Robot
Story: Robot – Season 12, Story 75
Year: 1974/75
Written by: Terrance Dicks
Directed by: Christopher Barry
Synopsis: As the Doctor recovers from his regeneration, Sarah is busy looking into mysterious activities at a scientific research centre. Meanwhile, someone - or something - is stealing all the vital elements to make a disintegrator gun...
Sarah Moments:
• She holds the Doctor’s hand and looks after him after he regenerates
• She flirts like mad with the Brigadier and gets him to get her a visitors’ pass to Think Tank
• She charges straight through the ‘Positively No Admittance’ door into the Robotics Section
• She sneaks back in later to get a look at the robot she knows must be there – and it is!!
• She empathises with the poor, confused robot
• She goes to rescue the Doctor from the robot after he’s lured into a trap, and manages to stop it because it remembers her as the person who felt sorry for it earlier. (Which just goes to show, you should always be nice to seven-foot-tall robots with big claws). And then Benton shoots it anyway.
• She sneaks into the SRS meeting, but gets discovered
• She threatens Evil Hilda Winters with a gun!
• She tries to persuade the robot not to destroy the world. It tries anyway.
Capture, Rescue and Mortal Peril:
• Evil Hilda Winters tells the robot to destroy Sarah! But it can’t, because that would violate it’s prime directive. Phew.
• She is taken hostage by Evil Hilda Winters, and tied up along with Harry
• She and Harry manage to escape, rescue Professor Kettlewell and let UNIT into the bunker
• She gets kidnapped by the robot
• When she tries to run away from the now-gigantic robot, it puts her on the roof!
• Benton helps her down from the roof
Quotes:
• ‘You realise, of course, Miss Smith, all this is top secret?’ ‘Then why are you telling me?’ ‘Well, because I... because there’s no-one else I can tell.’ - The Brigadier and Sarah.
• ‘You’re sure you’ve got the right man to look after him?’ ‘Young Sullivan? Oh, he’s a very fine chap – first class doctor.’ ‘Seems a bit... old-fashioned.’ ‘Nothing wrong with that, Miss Smith. You may not have noticed, but I’m a bit old-fashioned myself.’ ‘Oh, nonsense, Brigadier – you’re a swinger!’ - Oh, really, Sarah?
• ‘That was a cruel thing to do.’ ‘Cruel? It isn’t human, you know, it has no feelings.’ ‘Well, it’s got a brain, hasn’t it? It walks and talks like us. How can you be sure it doesn’t have feelings too? (to the robot) Are you all right?’ - Sarah tells Hilda Winters off
• ‘Really, Miss Smith, this is absurd. I think you must be the sort of girl who gives motor cars pet names.’ - Hilda Winters disapproves of Sarah being nice to the robot
• ‘There can’t be many groups of people in the country with the money and resources to design and build something like...’ ‘...an enormous robot, and it was seven feet tall!’ ‘Yes, something like that. However did you guess?’ ‘Guess? I’ve just seen it, I’ve been talking to it!’ - As the Doctor theorises, Sarah enters the room, in the middle of telling Harry about her day
• ‘Look, it’s obvious that that Think Tank lot are involved. Why don’t you just raid the place and arrest the lot of them?’ - If Sarah ran UNIT, things would be very different...
• ‘Why not? Your chance to be a real James Bond!’ - Sarah to Harry, when it's suggested that he should go undercover at Think Tank
• ‘Doctor, what are we going to do? Or shall we leave it all to Miss Smith?’ - The Brigadier, feeling a bit redundant
• ‘Your own attire – is it really suitable?’ ‘Trousers? Well, surely that’s a matter for me to decide!’ ‘As things are at the moment, it is. But in a more rationally ordered society...’ ‘I would wear what you thought was good for me. I see. And think what you thought was good for me too?’ ‘It would be for your own good!’ - Mr Short of the Scientific Reform Society doesn't approve of Sarah's sartorial tastes
• ‘I do hope you’ll include us in your article. We’ve been sadly misrepresented.’ ‘Really? Well, we’re covering a number of fringe organisations, and I’m sure we’ll find a place for you – somewhere between the flying saucer people and the Flat Earthers!’ - PWNED! Sarah puts Mr Short in his place. To get the full effect of this quote you need to watch the episode, because the best bit is the little face she makes at the end...
• ‘But the Brigadier will go spare, and so will the Doctor!’ ‘Well, one’s away and the other’s asleep!’ ‘Well, I’ll go and wake the Doctor and see what he says!’ ‘Don’t you dare! He had a nasty knock on the head and he needs to rest.’ ‘In that case, Miss, it’s just not on, I’m sorry.’ ‘Ohh... Mister Benton, are we members of UNIT?’ ‘No, of course not.’ ‘Are we under arrest?’ ‘No, Miss.’ ‘Well then, what we do and where we go is none of your business, is it? Come along, Professor.’ ‘Wouldn’t it be best if you...’ ‘So just you go and blanco your rifle or something, hmm?’ - Sarah wants to go to the SRS meeting, and poor old Benton can't stop her
• ‘James Bond?!’ - Sarah, derisively, when she discovers that Harry is a captive too
• ‘You won’t shoot, Brigadier.’ ‘Maybe he won’t – but I will!’ - Hilda Winters and Sarah
• ‘I can bring about the destruction of humanity! But do not fear, Sarah – you alone will be saved.’ - The robot tries to reassure Sarah
• ‘It was insane and it did terrible things, but, but, at first... it was so human!’ ‘It was a wonderful creature, capable of great good, and great evil. Yes, I think you could say it was human.’ - Sarah and the Doctor, on the robot
• ‘Doctor, you’re being childish.’ ‘Well of course I am! There’s no point in being grown-up if you can’t be childish sometimes! Are you coming?’ - Sarah and the Doctor, off on another whirlwind adventure
From the Target Novelisation:
Novelised by Terrance Dicks
• Yates had called in that journalist girl, Sarah Jane Smith - The Brigadier apparently still thinks of Sarah this way
• Although she wasn't a member of UNIT, Sarah's friendship with the Doctor made her a kind of unofficial agent. - Aw, that's sweet
• 'I'm very keen to get away from all this woman's angle stuff, and if I could come up with a really good scientific story...' - Sarah explains her motives for investigating Think Tank
• Sarah thought he looked rather like the hero of a Boy's Own Paper adventure yarn. He immediately made you think of Biggles or Bulldog Drummond. - Sarah's first impression of Harry
• Faintly, he heard the hammering on the door, and the sound of Sarah's voice. He reached for the switch, then withdrew his hand. There was something about that voice, a note of anguish or appeal that was difficult to ignore. He put the TARDIS on shutdown, and pressed the control which opened the door. - The Doctor decides not to leave because of Sarah, yay!
• 'And Sarah Jane Smith! Well, well, well, this is quite a reunion!' He stretched out his other arm and drew Sarah to him in a friendly bear-hug. - The Doctor doesn't do this in the episode, but how cute?
• 'That journalist girl's arrived,' he said. 'The one with the UNIT pass, they telephoned about her.' - Jellicoe is already familiar with Sarah's UNIT nickname...
• 'If UNIT intended to investigate us, they could find better agents than a freelance female journalist.' - That's what you think now, Miss Winters!
• They'd soon discovered her lack of formal scientific training, and instead of simplifying their explanations, had taken every opportunity to bombard her with scientific data. - The Think Tank folk are mean to Sarah
• Quite a drive there and back, and then on to London. Still, a story was a story. And the thought of getting the better of that smug pair at Think Tank justified any amount of effort. Full of professional zeal, Sarah started the car. - Sarah decides to track down Kettlewell
• Eventually the guard reappeared. To her surprise he said, 'It's okay, miss. You can go in. Be as quick as you can, please.' - In the episode, Sarah distracts the guard and sneaks in
• As the Robot stalked towards her, huge metal hands outstretched, Sarah fainted dead way... - Not in the broadcast version, she didn't!
• The thought of Miss Winters in handcuffs gave Sarah considerable pleasure. - You know... I'm not even going to touch this one...
• Harry spent a good deal of his off-duty time reading lurid thrillers. - Apparently
• [The Brigadier] usually had to chase Sarah away from UNIT H.Q., which she seemed to regard as a second home - That's rather sweet, really
• 'To whom it may concern: Professor Kettlewell tells me he has the Robot hidden at his cottage. Gone to meet him there. PS. If the Robot really is there, I think I can deal with it. PPS. I am leaving this note in case I can't!' - In the TV version, this note is addressed to Sarah specifically
• Miss Smith had gone off on a wild, dangerous and unauthorised mission with the one and only independent witness! - The Brigadier is cross with Sarah
• An ugly growl rose from the crowd, and they began to surge forward. Jellicoe muttered, 'Stop them, you've got them so worked up they'll tear her to pieces.' Miss Winters said nothing. She watched with evident enjoyment as the crowd closed in on Sarah. Her tape-recorder and camera were smashed. Sarah, struggling wildly, was grabbed. - Sarah's capture by the SRS is more violent than in the TV version
• Now that the crisis was over, she felt tired and drained. She was also shocked by the realisation that she really had been prepared to shoot Miss Winters. What she now wanted more than anything else was a long rest. Suddenly she couldn't bear to stay in the tiny, airless room full of noisy, jubilant men any longer. - Poor Sarah!
• She had even managed to make a light meal on tinned lobster and champagne, though under the circumstances her appetite had been far from good. - Even when you're being held prisoner by a robot, there's always time for a gourmet snack...
• Sarah looked at him. The very idea was ridiculous, of course. She had deadlines to meet, commitments to honour. If she went off in the TARDIS there was no telling where or when she'd end up. Or what kind of terrifying danger she'd run in to. - But still, she can't resist...
Wardrobe Appreciation
It's all go today - Sarah wears a whole bunch of different outfits!
The first one she wears only very briefly - the one she was wearing at the end of Planet of the Spiders, for the Doctor's regeneration.
After that she swiftly changes into a blue skirt suit, with an adorable white hat.
It was difficult to capture the details for this one, but in this shot you can see the pattern on the suit, the necklace, the gloves and the watch...
Soon it's all change again, and she opts for this outfit to go and quiz the SRS:
Here's a closer look at the cardigan and the shoes, and one of the bandana and her lovely chunky bracelet
And, just for fun, another look at the bandana...
The final outfit of the story is the one she's about to wear in The Ark In Space, which follows immediately on from this story. I know some people aren't keen on this flowery dress, but I rather like it
The Panel Said...
Style Watch:
paranoidangel: I do hate that dress at the end but the other outfits are nice. The bandana looks great, and she does look quite sweet in the suit and hat. 7/10
Cadi: I like the blue skirt, but I'm not so sure about the other outfits...and I don't like the dress, sorry :P
hhertzof: The collar on the first outfit - is she trying to put someone's eye out? I like the second suit but it has a 50's/60's feel not modern for the 70's. I liked the third outfit and loathed the dress. 7/10
Llin: Words cannot describe how much I love that blue outfit. And the others are all pretty good too. 9/10
Sarah_JaneSmith: I'm not keen on the first outifit, i love the blue suit with the little bonnet though and i think the cardigan and bandana ensemble is adorable, However! i absolutely positively passionately with every fibre of my being DETEST that flowery dress, it's not flattering at all and does nothing for her, i dont know what the hell they were thinking putting her in that, she's a 20 something woman not a grandmother! 6/10
Sarah Watch:
paranoidangel: I like that Sarah's the one going off and doing stuff for most of the story while the Doctor's incapacitated. And making friends a lot :) 8/10
hhertzof: Very girl reporter. I'd like it better if she was getting herself out of jams rather than getting herself into them 7/10
Llin: She doesn't take any crap from anybody and just barges into places she isn't supposed to be. And she's nice to the poor robot. 9/10
Sarah_JaneSmith: Oh she's brilliant in this, being nice to the robot, flirting with the brig, sneaking into SRS and pulling a gun on Miss Winters, i think you've made an enemy for life there Sarah. 9/10
Story Watch:
paranoidangel: The giant robot's a bit dodgy but I like the new Doctor and everyone's reactions to him, and Harry's quite funny, not having a clue. And it's quite sweet the Brigadier's a bit lost without the Doctor. 7/10
hhertzof: I was more interested in the links to the audios, than the story itself. I wish they had shown more of Sarah getting used to the new Doctor. 6/10
Llin: Quite a lot going on, and I didn't see the twist coming. 7/10
Sarah_JaneSmith: Ok there's poor special effects but i love the allusions to King Kong, not bad at all. 9/10
Bonus Pictures
Sarah, in glorious Robovision!
A very scary lady...
The Doctor gets to change outfits too!
"Brigadier, we're getting married!"
The love that dare not speak its name...
What a lovely smile!
"Yes... I'm on the mobile..."
Our two favourite boys...
And our two other favourite boys!
The Doctor sings karaoke and breaks into places
Harry, James Bond-ing
The Doctor and Sarah have a good laugh at Harry's expense. Ah, happy days...
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