strong but also
has an innocence about her that comes from her more
primitive home world. Her intelligence and willingness to
learn means that she’s never overwhelmed by the sights
and sounds that greet her during the adventures. There’s
also a great teacher / pupil relationship between The Doctor and Leela with not even a hint that theirs is a relationship other than platonic.
Robots of Death also stands out because of its design. The
whole production has an art-deco vibe about it. This lends
a feeling of decadent opulence to the society, particularly
whencombined withtheproduction’spredominantlygoldhued colour pallet. The robots, with their sculpted faces
are quite disturbing. Particularly when they go rogue and
their eyes glow a vibrant red. Even though the robots’ torsos are clearly quilted fabric of some kind, the opulence of
the design means that it is feasible that the robots harsh
/ constructed frames are swathed in material to soften
their overall appearance. It also means that a robot or two
could be people in disguise …
I don’t want to say much more about the story as it really
is worth watching for the mystery element. Suffice it to
say, this is one of the very best acted, directed, written and
designed Doctor Who stories from this or any other era of
the show.
Next Issue: Incarnations Five and Six
Don’t forget to check out the previous two issues of Geek
Syndicate Magazine for more of Luke and Antony’s Doctor Who debate. Next time, the pair will be choosing a top
story from the Fifth and Sixth Doctors.
Luke Halsall
Antony McGarry-Thickitt
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