The Krotons

The rules on the Planet of the Gonds are simple: you do what the Krotons want, or else. You learn what they tell you is important and if you’re very clever and smart you get to leave your simple life and become a Companion of the Krotons. If you are a Gond, this is what life is all about. It also gets you killed. The Doctor, Jamie and Zoe discover that to become a Companion of the Krotons is to have your prized intellect sucked out of you for their purposes and your body is vaporized. The Krotons have decimated the planet once and will do so again if they are defied, but if you’re extremely clever, like the Doctor and Zoe, you get to live a bit longer. But you’re still going to die.

It’s a simple oppressor / oppressed story, really, nothing too complicated and certainly not the most promising start for one Robert Holmes, who will pen some of the best Doctor Who episodes ever as the series carries on and on. In his debut effort he gives us the steady trio of the TARDIS crew at their most ordinary; the Doctor is clever and smirks a lot, Zoe is clever and a bit full of herself for it, and Jamie is not clever but still smart enough to be headstrong and effective. And there’s really nothing wrong with that at all; the TARDIS crew can be simple and enjoyable together without heaps of personal baggage or the companion being some lynchpin to the future of the universe or secretly (or openly) going all doe-eyed over the Doctor (yes I am going to that shit-on-the-current-series place again). Holmes' trademark, though, will emerge as the presence of an engaging double-act among the supporting cast; there is just not such a combo here this time.

Unless it's the pair of Krotons themselves. How about those Krotons eh? Big shiny crystal light bulbs with deep booming voices. Admittedly the voice could be very intimidating if you’re a simple people, and you’d probably do what it wants just to make it stop. They don’t have a lot of dexterity in those pincer hands though, can’t even really hold their weapons either. And they’re practically blind. But the power to level a planet and poison it for generations makes the Gonds overlook all that and live in fear. One can't help but imagine there is a bit of a camaraderie between the two of them which we don't normally see when it's two Daleks or Cybermen talking to each other. The Krotons are certainly different from those hallmark baddies in that they are capable of getting angry and will in fact yell when getting frustrated - usually with the Doctor.

The Gonds aren’t mindless by any stretch, and among them are some who would rise against the Krotons and deny them their Companions; Abu defies the will of his father and dares to protect Varna, the woman he loves, from the Krotons. Other Gonds are quick to side with the Krotons until they see some advantage to defying them as well and hope to rise to some sort of political power by doing so. Still, people who are dressed as Sensorites (minus the round feet) aren’t going to do very well without the Doctor’s help.

The Second Doctor’s final season is really starting to head to its end, but from a simple tale to a more complicated one we go, and then the expanded universe of novels and audio will fill out some gaps between the remaining three televised stories…

NEXT EPISODE: THE JIGSAW WAR