Lords and Ladies, we invite you to take a tour round the ruin that is Hastings Castle…
 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wasted locale aside (tempting us to pen a side ranking of excellent aspects in sub-par Who stories), it was still a lovely gesture by the BBC to run a competition for primary school children to write a Doctor Who story as part of the 20th anniversary celebrations.
 
Nobody in their right mind thought the producers would actually go through with it and make the ‘winning’ entry in its entirety, but life’s full of head-scratchers.
 
Obvs, of the hundreds of entries received, the cost-conscious Beeb plumped for one they could churn out as a cheap historical.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
It’s even less of a surprise that the kiddies penning it brought back that panto baddie supreme, the Master. Oh, and included a robot.
 
Then rounded off the whole enchilada with the Doctor duking it out in a swordfight with his Time Lordy nemesis. Only this time without the presence of sandwiches.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Before we saddle up and charge at this limp jouster of a story, let’s build up to the combat with a quick spot of context that, written in black and white, seems unthinkable:

 

The King’s Demons is the strongest finale from Davison’s three seasons.
 
This statement alone must represent one of the most depressing realities from the 26-year run – to the extent that we can’t help wondering what egregious sin Pete committed in a past life to be saddled with such a legacy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Rant alert… seriously, what is it with this era? They're incapable of stringing two decent stories together. Last time out, Enlightenment was a strong offering – then we lurch into this pigswill.
 
Ditto with Resurrection of the Daleks into Planet of Fire next season. In fact, it’s how Five’s stint all began: Castrovalva was a promising opener, for which we’re then duly punished with Four to Doomsday.
 
Call us cynical but it feels intentional. As if there’s a traitor in the Royal Court of the BBC trying to bring down the whole dynasty from within.

 

No doubt our spy would be swaddled in a disguise so poor it wouldn’t even convince the primary school kids this story is written for.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shall we get the Master out the way, then? (Crikey, if only we could…)
 
We’ve not seen Ainley since the previous season finale fiasco of Time-Flight. Literally nobody’s missed him in the meantime.
 
We’ve also only just recovered from an ineffectual Big Bad bothering us during the Black Guardian trilogy, so presumably the logic for giving Ant a call is to restore a sense of familiarity before we blunder into the anniversary unknown of The Five Doctors.

 

What's that saying about familiarity breeding contempt?
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our fave scenery-chewer churns out his usual tiresome tomfoolery: all snarling smarm and manic eyes.

 

And yet…
 
If you do your best to ignore the Master's ludicrous plan (we’re no historians, but would preventing the Magna Carta signing really have major long-term impact on Western society?) AND his latest stoopid disguise, this is a reasonably enjoyable performance by the Antmeister (helped, of course, by the two-episode restriction – he’s bearable in small doses).
 
For example, he’s involved in the best moment of The King's Demons: being forced into the iron maiden that's revealed to be his TARDIS. Something that is disguised well, too.
 
What’s more, we slap our thigh with incredulous mirth at the delicious irony of him taunting the Doctor that he’s gonna be “hoisted on your own petard”.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Unfortunately, it’s time to turn our attention to the C-3PO knock-off, Kamelion.
 
The concept of a robot that can be mind-controlled for nefarious deeds is certainly intriguing. But as an example of poor execution, this is a princely triumph.
 
The prop has to be, err, propped up continually. Reminding us of the Nucleus in The Invisible Enemy. Or that bit in Toy Story when Woody pretends he’s befriended a depressed Buzz by waving his dismembered arm at their mates from a window.
 
We won’t get into the Kamelion design itself – by which we mean, of course, the pecs boasting the needlessly prominent nipples. Enjoy trying to unsee these now, peeps.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Yet if only metallic papilla mammaria were the main problem with The King’s Demons.
 
The timing of trying to introduce this character was a tad questionable from the get-go. We’ve already got one robotic male companion in the TARDIS we can’t trust. Why producers thought doubling down on this was a good idea is as baffling as their Under-11s script-writing comp.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We guess we shouldn’t be too stunned. There’s so little of anything original about this story, it’s effectively a Best Of (a Nobel Peace Prize for so generously using the term ‘Best’, please) late 70s/early 80s Who:
 

• The combo of swords and robots is painfully familiar. Did they learn nothing from The Androids of Tara? Well, it seems at least one key message got through: mercifully, the dull swordfight is 20 minutes shorter this time round.

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• During the Davison years, we’ve had the Doctor stumbling upon – in order of seismic-ness – the Big Bang, the dinosaur wipeout, the Great Fire of London and now the Magna Carta. This particular dead horse is being flogged mercilessly.

 

• Then we go proper old school with the specially-composed lute song, plunging us into Gunfighters territory.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The King’s Demons may not be a crowning Who glory, but it isn’t entirely without merit.
 
For once, the Fifth Doctor owns a story he’s the titular star of.

 

Not only is he knighted, he’s front and centre of everything. And even makes time at the end to call Tegan’s bluff – her sole purpose in this story is to constantly complain about being cold – by challenging her to leave the TARDIS.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Mind you, Davison’s elevation to prominence may merely be a happy accident.

 

In a story that’s a titchy two parts and also crams in the introduction of a new (albeit thankfully short-lived) companion, there’s zilch time to give the others anything to do.
 
Hence Turlough being written out of this one.
 
Which means we at least have something to thank the competition-winning child for, eh?

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