The bit where the robot was escaping from the UNIT soldiers
is a terrible part and that’s due to the fact that the robot moves so badly
that it becomes laughable. Another laughable moment is when Jellicoe is helping
Michael Kilgarriff (who is inside the costume) down the stairs in what is the
slowest escape ever recorded on video. There is a silly bit where a toy tank
appears in front of the camera to give the impression that its
Kettlewell just happens to be a member of the SRS and still
has his membership. I love how he seems like a nice moment until the Doctor
sheds light on his true intentions. I think that his hair is getting out of
control and every time he is on screen I am drawn to his hair and not necessarily
to his performance.
There is a moment when the Doctor talks about what would
happen if the nuclear arms were released and the look on his face at the end of
his speech is a great look and very much the look we would get in later
stories. Another famous trait from Tom Baker is when he stands in front of the SRS
group and acts like a bumbling clown
There is a scene where Miss Winters is talking to the SRS
group and she gives a passionate speech. She is arguably the best thing in this
story and puts some energy in the story because otherwise it would just be a
pedestrian story with a new Doctor and that’s a weird thing to have in
I still think that its weird that Tom Baker is driving
Bessie.
The action moves to the underground bunker in the latter stages
of the episode and this is a good setting for this series. This is where I
think that the story is making some strides towards a conclusion. I don’t know
if its being low down but Winters’ madness seems to escalate and become more
like a Bond villain.
The cliffhanger is a disappointing because it is just the
robot appearing from the bunker and that’s it. I liked the previous cliffhanger
because there was some drama to it but on this occasion here is the opposite.
The more that I watch this story the more that I think that this is a Jon
Pertwee story left over and that’s made even more plain by the information in
the info text on the DVD saying that even though this was the first story in
season twelve, it was actually filmed during season eleven which is why it doesn’t
have the vibe of future stories. Oh well only one more episode of the Barry
Letts era of Doctor Who to watch. Robot isn’t a terrible story but it doesn’t quite
have the impact that other new Doctor stories should have.
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