Robot by: Terrance Dicks directed by: Christopher Barry

 

Robot stars Tom Baker as the Doctor, Elisabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith, and Ian Marter as Harry Sullivan with Nicholas Courtney as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, John Levene as Benton, and Michael Kilgarriff as the K1 Robot.  It was written by: Terrance Dicks and directed by: Christopher Barry with Robert Holmes as Script Editor and Barry Letts as Producer  It was originally broadcast on Saturdays from 28 December 1974 to 18 January 1975 on BBC1.

 

1974 saw the end of what to that point had been the longest running production team for Doctor Who: Jon Pertwee’s five year run came to an end in Planet of the Spiders, deciding to leave after the death of costar Roger Delgado, Katy Manning left after her own three year run as Jo Grant, script editor Terrance Dicks had already been replaced by Robert Holmes, and producer Barry Letts would leave at the end of the eleventh production block and the introduction of the new Doctor.  After seeing his performance in The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, the part was offered to out of work actor Tom Baker, current companion Sarah Jane Smith played by Elisabeth Sladen was contracted for another season, and Ian Marter was hired as a third companion as the original plan was to have the new Doctor be an older version of the character.  This was changed with the casting of Baker, but production had begun and Marter’s Harry Sullivan would stay until the end of the twelfth production block.  As with Carnival of Monsters at the end of the ninth production block and The Time Warrior at the end of the tenth production block, Serial 4A would be produced as the final serial of the eleventh production block.  This allowed Barry Letts to establish Tom Baker as the Fourth Doctor in the familiar trappings of an Earthbound story with UNIT, meaning that the new Doctor would be the only new element for returning viewers.

 

Before the casting of Baker, Serial 4A was commissioned under outgoing script editor Terrance Dicks, who had convinced the BBC that this was a tradition for Doctor Who where the previous script editor would oversee the first story of a new Doctor (this was not a tradition and had only been done by Derrick Sherwin for The Invasion when several scripts fell through).  Letts and Dicks contrived a story about a giant robot, taking inspiration from 1933’s King Kong for the plot structure and the climax, titling Serial 4A, Robot.  Interestingly, taking inspiration from classic horror films would become standard practice under producer Philip Hinchcliffe who would replace Letts at the start of the twelfth production block.  Robot’s script is one that reads like a Jon Pertwee story in every aspect except not featuring Jon Pertwee: UNIT is called to investigate several governmental break ins where no evidence of a human presence while the new Doctor adjusts to his body.  Sarah Jane Smith investigates Thinktank, an organization which has been working in robotics, whose director is also in league with the Scientific Reform Society, a conspiracy network planning a fascist takeover of the world using the work of J.P. Kettlewell.  Sarah Jane connects with the robot which at the climax captures her as the SRS are held up in a bunker ready to unleash nuclear destruction.

 

The plot, while something out of a B-movie, is an enjoyable one.  Terrance Dicks as a writer knows how to keep the audience’s attention and clearly is setting up a scenario which can showcase the new Doctor’s talents which is excellent.  It does, however, fall apart near the end with the final two episodes in particular dragging quite a bit after Dicks apes a scene out of his script for The Avengers: The Mauritius Penny.  After this point it’s essentially trying to rescue Sarah and Harry and then stopping the robot and destruction.  The robot is killed by a plot device setup in the second episode, being splashed with a bucket and melted down by the Doctor and Harry who drive by on Bessie.  This climax is where Dicks’ script falls apart the most: it’s an anti-climax, once the robot is splashed the story is essentially over and is only saved by a lovely scene where the Doctor and Sarah Jane tease Harry into coming onto the TARDIS with them.  The direction of the story is by Christopher Barry who does help lessen the anti-climax, clearly enjoying himself with the numerous effects shots on the K1 Robot.  His direction elevates the subpar aspects of the script, and the use of perspective helps with some of the obvious models.  The Blu-Ray level restoration does reveal a number of production flaws, however, it is clearly done with care so this old serial is one shown to its best clarity.

 

The K1 Robot is played by Michael Kilgarriff who actually gives a very emotional performance as a robot who slowly becomes human over the course of three episodes.  Kilgarriff is performing through a rather large, though excellent, costume which is a feat especially considering Doctor Who’s general penchant for having an actor off-shot doing a creature voice.  The rest of the supporting cast are also excellent with the standout being Patricia Maynard as Miss Winters, our would be fascist overlord.  Maynard gives Winters a subtle level of camp that sells some of the more absurd aspects of the script.  Tom Baker also shines, establishing his Doctor as the more outwardly eccentric than Pertwee, Troughton, and Hartnell, though his actual actions feel like they were written for Pertwee with Baker’s personality edited in.  Baker also immediately shines with Elisabeth Sladen, who had already established Sarah Jane Smith as a more proactive companion.  Dicks doesn’t have Sarah Jane question the regeneration in the slightest, mostly due to already seeing a version of it in Planet of the Spiders.  Sarah Jane is the one who investigates the robot and ends up putting large parts of the plot together independently of the Doctor.  Ian Marter as Harry Sullivan hasn’t quite found his footing yet in this trio, as Dicks was clearly intending to have the Doctor be older and changing that with the casting of Baker, so Harry serves more as a comic foil for Tom Baker in some iconic sequences.  Nicholas Courtney and John Levene also work as comic relief and two more familiar faces to ease the new Doctor into the series.

 

Overall, Robot while a good start for Tom Baker and enjoyable enough, is a story which is heavily flawed.  It especially feels out of place considering the tone the rest of Season 12 and the early Tom Baker era would take.  Playing out like a Jon Pertwee serial complete with a third episode that drags and an anticlimax, plus rewrites to accommodate a different type of actor for the Doctor than was expected, there are still some rocky elements that take this down from being an all time classic.  Still, it is a worthwhile watch and the restoration is already a marvel to behold.  It starts the Tom Baker era with some minor glimpses of things to come and a great little horror film homage taking on an action B movie tone from a veteran writer.  6/10.