The Horns of Nimon | Sophisticated Idiots

Brace yourselves…we’re about to utter the unthinkable.

Tom Baker is a weakness in The Horns of Nimon.

There, we’ve said it. And we’ll accept our resulting punishment for blasphemy (which will undoubtedly involve being interrogated, tortured and killed – in that order, eh Nimon?) with good grace.

Tommy B is little more than a passenger here – reduced to fiddling about with electrical circuits, patting K9 and babbling through inane quips such as, “We’re up a gum tree without a paddle.”

It’s unsettling to see the Doctor having such a lack of impact on a story. Especially this Doctor.

On the rare occasions Tom's given something to do here, he hams it up for comic effect to an extent that’s borderline irritating.

It’s a seismic about-turn, coming just two stories after his outright masterclass in The Creature from the Pit.

We guess it’s symptomatic of this season of two halves. Season 17 boasts a tremendous first trio, then we have two tired stories in which our TARDIS team amble around studios, ushering in the Fifth Doctor vibes a year too early. And, of course, the whole thing is rounded off by the non-entity of Shada.

Having summoned the courage to say our piece about the Great Tom, we’re in need of a stiff drink. Who knows - maybe that was the problem on set?

Anyway, with the Doctor getting the Nyssa treatment and being unceremoniously sidelined, The Horns of Nimon leaves welcome room for Romana to take charge. And Lalla Ward doesn’t need asking twice.

She fully justifies her ringmaster garb as she effortlessly orchestrates proceedings. In all her meddlesome hussy glory, eh?

In a neat reversal of roles, Romana’s the one driving the action, charging around corridors and befriending elderly dudes who’ll eagerly sacrifice themselves for her cause.

By contrast, Tom is as static as William Hartnell in The Tenth Planet.

But taking a step back from our disappointment with the main man, we’re impressed that such an unrelentingly dark central premise – of children being vacuum-packed ready to be fed to unsteady space bulls – can be overshadowed by two individual performances.

So aside from Tommy labouring to his weakest showing in the scarf, who's responsible for the second notable performance in this accidental season finale?

We’ll give you one guess…

We’re utterly besotted with the love child of Ming the Merciless and Basil Fawlty.

For any wannabe actors watching this show in the late 70s, Graham Crowden delivers a showreel in how to camp it up.

He portrays Soldeed as a sneering wretch of a baddie, with tongue permanently in cheek. We’re surprised stagehands don’t encourage the audience to boo and hiss every time he steps into view.

It’s a downright delicious performance.

For a show whose long history is littered with actors chewing the scenery as if their life depended on it, this guy reaches new heights.

It’s no mean feat to make Richard Briers look restrained in Paradise Towers, so congratulations are in order. Maybe the Doctor has a spare gymkhana rosette to hand.

By rights, we should probably produce a ranking of OTT performances in Classic Who, but we’re not sure our stress levels could cope with re-watching some of these outrageous displays.

Among the less attention-grabbing performances in Nimon, we’re relieved that the brave-not-brave, prince-not-prince isn’t as irritating as he could’ve been. He gives off major Pecs vibes, but just about avoids crossing the line into so-hateful-we-want-to-commit-violence territory.

Oops, that’s two Paradise Towers comparisons in quick succession. Which is hardly a ringing endorsement of The Horns of Nimon’s quality.

Thankfully, lovestruck Teka has declared that Seth will save the day, and he musters these chunks of super-charged magnetic jesmonite for us:

The Nimon themselves have a cool design. It’s a shame the massive heads are clearly too heavy for the actors, who have also been tasked with staggering about on stilts while wearing sarongs
The ever-changing corridor walls idea is great
The children (aka tributes – hello Hunger Games…) lined up like action figures in their packaging is macabre

But did no-one tell these kids not to accept sweets from strangers? Especially from weird fellas with crazily long neck adornments
Oh, and thanks to this story, we’ve started yelling “weakling scum” whenever we pass a group of kids. They often throw things in response
We’re sure a slightly different K9 voice shouldn’t have become so distracting by now, but we can’t sleep for thinking about it
We adore the concept of the increasing gravity – and the distortion in Part One which had us checking our broadband connection

We can’t decide whether we prefer “despicable worm” or “weasel” for the co-pilot’s non de plume. Either way, we cheer when Lord Nimon zaps his sorry ass
Our heart goes out to Peter Davison when Tom declares, “With a talent like mine I might have been a great slow bowler.” Cricket is the one thing Pete can claim to be best at among the Doctor ranks – whatever you do, don’t take this away from him
The Nimon has a successful side hustle in merch featuring motivational phrases. We bought one of his mugs proclaiming, “No stumbling in the great journey of life” from Etsy.

All in all, this is a half-hearted entry whose by-the-numbers approach gives us a flavour of the Davison era that awaits us. It’s an unwelcome taste at that. After all, which gourmand in their right mind would replace Jelly Babies with a stick of celery?

Which is a massive shame because on paper, there’s enough going on here to make a decent stab at a strong Doctor Who entry. And that’s before we even consider that a plot based around Greek mythology – another Who staple – should be a safe bet.

The Horns of Nimon is a bit of a head-scratcher. As Tom himself frequently wonders in this serial, “What could possibly go wrong?”

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