K-9 and Company: A Girl's Best Friend (TV 1981)

Spin-off from "Doctor Who" which, despite good ratings, didn't get past the pilot stage. One time companion to a mysterious and body-changing alien known as "The Doctor", Sarah Jane Smith ... See full summary »

Director:

John Black

Writer:

Terence Dudley

Stars:

Elisabeth Sladen, John Leeson, Bill Fraser

Cast

Credited cast:
Elisabeth Sladen	...	Sarah Jane Smith
John Leeson	...	K-9 (voice)
Bill Fraser	...	Commander Bill Pollock
Ian Sears	...	Brendan Richards
Colin Jeavons	...	George Tracey
Sean Chapman	...	Peter Tracey
Mary Wimbush	...	Aunt Lavinia Smith
Linda Polan	...	Juno Baker
Gillian Martell	...	Lilly Gregson
Neville Barber	...	Howard Baker
John Quarmby	...	Henry Tobias
Nigel Gregory	...	Sergeant Vince Wilson
Stephen Oxley	...	P.C. Carter
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Sally Ann Wright	...	Coven Member

Storyline

Spin-off from "Doctor Who" which, despite good ratings, didn't get past the pilot stage. One time companion to a mysterious and body-changing alien known as "The Doctor", Sarah Jane Smith returns to Earth and carries on with her journalist career. Now, in 1981, she has managed to rebuild her career and has come, a matter of days before Christmas, to her Aunt Lavinia's (a famous scientist) house in the sleepy English village of Moreton Harwood to write a book and to rest after her world-travelling assignments. However, her journalist's nose sniffs out another mystery when she arrives to find Aunt Lavinia gone, and nobody knows where she is, but the local rumour is that she was the victim of a local witch coven. Worshipers of a pagan goddess Hecate gather to celebrate a festival by ritually murdering a friend of Sarah's. She needs help... and she gets it from a box from her friend "The Doctor." Inside the box is a metal robotic but almost human-like talking dog called K-9 that is built ...

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Plot Keywords:

christmas | doctor who | spin off | 1980s | number in title | 

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Genres:

Mystery | Sci-Fi

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Details

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

28 December 1981 (UK)

Also Known As:

K-9 and Company

Filming Locations:

Miserden, Gloucestershire, England, UK

Company Credits

Production Co:

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)

Technical Specs

Runtime:

50 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Trivia

Had a series been developed, it was planned to reveal (probably around the end of the first season) that K-9 had in fact been sent by The Master.

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Quotes

Juno Baker: [to Sarah Jane] We'll have you tucked up in bed well before midnight.

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Connections

Featured in TV's Finest Failures (2001)

User Reviews

You can see why this never became a series

OK but ultimately silly children's adventure series pilot which despite good ratings never it into an on-going series.

One major criticism for this pilot with its contemporary rural English setting is that there was nowhere for a continuing series to go. Removing K-9 from the "Doctor Who" sci-fi world of fantasy alien planets with smooth-floored jungle habitats and space stations with conveniently wide doorways and hallways just highlights that he is ludicrously ill-equipped to travel in any real-life location. Here Sarah-Jane drives him around in her car a lot, and presumably lifts him in and out of it, up and down steps and slopes and along gravel paths. This means he is not all that useful, and can be used in only limited situations. Plus in the rural English setting and the comparatively prosaic dangers it presents, K-9 can be of little help except to occasionally use his stun gun on intruders. How long can a series where the only action (apart from the occasional Emma Peel-style judo flip and bit of stunt driving from Sarah-Jane) is K-9's stun gun attacks? And what happens when the UK authorities (not to mention the newspapers) learn of K-9's existence in rural England? To escape being seized by the authorities, K-9 must presumably be mainly kept hidden, further limiting the part he may play in any adventures.

K-9 was very much a support character in "Doctor Who"; rarely a main part of any adventure he more frequently wheeled into shot just in time to shoot the baddie and make a comic remark before quickly exiting stage left. He did not carry the stories along in "Doctor Who", and neither did Sarah-Jane, and this pilot makes clear that neither can effectively carry the sci-fi styled mystery story along.

The plot is fairly childish, with eerie music played when certain characters appear - apparently to suggest to guessing viewers that they might be a villain, and there are constant phone calls to push the story along. Having Sarah-Jane acting nervous and thoroughly suspicious of all the townsfolk and their motives is a device to launch us straight into the story, although it is implausible and out-of-keeping with the more open-minded, don't-jump-to-conclusions atmosphere usually typical of "Doctor Who". The script does not present a high level of sophistication implying that the ee-arr accents of the townsfolk are a sign of their villainy. This is reinforced by their sinister and heavy-handed "we don't take to strangers 'round 'ere"-type behaviour, while the two parochial and unfriendly market gardeners who are strongly suspicious of "science" are particularly silly. At another time, a young man is described as resembling "a gypsy", despite his trendy (for 1981) haircut, blue jeans and bikers' leather jacket.

There are also problems with Sarah's nephew, a nerdy scholar clearly moulded in the stereotype of a "computer nerd" or a "Doctor Who" fan. Possibly more effective would have been more an action-oriented and non-technically-minded and street-smart youth to contrast and to bounce off the thoughtful and intellectual Sarah and the super-intelligent K-9 - just like how the non-technically-minded Leela worked so well with her co-stars in "Doctor Who". As it is the nephew has little to do but be kidnapped and then rescued.

And yes the song and title sequence is laughable, plus it goes on way too long.