K9

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1.17 Lost Library of Ukko:
Starkey and Darius uses the Department Careers’ Day as an opportunity to search Thorne’s office but it was a trap by Thorne as Starkey was literally sucked into the library card from Ukko.
From the looks of it Thorne is worse than Drake.
K9 says mistressed instead of mastered in reference to the fact that the librarians of Ukko are all female.
Very amusing K9 in goggles.
This is perhaps K9’s best episode with his verbal duel against Thorne.
Due to a trick from Darius, Jorjie and K9, Thorne got sucked into the card. Served him right for him about to double cross them.
Quite funny in order for both Starkey and Thorne to get out of the card they have to appear as one entity meaning they had to embrace each other.
The library lady was an enjoyable character and she was certainly portrayed well by Cathey Robinson.

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1.18 Mutant Copper:
After a protest Starkey, Jorjie and new friend Marcus encounters a rogue CCPC that the other CCPCs were looking for. This CCPC is a rogue because its systems are damaged. Due to Jorjie’s compassionate nature they take the CCPC, who Jorjie named Birdy due to its obsession with birds, take it to the Gryffen mansion where the professor finds that Birdy has human intelligence. It was an experiment from the Department that gone wrong.
Jorjie made a faux pas in calling Birdy a lost puppy in K9’s presence.
Marcus was a distraction as I wondered whether he was meant to be a new regular character or a one-off. He would proved to be the latter as Marcus turned out to be a traitor who informed the Department about Birdy’s location in the mansion.
I think writer John O’Brien had good heart in writing this episode to evoke sympathy in Birdy which he does succeed but the presentation of the episode felt a little off.

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1.19 The Custodians:
Children including Jorjie and Darius are in a trance as a result of a new virtual reality game called Little Green Men (not a very imaginative name).
As the Professor always stays at home, he stays there to tend to Jorjie and Darius whilst June, Starkey and K9 goes to Green Room Entertainment, the makers of Little Green Men in order to investigate the situation.
Perhaps not surprising that it turned out to be an experiment from Thorne with the help of Senior Vice President of Green Room Entertainment John who is also a custodian. The custodians are wardens of juvenile detention centres. Despite the plural in the title, John is the only custodian who appears here.
The experiment involves an Etydien, the last member of his race telepathically controlling children via Little Green Men. The purpose of this experiment is that since children are the future, the Department gets to control the future. The experiment however backfires when the Etydien had other ideas that of recreating his society by turning Earth’s children into his race.
The custodian John was very irritating with his smile. I really wanted to whack his head for smiling even after June told him about the situation with the children and when he had the nerve to blackmail Thorne as payment to stop the experiment to save the children. Felt satisfying that he stopped smiling when he found the situation was not in his control.
It was well played when Robyn Moore as June pleaded with the Etydien to save Jorjie as the emotion here was well displayed.
Quite like that the episode ended with a shot of a just recovered Jorjie with a smile on her face.

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1.20 Taphony and The Time Loop:
The episode title was the one I found most curious due to the word Taphony and upon watching it I finally found out what it meant, it is the name of the girl who was developed as a time being by the Department.
The opening scene in which we are introduced to Taphony is quite akin to how we were introduced to the girl in Steven Moffat’s Doctor Who Library story.
Taphony has the ability to sustained her own life by absorbing other people’s life forces much like another of Steven Moffat’s other creations the Weeping Angels. Therefore it was essential for Taphony to go into a time portal as it is dangerous for her to roam about in ‘our’ world.
It was quite moving when the Professor, June, Starkey and Darius were willing to trade their lives for Jorjie whose life force had been absorbed by Taphony. It is here that K9 earns points for being the series title character when it was he that ultimately convinces her to go into the time portal. Taphony learns, that with the others willing to sacrifice themselves for Jorjie, the value of friendship.
Taphony and the Time Loop certainly delivered well the message of friendship.
One thing that is notable about the episode title is that it served as an index to the whole story, it begins with us seeing Taphony and ends with a time loop in which everyone except K9 has forgotten their experiences with Taphony in the mansion.

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1.23 Angel of the North:
The title refers to the spaceship that has been called the Fallen Angel and where the STM was taken from and it is in Canada.
Written by K9 co-creator Bob Baker in his first solo script for the series and his first solo Doctor Who related TV story since Nightmare of Eden, one that featured K9 Mark II in 1979.
Unlike Baker’s very first episode for the K9 series, the previous one Mind Snap (with fellow series co-creator Paul Tams) Angel of the North is completely new in content.
The STM has been affected by activity coming out of the Fallen Angel. This leads to the Professor finally getting out of the house. Accompanied by Thorne and some CCPCs, Gryffen goes to the Fallen Angel to get the temporal stabiliser, a part that can get the STM to work accurately.
Despite its unpredictability K9 and Starkey uses the STM to follow the Professor to the Fallen Angel.
Very amusing when Starkey said about synchronising watches, K9 says that he is not a watchdog.
The Fallen Angel is ultimately revealed to be a Korven ship with a Korven appearing here.
In his first solo script for the series, Bob Baker writes Angel of the North as a top notch and very solid adventure. The quality of Angel of the North certainly surpassed my expectations of it.

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1.24 The Last Precinct:
The Last Precinct is a group of former human police officers who had lost their jobs when they were replaced by the CCPCs. As a contradiction in terms, The Last Precinct is an illegal police force and they are seen here when they invade the Gryffen mansion. Their leader is revealed to be Sergeant Harry Pike, Darius’ father.
With Gryffen and the kids held hostage, Sergeant Pike infects a CCPC with a virus to pass on to the other CCPCs. The plan is that with the corruption in the CCPCs’ systems there would be no choice but to reinstate the former human police officers.
However this plan goes haywire when the first infected CCPC goes haywire itself when it turned on The Last Precinct.
Written by series developers Shayne Armstrong and SP Krause and along with the primary storyline about The Last Precinct, they expanded well Darius’ background.
This episode also presents the message that no one can choose their parents.
Both Jorjie and Darius expressed disappointment with their respective parents’ positions of authority. For Jorjie it is with June being involved in the making of the CCPCs and Darius with Harry abandoning his family for The Last Precinct.
However as the orphan Starkey pointed out Jorjie and Darius are lucky to have parents whereas Starkey has none at all.
With series developers Shayne Armstrong and SP Krause having introduced the CCPCs at the beginning of the series, it was only right that they are the ones to show the consequences for the human police officers that they replaced.

I am pretty sure that The Last Precinct being about a group against the current authorities is coincidental to the fact that it was screened by Network Ten in Australia on September 11 2010.

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1.25 Hound of the Korven:
Penultimate episode of season 1.
The title refers to none other than K9 himself. Unlike other monsters who had their names in story titles like the Daleks, Cybermen and Sontarans, the Korven were a complete no-show for this episode.
The episode instead has Thorne offering a deal to K9 for K9 to give Thorne his regeneration unit in exchange for K9’s memory chip.
However K9’s memory chip turned out to be a bomb. K9 as a bomb has been set to explode upon encountering his target, that of a Jixen.
Jixie (as named by Starkey as individual Jixens don’t have names to distinguish themselves from one another) soon revealed that the Jixens were actually peaceful emissaries who came to warn Earth about the invasion of the Korven and that K9 has been used to destroy the Jixens hence the bomb.
This was the second episode in a row written by series developers Shayne Armstrong and SP Krause which was why the storyline about Darius’ father Harry Pike from the previous episode The Last Precinct had been used as the setting point for Thorne presenting his deal to K9.
Prior to the debut of K9 the titles for the first and second half of the 26 episodes were revealed within a short period of time. So it would seem that Armstrong and Krause had decided from the outset to make the Jixens made to appear as the bad guys only for them to be revealed in this episode as the good guys all along.
The resolution of K9 as a bomb was not bad and a good lead-up to the season finale Eclipse of the Korven.

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1.26 The Eclipse of the Korven:
Season 1 finale written by series developers Shayne Armstrong and SP Krause.
Armstrong and Krause does an adequate task in setting up this season finale.
Not a bad design of the super soldier monster.
June got demoted to constable and an office in the basement as a result of her going against orders in the previous episode Hound of the Korven. However it was a delight when she pulled her big gun to shoot the CCPCs.
The Korven invasion was not unexpected but what was unexpected was Thorne being their ally and the reason for him doing so as I really did not see it coming.
Notwithstanding him leaving the mansion before in Angel of the North, very commendable how much strength it took the Professor to leave the mansion to successfully quash the Korven invasion.
While the Korven invasion got quashed, Thorne’s fate is ambiguous.
Very awkward scene when Darius was on top of June as a result of being knocked unconscious by the explosion of the STM.
I found the most impressive and most moving part of the episode was when the others show their sorrow over K9’s ‘death’. The direction by director David Napier of this scene was well handled.
Of course with kids being the target audience, K9 does come back to life at the very end.

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According to the Stewart and Wall Entertainment site, the second season of K9 is in development to begin production next year 2011:
stewart-wall-entertainment.com/in-development/childrensTelevisionDetail.php?K9-Series-II-1

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Paul Tams has given an update about K9 season 2 and can be read here:
www.doctorwhonews.net/2011/12/dwn051211190008-k9-series-and.html

Tams have cited the economic climate as one reason why it has been slow going so far more than a year after the end of season 1.
Tams also revealed that the production team has been developing two other shows unrelated to K9 as being another reason for the delay in starting the production of season 2.

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K9 and Company was the very first Doctor Who TV spinoff but its first episode A Girl’s Best Friend would turn out to be its last.
As a result of K9 and Company, being a one-off, it easily been overlooked not to mention as simply K9 and Company with no one bothering to remember the A Girl’s Best Friend title and/or absorbed within “classic” Doctor Who. In regards to the latter I have seen it being written as Doctor Who: K9 and Company in catalogues.
For K9 and Company’s DVD release it came under the purview of the “classic” Doctor Who range with it being part of the K9 Tales set along with the Doctor Who story that introduced K9, The Invisible Enemy.
Although K9 and Company was released as part of the “classic” Doctor Who range, its DVD sleeve presented it as its own show the style of it being distinctive to Doctor Who.
Despite the DVD sleeve presenting the distinction of K9 and Company to its parent Doctor Who it isn’t reflected on the content of the disc.
The K9 and Company disc content is the same in template to the “classic” Doctor Who discs. That is, it has the flying TARDIS followed by the big Doctor Who logo and then comes the menu.
On the menu the Doctor Who logo is placed next to the spinoff title making it look like “Doctor Who: K9 and Company: A Girl’s Best Friend” and the menu like the “classic” Doctor Who discs has the TARDIS roundels.
The presence of what is usual for the template of a “classic” Doctor Who disc on the K9 and Company disc could easily be explained of presenting consistency with the “classic” Doctor Who range.
In the end it is really about maintaining the perception of the absorption of K9 and Company with “classic” Doctor Who.
The K9 and Company disc complements the Sarah Jane Adventures season 1 DVD disc. The perception of K9 and Company being part of “classic” Doctor Who would perhaps explains the timeline on the SJA season 1 DVD.
The timeline features clips of Sarah’s episodes of “classic” and “new” Doctor Who and the first SJA episode Invasion of the Bane but not K9 and Company. A definite oversight as K9 and Company is much a part of Sarah’s history as that of Doctor Who and The Sarah Jane Adventures.

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K9 and Company: A Girl’s Best Friend:
The sleeve notes stated that Doctor Who producer John Nathan-Turner only made K9 and Company in response to the outrage that was sparked when the decision was made to write K9 out of Doctor Who.
However the DVD info text written by Martin Wiggins seems to contradict this. The info text stated that Nathan-Turner always wanted to do a K9 special but it could only been made if K9 was out of Doctor Who.
One thing that Wiggins did not point out with his notes is the dialogue between Lily Gregson and Sarah when they first met. Sarah was looking for her missing Aunt Lavinia and asked Lily about when she last saw her.
Lily acts like she and Lavinia were friends. However this is contrasted to when Lavinia appeared at the beginning as she had trouble remember Lily’s name.
Lily worked in the local post office and with Lavinia not remembering Lily’s name it would suggest they are nothing more than passing acquaintances. I would have thought that Wiggins would have pointed this out in his notes as that was a clue to the nature of Lily’s role in the story.
Wiggins stated that prior to K9 and Company, Lis Sladen was in Gulliver in Lilliput playing Lady Filmnap and described a Daily Express columnist as careless when this columnist wrote that Lady Filmnap was played by Sarah Jane Smith rather than Lis Sladen’s own name.
Unfortunately Mr Wiggins could easily be accused of being careless in confusing between character and actor’s name. When Wiggins wrote that with K9 Mark III being on Earth he had to be accompanied by a former human companion of the Doctor’s and Wiggins stated it was Sarah Jane Smith (not Lis Sladen’s own name) who suggested herself to be that former human companion.
Wiggins stated “curiosity killed the cat” when K9 stated it in a different way and yet he did not define what compos mentis when this was said by Sarah.
For those curious to know compos mentis means “literally, being in full possession of one’s mind”.
Wiggins mentioned that K9 creators Bob Baker and Dave Martin were not happy on not being asked to write for K9 and Company.
K9 and Company went ahead without any consultation with Baker and Martin and as Wiggins stated Nathan-Turner mollified them by promising that if K9 and Company became a series (which it didn’t) they would get to write for it.
It would seem that Nathan-Turner did not learn anything when it came to creations from Baker and Martin.
Baker and Martin had previously created Omega for The Three Doctors. Omega would return in 1983 in Arc of Infinity but as stated in the DVD info text for Arc of Infinity, Baker and Martin only found out about Omega in this story when they saw it on its original transmission. This situation was quickly resolved when Nathan-Turner paid a belated-fee to Baker and Martin for the use of Omega.

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K9 and the Beasts of Vega:
Included on the K9 and Company disc which in turn is part of the Doctor Who: K9 Tales set is the book K9 and the Beasts of Vega written by K9 co-creator Dave Martin in 1980 for younger children featuring K9 in situations without the Doctor.

This adventure has K9 on a spaceship, one that is constructing a planet when the titular Beasts of Vega.
Accompanying by nice illustrations, this is a pretty enjoyable story with the Beasts of Vega being presented as quite a menace in the story before K9 reveals why they did what they did here.
It is also amusing that natives of Vega are called Vegans!

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Paul Tams has provided an update on K9 season 2 which includes Bob Baker writing more for this season:
www.doctorwhonews.net/2012/06/dwn1306104508-k9-series-update.html

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K9 and the Missing Planet:
Second book presented in the DVD of K9 and Company although it seems to be the fourth and last in this series of books.
In this adventure a planet goes missing and K9 is sent to find it.
Not bad the mystery and intrigue when K9 finds the said planet.