‘A GIRL’S BEST FRIEND’ (K-9 & CO)
Please feel free to comment on my review.
Sarah Jane’s First Adventure with K-9
So yeah! This was a thing back in 1981! This was the only spin-off to be made from the classic TV series of ‘Doctor Who’! I’m amazed this got made! ‘K-9 & Company’ was an attempt to try and give K-9, the Doctor’s robotic dog, his own spin-off series and he had Sarah Jane Smith to join him on his TV show.
I was initially surprised when I found out this spin-off special existed. The first time I saw it was when it was part of the ‘K-9 Tales’ DVD box set along with ‘The Invisible Enemy’. I wouldn’t regard the ‘K-9 Tales’ DVD box set very highly, but it was a fairly enjoyable collection of tales when I first watched it.
I suppose ‘The Collection’ range of classic ‘Doctor Who’ seasons couldn’t find a place to put this one-off special of ‘K-9 & Company’ before it was decided to put it at the end of Tom Baker’s final season, Season 18, when it was re-released on Blu-ray. Mind you, it’s not a bad place to put it in that box set.
‘K-9 & Company’ was released in-between Season 18 and Season 19 of ‘Doctor Who’ when it was transmitted via BBC1 on the 28th of December 1981. Having ‘K-9 & Company’ in the Season 18 Blu-ray box set acts like a bonus story, even when you want to have the Blu-ray box set for Christmas! 😀
This one-off special is of course where Sarah Jane first meets K-9 in the ‘Doctor Who’ universe. I was surprised their first meeting didn’t happen in ‘Doctor Who’ and it happened in a spin-off show that ended up being a one-off. I have seen ‘The Five Doctors’ and ‘School Reunion’ set after this TV story.
I enjoyed ‘K-9 & Company’ and found it very interesting indeed. I wouldn’t say it was a great spin-off episode and it’s a shame ‘K-9 & Company’ didn’t get to have its own series. But from what I’ve seen, it did have potential if only the correct writing team and producer had been employed to make this.
The spin-off was devised by John Nathan-Turner, the current producer of ‘Doctor Who’ in the 1980s. JNT had hoped to make a series out of ‘K-9 & Company’ when he had the robot dog exited from the TV series recently. I’m so surprised by this, since JNT made his views clear that he didn’t like the dog.
Mind you, the reason why ‘K-9 & Company’ was produced was to counteract the backlash JNT received about K-9 being written out of the ‘Doctor Who’ TV series during Season 18. JNT wanted to make ‘K-9 & Company’ in order to fulfil fans’ desires to see K-9 on TV but not travel with the Doctor.
It’s actually a brave thing to do and to give credit to JNT, I’m impressed he saw to it that he got it made. Sadly, the intention of spawning a TV series for K-9 wasn’t to be and only the pilot episode was made. Whilst that’s sad in itself, I’m glad I got to see how K-9 and Sarah Jane first meet each other.
It’s unusual to see Sarah Jane and K-9 meeting each other after watching the ‘Doctor Who’ TV series overall from beginning to end. In the days of being uninitiated into ‘Doctor Who’, I assumed K-9 travelled with the Doctor and Sarah Jane in the TARDIS. How wrong I was when it turned out not to be.
By the time K-9 joined the Fourth Doctor in the TARDIS, Sarah Jane had long gone. The female companions K-9 encountered with the Doctor were Leela and Romana. So it seems rather an oddity for Sarah Jane to meet this robot dog whom she hadn’t met before and not had an association with.
Mind you, Sarah Jane had already been hailed as a popular ‘Doctor Who’ companion by that point long after she left the series. So, her return to the ‘Doctor Who’ universe in this one-off TV special with K-9 was a welcome one. And this would not be the last time, as Sarah Jane returned more and more.
So, the pilot episode of what would’ve been a potential ‘K-9 & Company’ series is called ‘A Girl’s Best Friend’. It’s a 50-minute special episode by Terence Dudley. This wasn’t Terence Dudley’s first association in the ‘Doctor Who’ universe. For Season 18, he directed the four-part TV story ‘Meglos’.
Dudley would later write three ‘Doctor Who’ stories for Peter Davison’s Doctor including ‘Four to Doomsday’, ‘Black Orchid’ and ‘The King’s Demons’. Out of all the stories Dudley wrote for the TV series, I still regard ‘Black Orchid’ as his best one. The ‘K-9 & Company’ episode he wrote is average.
Don’t get me wrong. Watching it again made me realise that Terence Dudley was going for a more mystery element, as he’d done in ‘Black Orchid’ which I liked, especially with people disappearing. But I wouldn’t have chosen the subject matter Dudley applied for in the first ‘K-9 & Company’ story.
The episode involves a satanic cult which isn’t to my liking and most of the episode is pretty grim and serious like a thriller. I would’ve gone for a more child-friendly approach especially for a spin-off pilot featuring a robot dog and a former ‘Doctor Who’ companion. Maybe have something in outer space.
Another reason for why the spin-off series never happened apparently was that there was a change of controller on BBC1 who decided ‘K-9 & Company’ didn’t have enough legs to stand-on. This could be due to the belief made that only satanic cult stories could be made with K-9 and Sarah Jane here.
I would disagree on that regard. There’s more potential for stories with K-9 and Sarah Jane solving mysteries other than satanic cults. They could do seaside murder mysteries or fairground mysteries or something. Again, the right team of writers chosen for ‘K-9 & Company’ could’ve made this work.
In fact, I would say Terence Dudley was the incorrect person to write the pilot episode for ‘K-9 & Company’. It should’ve been Terrance Dicks or Barry Letts, since they know the character of Sarah Jane inside out. Either one of these two would give a stronger re-introduction to Sarah Jane with K-9.
I’m surprised Terrance Dicks wasn’t asked to write the pilot episode of ‘K-9 & Company’ instead of Terence Dudley. Terrance Dicks wrote for Season 18 with ‘State of Decay’. He even wrote K-9 for that. He would’ve been ideal to re-introduce Sarah Jane as well as K-9 in this special spin-off episode.
Anyway, the episode was also directed by John Black who had previously directed ‘The Keeper of Traken’ in Season 18 of ‘Doctor Who’. He would go on to direct ‘Four to Doomsday’ in Season 19. I enjoyed John Black’s direction on this ‘K-9 & Company’ pilot, especially with some action sequences.
It must’ve been so exciting for ‘Doctor Who’ fans to watch this special episode of K-9 over Christmas time in 1981. It could’ve done without the satanic cult and attempts could’ve been made to make it more Christmassy. But besides all of that, it must have been great for kids to see Sarah Jane and K-9.
It’s interesting to note that whilst ‘K-9 & Company’ didn’t get off the ground as it could’ve done, the pilot episode received some strong viewing figures. About 8.4 million viewers apparently! ‘K-9 & Company’ must’ve been great TV viewing at the time in Christmas 1981. It wouldn’t be like that now.
It was lovely to see Elisabeth Sladen return to the world of ‘Doctor Who’ as Sarah Jane Smith in ‘K-9 & Company’. As many know, Sarah Jane was a former companion of the Third and Fourth Doctors during the 1970s. It was interesting to see what Sarah Jane was doing she left in ‘The Hand of Fear’.
It was equally fun and interesting to see how Sarah Jane and K-9 first meet. It transpires K-9 was a gift given to her by the Doctor which is amazing. I assume it’s the Fourth Doctor who built K-9 to give to Sarah Jane and not a later incarnation, which I’ve indicated in my Fifth Doctor story ‘Junglos 4198’.
This version of K-9 is the Mark III model, not the Mark I model who stayed behind with Leela on Gallifrey in ‘The Invasion of Time’ and not the Mark II model who stayed with Romana in E-Space in ‘Warriors’ Gate’. This pilot marks the first appearance of K-9 Mark III in the ‘Doctor Who’ universe. 🙂
John Leeson returns to voice K-9 in this pilot episode. It’s always a joy to hear John voice the robotic dog whenever I watch or hear ‘Doctor Who’ in the TV stories and the Big Finish audios as well as this pilot episode for a spin-off series that never happened. K-9 even gets to take part in the theme song!
Yeah, I did find the ‘K-9 & Company’ titles sequences a bit contrived especially when showing Sarah Jane and K-9 in a montage of fast-paced editing that seemed all over the place. But the theme song was catchy to listen to, especially when K-9 repeated “K-9! K-9!” over and over again when I heard it.
The ‘K-9 & Company’ theme song was composed by Fiachra Trench and Ian Levine. Interesting that Ian Levine, the continuity advisor for ‘Doctor Who’, co-composed the ‘K-9 & Company’ theme song. But then he and Fiachra Trench did compose that ‘Doctor In Distress’ charity single together in 1985.
Like I said, the story of ‘A Girl’s Best Friend’ isn’t really great. But the mystery aspects are interesting especially when Sarah Jane tries to solve the whereabouts of her missing Aunt Lavina with K-9’s help. The satanic cult becomes the cause for this mystery in the sleepy village of Morton Harewood.
I enjoyed the location scenes being shot in the pilot special. The episode was filmed in the Cotswolds during November of 1981. Wow they filmed this episode a month before it was transmitted over Christmas time that year. The cast and crew must’ve been under a lot of pressure to make this one.
The guest cast includes Mary Wimbush as Aunt Lavina, Sarah Jane’s aunt. I’ve seen Mary Wimbush before as she played Aunt Agatha in ‘Jeeves & Wooster’ with Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie. It was a delight to see her in this K-9 special. I’m glad she’s playing Aunt Lavina in the ‘Doctor Who’ universe.
Aunt Lavina has been talked about in ‘Doctor Who’ right from Sarah Jane’s debut appearance in ‘The Time Warrior’. It was a shock to see Aunt Lavina smoking in the episode as this is supposed to be a TV show for children, right? I wish we could’ve seen Aunt Lavina more in the ‘Doctor Who’ universe.
There’s Ian Sears as Brendan Richards, who is Aunt Lavina’s ward that Sarah Jane meets. He is a bit of a nerd when he comes across K-9. As I understand, Brendan was meant to be one of the regulars had the spin-off series got green-lit. But honestly I think Brendan would end up being another Adric.
Poor Brendan though. He gets knocked out once and then gets knocked out again to be captured and taken away to be used as a sacrifice for the satanic cult’s purposes. Thankfully Sarah Jane does rescue him by the end of the episode. I’m certain Ian Sears was very cold filming the sacrifice scenes.
There’s also Bill Fraser as Commander Bill Pollock. Bill Fraser had previously appeared in the ‘Doctor Who’ story ‘Meglos’. He plays a different character here compared to General Grugger. 😀 Thankfully he doesn’t kick K-9 here and he seems to be a kindly gentleman smoking a pipe. But is he really nice?
Linda Polan guest stars as Juno Baker with Neville Baker as her husband Howard Baker. Juno seems to be good friends with Aunt Lavina as the beginning of the story and even invites Sarah Jane around for a party one night. But are Juno and her husband Neville suspects in Aunt Lavina’s disappearance?
There’s Colin Jeavons as George Tracey, who is one of the satanic cult that is rather humourless and firm in his beliefs in serving the goddess Hecate (which sounds like ‘Hegatty’ when the cult chant her name). There’s also Sean Chapman as Peter Tracey, George’s son who’s so reluctant to be involved.
There’s also Gillian Martell as Lily Gregson, who seems to be another kind lady living in the Morton Harewood sleepy village that offers Sarah Jane a cup when she comes to visit her house. She seems friendly enough, but could she have a part to play in the satanic cult as well during the tale’s events?
And of course there’s John Quarmby as Henry Tobias, who is the editor of Morton Harewood’s ‘Standard’ newspaper when Sarah Jane meets him at Juno Baker’s party. I was delightfully surprised to see John Quarmby in this, as he played Mr. Carnegie in the ‘Fawlty Towers’ episode ‘Basil the Rat’.
What I liked about this spin-off episode is how the mystery is created and that you don’t know who the main villain is. The episode has you change your mind on who the suspect is in whether it’s Juno and Neville Baker or not and whether it’s Commander Bill Pollock or not. I did not have a clue! 😀
Whilst the ‘K-9 & Company’ theme song was composed by Fiachra Trench and Ian Levine, the episode’s incidental music was composed by Peter Howell. I liked it when the incidental music went a bit spooky during some of the night-time scenes and didn’t go all electronic as it usually would do.
I liked how the episode ended with K-9 singing “We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!” It all ties in very well before the end-credits roll up with the ‘K-9 & Company’ theme song accompanying it. I’m surprised K-9 wasn’t invited to the Christmas party Sarah Jane went to at the end!
The original DVD special features were as follows. There was ‘The K-9 Files’ making-of documentary; the ‘K-9 – A Dog’s Tale’ interview with K-9 himself; a ‘Pebble Mill at One’ interview with K-9 himself and BBC trailers and continuity announcements of the story. There were two audio options including a mono sound audio mix option for the story and a DVD audio commentary with Elisabeth Sladen, John Leeson, Linda Polan and script-editor Eric Saward. There was also an info-text commentary option to enjoy; a photo gallery of the story and PDF materials including ‘K-9 Stories’ comprising of ‘The Adventures of K-9’ and ‘The K-9 Annual 1983’ as well as a ‘Radio Times Listings’ of the story. There was also a ‘coming soon’ DVD trailer for ‘The Brain of Morbius’ with Tom Baker and Elisabeth Sladen.
On Disc 8 of the ‘Doctor Who – The Collection – Season 18’ Blu-ray, ‘The K-9 Files’ making-of documentary; the ‘K-9 – A Dog’s Tale’ interview; the ‘Pebble Mill at One’ interview with K-9; the mono sound audio mix option for the story; the DVD audio commentary; the info-text commentary option; ‘The Adventures of K-9’ PDF; ‘The K-9 Annual 1983’ PDF and the ‘Radio Times Listings’ PDF can be found on there. The BBC1 trailers and continuity announcements and the photo gallery for ‘K-9 & Company: A Girl’s Best Friend’ have been updated for 2019 on the Blu-ray.
The new special features on Blu-ray include the ‘Behind the Sofa’ feature on ‘K-9 & Company: A Girl’s Best Friend’ with John Leeson (K-9), Gillian Martell (Lily Gregson) and Sean Chapman (Peter Tracey). There’s also the ‘Brendan and Company’ interview with Ian Sears and a Happy Christmas trailer featuring Peter Davison, Sarah Sutton, Janet Fielding and Matthew Waterhouse in it! Yay!!! 😀 There’s also ‘The Writers’ Room’ with Christopher H. Bidmead, Andrew Smith, Stephen Gallagher and John Flanagan on Season 18 of ‘Doctor Who’ and ‘The Fourth Doctor Revisited’ 50th anniversary documentary. There’s also the ’50th Anniversary Archive’ interview with Matthew Waterhouse; ‘The Panopticon Archive’ panel interview with Tom Baker and ‘Commerical Break’ featuring Tom Baker as the Doctor in a 1997 New Zealand superannuation campaign. There’s also the ‘Galactic Glitter Tours’ Season 18 Blu-ray trailer; the studio clocks compilation for Season 18 and a trailer for ‘Scratchman’, a ‘Doctor Who’ book by Tom Baker. There’s also an updated corrected version of the BBC continuity announcements and trailers for ‘Castrovalva’.
Okay, I need to go into a bit of background with this special feature on the ‘K-9 & Company’ Blu-ray disc and explain why it’s misplaced here when it should be on the ‘Castrovalva’ Blu-ray. When the Season 19 Blu-ray box set was released before the Season 18 Blu-ray box set, there was an error with one of the special features – an updated version of the ‘Castrovalva’ BBC continuity announcements and trailers. I noticed the error when I watched the special features on the ‘Castrovalva’ Blu-ray disc. Apparently the audio for the updated version of the ‘Castrovalva’ BBC continuity announcements and trailers didn’t match to what was shown in the video presentation. It was the audio for the original DVD version of the ‘Castrovalva’ BBC continuity announcements and trailers instead of the brand-new audio version for Blu-ray. Thus there was a fault with the audio which I found disappointing when I saw it on the Season 19 Blu-ray. Thankfully this has been corrected into a new version of the ‘Castrovalva’ BBC continuity announcements and trailers which can now be watched on the ‘K-9 & Company’ Blu-ray disc via the Season 18 Blu-ray box set. It would be nice if it was on the ‘Castrovalva’ Blu-ray disc, but still. I’m glad the Blu-ray makers corrected this.
On the PDF front, as well as ‘The Adventures of K-9’; ‘The K-9 Annual 1983’ and the ‘Radio Times Listings’ of ‘K-9 & Company: A Girl’s Best Friend’, there are also production documents and a script for ‘K-9 & Company: A Girl’s Best Friend’. There’s also the ‘Doctor Who Annual 1982’ (taken from the ‘The Keeper of Traken’; ‘Logopolis’ and ‘Castrovalva’ DVDs) and some BBC Enterprises Literature for Season 18. You need a special Blu-ray computer drive for that.
So anyway, ‘K-9 and Company’ is an enjoyable excursion of an attempted spin-off TV series from the classic era of ‘Doctor Who’ featuring K-9 and Sarah Jane. It’s a shame that this never got a series. It would’ve been interesting to see Sarah Jane and K-9 having adventures on Earth without the Doctor.
Thankfully though, Sarah Jane came back with K-9 in the new ‘Doctor Who’ series to make a guest appearance in ‘School Reunion’. This was before her own spin-off series ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’ happened. It wasn’t exactly ‘K-9 & Company’, but K-9 had a fair share of stories in that.
As for the ‘K-9 Tales’ DVD box set…well like I said, I enjoyed it very much. Whilst it wasn’t the best collection of ‘Doctor Who’ stories on DVD, I enjoyed K-9’s first meeting with the Fourth Doctor and Leela in ‘The Invisible Enemy’ as well as his first meeting with Sarah Jane Smith for ‘K-9 & Company’.
Watching ‘K-9 & Company’ again on Blu-ray has been a joy for me. I’m glad it’s part of the Season 18 Blu-ray box set as I’ve enjoyed revisiting Season 18 overall. It’s nice to have ‘K-9 & Company’ as a bonus story to the Season 18 collection and I’m sure it made plenty of ‘Doctor Who’ fans very happy.
CUDDLES: Ahem!
Oh yeah! And it made a lot of K-9 and doggy fans happy too!
CUDDLES: Yay!!!
‘A Girl’s Best Friend’ (K-9 & Co) rating – 6/10
‘GALACTIC GLITTER TOURS’
Please feel free to comment on my review.
I was pretty excited to see the announcement trailer for the Season 18 Blu-ray box set of ‘Doctor Who’ on YouTube back in November 2018! The Season 19 Blu-ray box set hadn’t been released yet. But still, they were announcing these classic ‘Doctor Who’ seasons on Blu-ray box sets pretty quickly.
It was fun to hear Tom Baker narrate the ‘Galactic Glitter Package Tours’ for the Season 18 stories in the Blu-ray box set. I wonder if it was all Pete McTighe’s writing for those adverts or whether Tom adlibbed some lines of his own. Probably both! It was entertaining and amusing to hear throughout.
Watching the trailer, I was excited about a third ‘Doctor Who’ Blu-ray box set featuring Sarah Sutton. This is due to ‘The Keeper of Traken’ and ‘Logopolis’ being the last two stories featuring Nyssa in Season 18. I was looking forward to the other stories as well, but those two were a definite highlight.
It was a nice surprise to see that the ‘K-9 & Company’ special would be included in the Season 18 Blu-ray box set. I was so excited to see Janet Fielding and Sarah Sutton included in the extras part of the trailer since they took part in the ‘Hanging on a Thread’ making-of documentary for ‘Logopolis’. 🙂
I didn’t know Sarah, Janet and Wendy Padbury would be in the ‘Behind the Sofa’ items for the Season 18 Blu-ray box set. It was a nice surprise for me. In the trailer, they only showed Tom Baker, costume designer June Hudson and K-9 voice actor John Leeson for those ‘Behind the Sofa’ items. 🙂
‘Galactic Glitter Tours’ rating – 9/10
| The previous story
For Sarah Jane was For K-9 Mk III was
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The next story
For Sarah Jane is
For K-9 Mk III is
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| Return to Sarah Jane’s Timeline | |
| Return to The Timelines of K-9 | |
| Return to The Companions’ Timelines Index | |
| Return to Doctor Who Timelines | |
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Bradley's Basement 
God i remember seeing seeing this aged 6 & hadn’t seen Lis as Sarah Jane before & i remember that awful title sequence but i did enjoy tbe episode & K-9.
What let’s this down is the weak script that fails to get going but maybe if it had gone to series the scripts would’ve improved, i thinl Barry Letts or Terrance Dicks would’ve been great producer/writer for this show.
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Thanks for sharing your memories of seeing this ‘K-9’ special, Simon.
6 years old were you? Goodness me! It must have been exciting for you to see Sarah Jane Smith for the first time in anything ‘Doctor Who’ related. Yeah the title sequence isn’t spectacular, but somehow I found the theme music pretty catchy to listen to 😀
Yes, the script’s not great and it’s such a shame that this episode didn’t guarantee a series. But it was a decent introduction for Sarah Jane meeting K-9 in this.
Yes Barry Letts and Terrance Dicks would have been great to produce/write for ‘K-9 and Company’ had it been made into a series. Most importantly, Bob Baker and Dave Martin should have written the introductory episode to the series instead of Terrance Dudley.
Thanks for your comments, Simon. Glad you enjoyed my ‘K-9’ reviews.
Tim. 🙂
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Great updated Blu ray review, i also remember being scared watching this on original transmission & as i said,in my previous post i didn’t know about Sarah Jane only K-9, i think the tone was little to dark for the pilot & needed Terrance Dicks write the pilot as someone who knows the character & tone the show should be, however instead you have a dark gothic pilot merged with those awful campy opening titles & cheesy song which will forever haunt me lol.
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Hi Simon.
Glad you enjoyed my updated review on ‘K-9 & Company’.
Thanks again for sharing your memories of being scared when you first saw this TV special and when you first saw Sarah Jane with K-9.
Yeah Terrance Dicks should’ve been writing this K-9 pilot with Sarah Jane, not Terence Dudley (no disrespect). I’ll have to check out those ‘Sarah Jane Smith’ audios by Big Finish and find out what they’re like with Terrance Dicks and Barry Letts writing a few of them.
The opening titles and theme music do seem contrived and cheesy don’t they? But the theme song is catchy, isn’t it? 😀
Thanks for your comments Simon.
Tim. 🙂
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Great review Tim.
It was nice to check out ‘A Girl’s Best Friend’ on Blu-Ray after I had finished watching Season 18. I saw it last Christmas so I’m a bit delayed in sharing my thoughts on it. But I have recently watched ‘Behind the Sofa’ for it.
I found the episode itself to be alright. I suppose I can agree with you that the tone was a bit off for the episode and should have been light-hearted, especially for starting the series off. I didn’t mind the opening title sequence and theme tune. I agree that it is catchy. I wish the series could have been given a chance to have more episodes with different premises.
I liked the chemistry shared between Sarah Jane and K-9. It was also refreshing to hear John Leeson voicing K-9 after hearing David Brierley voicing Mark 2 in ‘The Creature from the Pit’ which I will be sharing my thoughts on soon. I think K-9 Mark 3 had a good introduction. It’s sad knowing that this is the K-9 that sacrifices himself at the end of ‘School Reunion’.
How much of ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’ have you watched? I’ve only watched the first story ‘Invasion of the Bane’, but I hope to use Britbox to watch more of the series as well as using the Collection Season 10 box set to watch ‘Death of the Doctor’ featuring Lis Sladen with Katy Manning and Matt Smith.
Take care, WF92.
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Hi WF92,
Glad you enjoyed my review on ‘K-9 & Company’. Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the pilot episode. I’m pleased you found it alright. It’s a shame this never became a series but at least it’s a brave attempt.
Ah, so you’ve heard David Brierley voice K-9 in ‘The Creature From The Pit’. I’ll be interested to hear how you found his voice for K-9 in that. 😀 I’ve seen all of ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’. I’ve been meaning to review the series for some time on my blog, but I haven’t been able to find an opportunity to do so. Hopefully I will soon. I would like to share reviews on ‘The Wedding of Sarah Jane’ and ‘Death of the Doctor’ soon.
Many thanks for your comments.
Tim 🙂
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It may have been thanks to Wartime, P.R.O.B.E. and Downtime that sufficient creativity for Dr. Who companion spinoffs could be fully sparked. But as I much I could still like K-9 & Company and even more now thanks to the G7TV modern edit (to make it feel like part of the Sarah Jane Adventures), I understood why it didn’t succeed in becoming a series. Because one major challenge for a Dr. Who spinoff is for it to share a good deal of the parent series’ great dimensionality. From a most obvious viewpoint, K-9 & Company probably wouldn’t have achieved that. Certainly not as much as SJA, let alone Torchwood, Class and whatever new spinoffs that Russell T. Davies is planning now. And yet there’s always one good reason to admire K-9 & Company. Namely its reminder of how simpler the nostalgic Whoniverse felt in the 20th century. Thank you, Tim, for your review.
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Hi scifimike,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on ‘K-9 & Company’ and glad you enjoyed my review on the one-off spin-off episode featuring K-9 and Sarah Jane. It’s a shame this spin-off didn’t get a full series compared to ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’, but I appreciate the attempt to do it in 1981 and it’s brave attempt on the production team’s part to do a K-9 spin-off episode with him and Sarah Jane. I do wonder how many people went into ‘The Five Doctors’, not seen ‘K-9 and Company’, and became confused as to why Sarah Jane had K-9 when they didn’t meet during her travels with the Fourth Doctor. It got me confused when I was discovering the classic series after seeing ‘School Reunion’ and I didn’t realise Sarah Jane never met K-9 in the classic ‘Doctor Who’ TV series but in a one-off spin-off episode.
Many thanks,
Tim 🙂
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I seem to recall seeing The Five Doctors before K-9 & Company. That consequently made it all the more intriguing to learn how K-9 would be with Sarah Jane.
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Hi scifimike,
Yes, I more or less saw it the same way with checking out ‘School Reunion’ first, then ‘The Five Doctors’ and eventually ‘K-9 & Company’ to learn how Sarah Jane and K-9 ended up together. 😀
Thanks,
Tim 🙂
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It’s funny to look at ‘K9 and Company’ in isolation (sans multiverse) as the core idea itself is quite brilliant. The Austrian television series, ‘Inspector Rex’, would cover similar ground in the 1990s with an Alsatian police dog and his investigative police team. To great success. The original series ran for eight years before it was picked up by an Italian production company and a Canadian company after that.
“A Girl’s Best Friend”, unfortunately, doesn’t really know what it wants to do with the premise. As a pilot episode, the viewer has little idea of what to expect from a full series. The annual gives the impression that K9, Sarah, and company will face off against cultists and covens over their tenure. Not an impossible set-up, “Robin of Sherwood” would have great success with Pagan-inspired wyrd influences, demons, witches, and spellcraft, but on contemporary mid-80s Earth they’d have to be very clever about it to keep it interesting.
I wonder why they didn’t go with John Nathan-Turner’s suggestion that K9 was actually sent by the Master? That would’ve made for quite the debut. Reminiscent of the bait-and-switch involved behind ‘Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons’. A hero raised from involuntary turncoat villainy. It has some nice staying power.
I suppose that’s the only thing it’s missing, really. For fans of ‘Doctor Who’, K9 and Sarah’s stories would have felt like a return to early Pertwee, so… If the Doctor had the Master as his recurring adversary, what do K9 and Sarah have? A Tobias Vaughn? A Hilda Winters? A Harrison Chase? Why not make the recurring villains “companions” of the Master? Or even, perhaps, disciples — if they wanted to keep the cult aspect. A cult worshipping the Master under hypnosis and charged with causing trouble?
There’s a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book, written by Dave Martin, called “Search for the Doctor”, which features an unnamed protagonist (the reader), Drax… and K9 Mark III. Very specifically. Attempting to hunt down the Doctor who has been snared in a trap left by Omega in 2056. With ‘K9 and Company’ in mind… I wonder if Martin may have subconsciously written his interpretation of what a K9 spin-off could have looked like later in 1986.
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Hi Wolfie,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on ‘K-9 & Company’ and how the series could have been developed had it gone in a different direction. I still think having Terrance Dicks and/or Barry Letts writing for the show, including the pilot, instead of Terence Dudley would have been better, even if this was a one-off episode. I had no idea about JNT’s suggestion of K-9 being sent by the Master. That would have been interesting, especially when K-9 meets Sarah Jane, but I’m not sure how that would’ve worked considering the Master had no connection to K-9 beforehand. It probably inspired the Master meeting and owning Kamelion in ‘The King’s Demons’.
I think having either Tobias Vaughn, Hilda Winters or Harrison Chase as reoccuring villains would have been great had ‘K-9 & Company’ been green-lit as a series. I should check out the Target novelization/audiobook by Terence Dudley, which I have purchased, but haven’t got around to checking out yet. I also should check out the ‘Sarah Jane Smith’ series by Big Finish to find out how Terrance Dicks and Barry Letts made their contributions to the spin-off series and check whether my argument for them as writers for ‘K-9 & Company’ is valid.
Many thanks for your comments,
Tim 🙂
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Recurring spinoff villains that were specifically created in the parent series may not be the wisest move, in reflection of bringing Q and the Borg back into Star Trek: Voyager. It might occasionally work with a Sontaran in SJA, a Cyberwoman in Torchwood or even a Weeping Angel in Class. But fresh new villainies for spinoffs should provide creatively better stories and certainly for the companions’ best growth.
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Hi scifimike,
I know Hilda Winters appears in the ‘Sarah Jane Smth’ audio series by Big Finish, but I would need to check out the series in order to determine whether her return in that from ‘Robot’ is worthy to be remembered and be excited about.
I agree that there needs to be a freshness to the villains of a spin-off series, whether they be ‘Doctor Who’ or not. I enjoyed the Q and Borg episodes in ‘Voyager’. I need to do more ‘Voyager’ episode reviews to justify why I enjoyed them. 😀
Many thanks,
Tim 🙂
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Voyager wasn’t among the best Star Trek shows for me I’m sorry to say. But I’m glad that Janeway has returned for Prodigy which is certainly one of the best new Treks.
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Hi scifimike,
Not seen ‘Prodigy’ yet. There’s a lot of ‘Star Trek’ I haven’t seen yet. I’m planning to check out Season 3 of ‘Star Trek: Picard’ very soon.
Tim 🙂
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I can at least agree with some friends that the Borg and Q in Voyager were better as recurring villains than the Kazon. Since there are the obviously significant differences between Trek villains and Dr. Who villains, even between the Borg and the Cybermen, it benefited Trek hero-vs-villain relationships to be more personalized. Q and thanks to John de Lancie’s acting could certainly provide that.
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Hi scifimike,
I didn’t mind original ‘Voyager’ villains like the Kazon and the Vidiians when I saw them, though the Borg and Q are more enjoyable than them and I admit there’s limit to how you can do aggressive aliens like the Kazon and diseased aliens like the Vidiians, unless you’re clever and you can find ways to have them keep coming back (I’ve done hyper-aggressive villains in the Dwaxi for my ‘Fifth Doctor’ series in ‘Doctor Who’). I imagine the ‘Voyager’ writing team struggled with doing a ‘Lost In Space’-styled ‘Star Trek’. I haven’t seen all of ‘Lost In Space’ (I’ve mostly seen some Season 2 episodes), but I’m glad ‘Voyager’ has more variety in terms of planets as opposed to staying to just one planet.
Incidentally, I enjoyed the ‘Doctor Who’/’Star Trek’ crossover in ‘Assimilation2’ where the Eleventh Doctor, Amy and Rory meet the Enterprise-D crew from ‘TNG’ and they fought Cybermen and Borg. I’ve even reviewed the comic story here – https://bradleybasement.wordpress.com/sci-fi/doctor-who/doctor-who-timelines/the-doctors-timelines-index/the-eleventh-doctors-timeline/assimilation2-comic/
Thanks,
Tim 🙂
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Assimilation was a great crossover. I got it for my nephew.
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Well done! 😀 I hope he enjoys it (or enjoyed it). Tim 🙂
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Agreed. It’s better to have the hook for the bad guys come from a broadly similar premise, rather than a one-for-one duplication. Villains inspired by the ideas of the parent show can be quite compelling. But we have to remember, the strengths of ‘K9 and Company’ won’t necessarily be the same as ‘Doctor Who’.
Let’s look at each example, disassemble it down and rebuild them up again for K9:
Who was Tobias Vaughn? Well, broadly, Vaughn was a computer magnate with an international electronics company. A Vaughn-like character might have entered the show with the specific purpose of capturing K9 or discrediting Sarah’s journalism. And he could look anything like a Max Zorin to a Lux Luthor. Quite a natural combatant for K9.
Who was Harrison Chase? Again, broadly, a misanthropic aristocrat with enough money to launch an international expedition on a whim. To whatever prize he fancied. A malevolent treasure-hunting character would have slotted in quite easily during the early 1980s. A villainous Indiana Jones sort. Better, you could even make them a local neighbour (the squire’s family, etc). That plays quite well to Sarah’s character.
Who was Hilda Winters? Broadly, a cold-blooded fascist with designs that stretched to nuclear war. If K9 were ever recruited by the Ministry of Defence (a la ‘The Avengers’ or ‘The Saint’), then a hostile character deliberately invested in Cold War politics — someone who actually pits K9 and Sarah against one another — could have made for some harrowing episodes. An Emma Peel or Illya Kuryakin turned bad. That gives us something to shake things up occasionally.
The villain needs to be a foil for the protagonists (and vice versa). ‘Voyager’, for instance, tended to succeed with original opponents who were reflections of the crew’s own struggles. People looking for survival or to return to a better world. For K9, it would be:
– Someone with computer or electronics expertise;
– Someone with knowledge of the future and/or alien life, or;
– Someone assigned to protect, as K9 has been, or attack those protectors.
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Hi Wolfie,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on how Tobias Vaughn, Harrison Chase and Hilda Winters could have worked as villains for Sarah Jane and K-9 in ‘K-9 & Company’. I honestly wouldn’t have minded those three appearing in the series if it ever happened. So long as there was a mixture of original and classic ‘Doctor Who’ villains in ‘K-9 & Company’, I’d be happy.
Many thanks,
Tim 🙂
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Hi Tim,
No, characters inspired by those on ‘Who’. Not the characters themselves. Both Vaughn and Chase are dead by the end of their respective stories on ‘Doctor Who’.
Best,
Wolfie
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Hi Wolfie,
Ah yes, characters inspired by those villains rather than the actual villains themselves. That makes sense. Although, I recall Tobias Vaughn sort-of returning in ‘Original Sin’, both book and audio. Mind you, it’s been a while since I’ve heard that story and I would need to revisit it to be sure.
Thanks,
Tim 🙂
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Hi Tim,
Oh, “Original Sin” is a very interesting case. I won’t spoil anything for you and try to keep it vague: Yes, Vaughn is killed at the end of “The Invasion”, but… That means something very different to a man like Tobias Vaughn.
Vaughn is also an implied to be a backer behind the events of “The Scales of Injustice”, “The Green Death”, “Robot”, and others. *taps nose* His history is a lot clearer in the novel version of “Original Sin”.
Best,
Wolfie
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Hi Wolfie,
Ah, now that’s interesting. I’ll have to check out both book and audio versions of ‘Original Sin’ to find out more on how significant Tobias Vaughn’s place in ‘Doctor Who’ history is compared to just seeing him in ‘The Invasion’.
Many thanks,
Tim 🙂
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