The Robots of Death

Please do not throw hands at me.

Doctor Who does Agatha Christie. In some ways it's a bit anticlimactic since obviously it is the robots who are doing the killing; the title gives that away. But you at least have the question of who is ordering the robots to kill the crew. This one of the few times where a writer got to go back-to-back as this is Chris Boucher's second story, immediately following his introduction of Leela in The Face of Evil.

Plot Summary

The Doctor and Leela land on a sand miner in the middle of a multi-year tour. The miner is manned by nine crew and a host of humanoid robots. As they land, one of the crew is murdered by a robot while the rest are busy extracting ore from a sand storm. The dead man is discovered by a crewman named Poul who reports it to the Captain Uvanov. Uvanov is forced to turn control of the miner over to the robots while the crew retires to the lounge to investigate.

The shutting down of the scoops helps the Doctor and Leela as the TARDIS was removed by the robots as an obstruction and the two were at risk of being enveloped by the high speed sand. They are removed from the scoop by a robot and taken to a cabin to wait.

Meanwhile the crew is already snipping at each other with paranoia beginning to set in. Another crewman is missing, adding to the tension. They are told that the body was decorated with a red disk usually used to mark deactivated robots, often called a corpse-marker by robot workers. One of the robots enters and informs the crew of the two stowaways. Tension eases a bit as the two are believed to be the murderers and Uvanov orders a search of the ship to ensure that it is only the two.

The Doctor uses his sonic screwdriver to open the cabin door to find the TARDIS with Leela following him. She breaks off and finds the body of the first dead crewman and watches as two robots come to take him away. The Doctor finds the TARDIS but doubles back when he notices Leela hadn't followed him. He passes by a process bin and discovers the body of the second crewman inside. As he checks on him, the door behind him seals and the room fills with ore. The Doctor pulls out a snorkel, allowing him to breathe while he is buried by the ore. The command robot, SV7, discovers the Doctor and pulls him out. The Doctor informs him of the second body and SV7 takes the Doctor to the lounge with the others.

Leela returns to the cabin they had originally come from and discovers the body of a third crewman who had gone to look for the second. The scene is investigated by a detective robot named D84, disguised as a silent worker robot. The two are discovered by Uvanov and to protect his cover, D84 grabs Leela as if capturing her. Uvanov tries to interrogate her but she batters him off. She is also taken to the lounge.

In the lounge the crew interrogate the Doctor and Leela, some believing they are the murderers while others are less sure, paranoia running higher now. Worried about losing profits from the recently discovered storm, Uvanov orders the Doctor and Leela locked in the robot repair bay while the rest of them return to their duty stations. The Doctor and Leela are bound in place with metal straps and forced to wait.

One of the crew, a woman named Zilda, leaves her duty station and breaks into Uvanov's quarters. She pulls his old logs and begins to break down crying. She screams over the intercom about how Uvanov is a murderer before she gives another scream. Uvanov runs to his cabin where he find her dead.

Meanwhile Poul visits the Doctor, intrigued by the Doctor's statements that a robot might have performed the murders. Poul releases the Doctor and Leela and the Doctor, using Poul and Leela's information about how the first body was discovered, demonstrates how it was likely a robot. Poul is signaled by second-in-command Toos about Zilda and he runs to Uvanov's cabin. He orders the Doctor and Leela to wait in a cabin and he finds Uvanov bent over Zilda's body. He accuses Uvanov and relieves him of command, knocking him out when he tries to escape. Poul informs SV7 of the change in command. SV7 also informs Poul that crewman Borg is also dead.

The miner suddenly lurches as it's drive motors have been sabotaged. Poul runs to the bridge, followed by Leela and the Doctor. Discovering what has happened, the Doctor orders the motivators shut down despite the fact that they'll sink into the sand. Dask tries to stop him at first but then does the shut down himself. As the miner begins to sink, Dask heads below to repair the engines.

Poul informs Toos of his theory regarding Uvanov. He also tells her that Uvanov was disciplined for leaving a crewman to die on a previous voyage and that crewman was Zilda's brother. Dask manages to get the engines going again, raising the miner out of the sand just before the hull begins to buckle. Safe, the miner holds position while the robots begin repairs.

Toos leaves to get some rest, having injured her arm in the accident. The Doctor instructs Leela to follow Poul while he speaks with D84. However, Poul slips away from Leela and locks her in the lounge. Poul heads to the robot repair facility where he finds the robot that killed Borg with blood on it's hands. Seeing the blood triggers a violent attack of robophobia in Poul and he collapses.

The murderer, an extremist named Taren Capel, overrides the commands of SV7 and orders him to act as agent. Kapel then overrides the command structures of several other robots in order to take over the miner.

The Doctor discovers D84 investigating Zilda's body and discovers that D84 and Poul are investigating agents sent by the mining company after receiving threats from Capel. The Doctor theorizes and convinces D84 that Capel is posing as one of the crew to instigate a robot revolution. The two of them head to a place where the Doctor believes Capel is conducting his modifications.

SV7 gives instructions to other robots to kill Toos, the Doctor and Leela while he kills the others. One robot attacks Leela but she manages to slip past him into the hallway. Leela hides in the robot repair bay and discovers Poul hiding. She tries to get him to come but he has mentally collapsed.

The Doctor signals Toos from Capel's lab and orders her to head to the command deck with all surviving crewmen. She tries but is trapped in her cabin by the robot sent to kill her. The Doctor sends D84 to help her. After he leaves, Uvanov discovers the Doctor in the lab and believes he is altering the robots. However, a robot enters and attacks the Doctor. Uvanov grabs a probe and plunges it into the robot skull, damaging it's control circuits. The two flee into the hallway, pursued by the damaged robot.

The robot outside Toos' cabin breaks in and attacks her but is called back by SV7 before he finishes the job to pursue the Doctor and Uvanov. Leela discovers D84 checking on Toos. D84 then heads to collect Poul and brings him to the command deck while Leela and Toos head back themselves. While going, Toos discovers that SV7 has been compromised as well when she tries to communicate with the Doctor.

The three groups assemble on the bridge with only Dask missing. The Doctor reveals Poul and D84's mission and Uvanov also reveals that Zilda's brother died as a result of the same robophobia that Poul is now suffering from. The Doctor, Leela and D84 leave the bridge and head to the robot repair room while Uvanov and Toos rig anti-robot bombs from magnetized blast charges stored on the bridge.

The robots begin to attack the bridge under the command of Dask, who is actually Taren Capel. Dask tries to trick his way in but the two refuse. They send a signal for rescue and warning from the bridge. Uvanov manages to destroy one robot who tries to get in from another door. After destroying it, Uvanov and Toos leave the bridge to act as a distraction.

In the repair bay, the Doctor rigs an anti-robot pulse weapon from a damaged robot and one of the communicator. As he does so he orders D84 to bring a canister of Helium to him. D84 returns as the Doctor finishes the weapon and the group returns to Capel's lab. He hides Leela in a storage area, ordering her to release the gas when Capel enters.

Dask breaks in and damages D84 with a probe. Another robot restrains the Doctor and Dask prepares to torture him to death. As he begins, D84 activates the Doctor's weapon, destroying the robot guard and himself in the process. Dask tries to finish the Doctor off but he manages to throw him back. SV7 enters, the bomb having reduced it to it's core command of killing humans. Dask tries to order it off but the helium has affected his voice so that SV7 does not recognize his command and kills him. SV7 turns on Uvanov and Toos as they enter but the Doctor plunges the probe into it's head and disables it.

With Capel dead and the robots deactivated, the Doctor and Leela return to the TARDIS as a rescue ship approaches and take off.

Analysis

I greatly enjoyed this story. I think I even liked it better the second time around than the first. It is easy to imagine that the story is going to have a more traditional Agatha Christie development with a lot more twists and blind alleys among the various crew but they are removed rather quickly so that the traditional Agatha Christie portion of the story is more or less over by the beginning of Episode Three. That can throw you the first time you watch it. A second time around with that level of awareness allows you to get into the story better and how it flows from one genre into the next.

The writing in this story is excellent with a lot of witty banter being thrown about. It is also nice to have Leela's creator behind this story as she is well defined in her warrior ways but also has compassion, intelligence and good instincts. She holds her own with the Doctor, being instructed by him but also not putting up with too much garbage from him. He has one instance where he is sharp with her and she takes it in stride but it plays fairly well for laughs and doesn't diminish Leela's character in the story.

The Doctor himself is quite enjoyable. He gets off a number of one-liners and does a pretty good job of working through the situation without appearing either too omnipotent in knowledge or ignorant to the point of unbelief. His alienness sticks out fairly well but not to the point of being a major distraction or to be off-putting.

The rest of the crew is pretty good. Dask and Uvonov especially are good in the way they both garner and deflect suspicion until the truth is revealed. Toos is also pretty good, although she does get a little stereotypical wibbly when the robots advance on her. I'd have liked to see her with a slightly harder edge at that point, although I suppose it would be understandable given the stress of the situation. Most of the other crew don't get enough screen time to form much of an opinion of them except that they seem to be portrayed well enough.

The one exception to this would be Zilda. For most of her scenes she isn't bad, although slightly flat. However it goes very wrong when she steals the log in Uvanov's quarters. Her attempts to cry and show anguish are downright painful to watch. It is absolutely terrible acting. It is somewhat unfortunate that this is also the last impression she makes as she gets killed moments afterward and whatever decent performance she had earlier is shoved out of my mind by her final moments.

The design of the robots and the set were quite nice. There are a couple of moments of obvious CSO but for a studio-bound story, this is done very well. The art deco design of both the environment and the robots is very nice and it gives the ship a very arty feel that becomes more timeless than if they had tried to something futuristic from a 70's point of view. The robots especially had an element of grace but also creepiness. There is a touch of the uncanny valley effect going on but it probably would have been worse if they had attempted to have more realistic faces rather than the stylized features they had.

If I had to come up with any negative points, it involves the mystery. Even though I knew it was coming, I still feel like the reduction of the crew and the leaving of the "whodunit" element of the story happened too quickly. I would have liked it a little more if we'd gotten a bit more with the non-core members of the crew and kept the paranoia level going for longer rather than it shifting to more of a thriller story in Episode Three.

My second criticism is when SV7 is reprogramed. Teran Capel's face is visible on the screen and even slightly scrambled and tinged, it was very obvious that it was Dask due to the lack of facial hair. He is shown with a mask in his next scene and if he had to appear on a screen, appearing in a mask would have kept up the illusion that Capel was either Dask or Uvanov. It would have added more tension to the cliffhanger in Episode Three when the robot attacks the Doctor and you might still be suspicious of Uvanov as the dialogue suggests you should be. I think that was a directorial mistake and one that spoils the surprise although not in a terrible way.

Overall, this is a very good story. Your enjoyment of it probably depends on how much you enjoy the murder myster/thriller genre and as someone who enjoys these, it puts this right in my wheelhouse. I also happen to be fan of art deco and enjoy the set and robot design that much more. It is not perfect, there are acting and a couple of production flaws. But it is good enough that I enjoyed it more on my second time through and even watched a couple of scenes a third time and enjoyed those as well. This would be an easy one to pull off the shelf and get lost in for an evening.

Overall personal score: 4.5 out of 5