"K9 and Company" Title Sequence on Web

[mabfan]

After posting about the possibilities of the Doctor's robot dog K9 appearing on Firefly, I went poking around the web for more information on K9 and Company.

You see, for those of you who don't know, after K9 left Doctor Who, he got his own spin-off series, which lasted for, um, the pilot. My reference to "Kaylee, K9 and Company" was a riff on that old series. (Points to jenwrites for recognizing it.) The premise was that the Doctor sent a new model of K9 to his erstwhile companion Sarah Jane Smith, now living in the county of Gloucestershire. Because, after all, if you're an investigative reporter living in a sleepy English town in the early 1980s, what would you need more than a robot dog?

Anyway, for some unknown reason, the BBC has a page on which they've put up the opening title sequence from the episode. You can watch K9 sit there and intone his name to music as Sarah Jane sits at an outside desk, drinks wine, runs, drives a car...while the camera dramatically closes in on her a few times, to make it clear that this is an action show.

Who in the world thought this would be a good idea? The mind boggles.

And, come to think of it, how did K9 manage to climb up onto that stone wall? Did Sarah Jane pose him there specifically for the camera? Why, God, why?

(Watch it at BBC - Cult - Classic TV - BBC - Title Sequences - K9 and Company. And if you want to read a plot summary of the episode, check out K9 and Company: A Girl's Best Friend. My favorite part: "Brendan is using K-9 to test soil samples from the garden when he is attacked by George Tracey and Tracey's son Peter. K-9 stuns Peter with a blast from his nose laser and George flees in terror before Brendan can get a good look at him. " I want a nose laser!)

Comments

[charliesmum.livejournal.com]

I met Elisabeth Sladen once. She liked my hat. So did Jon Pertwee.

I'd have watched a show about a robot dog in a sleepy English village in the 1980s. But I also really liked Wizards and Warriors, so what do I know.

[mabfan.livejournal.com]

I loved Wizards and Warriors! They need to release that on DVD; it was brilliant.

I'll be honest here -- I love K9, and thought the pilot episode was cute. But I can't possibly see how the premise could have sustained a whole series, even on British television.

And I'm delighted that Sladen will be back on Doctor Who next year as Sarah Jane.

[charliesmum.livejournal.com]

Wizards and Warriors on DVD would be most excellent. I loved that show. It was too clever for regular TV, I guess.

I didn't know Sarah Jane was coming back. When are they going to show the new Dr Who in America? Do you know?

When I met her, and Jon Pertwee, it was totally cool, because I was with British friends who had a Worzel Gummage doll, because that was the show Jon Pertwee was currently doing, and he was so amazed to see this at a Dr Who convention he talked to us for several minutes. And, as I said, liked my hat. I'd chosen it because I thought it looked vaguely like something an assistant would wear.

That's way more than you needed to know, wasn't it. :)

[mabfan.livejournal.com]

There are still no plans to show the current incarnation of Doctor Who in the United States. From the rumors I've heard, the BBC offered it to the Sci-Fi Channel but wanted more money for the licensing rights than they were willing to pay.

The show has been shown in Canada, though, and some parts of the US that receive the CBC have managed to get the episodes.

(That said, there is a thriving underground community of people in Britain who have uploaded all the episodes to the Internet. The show can be downloaded illegally via BitTorrent, and quite a lot of people have done so.)

[fizzixrat.livejournal.com]

There is also the issue that the BBC tried to tell the New Series and 26 years of Old Series episodes as a package for a long time. They had hoped to have it airing in the US within a week or so of the UK airings, to minimize the amount of downloading going on, but they didn't do a very good job of selling the series to cable networks, and nothing happened.

There was a point early this year where it looked like they had nearly worked out a deal with BBC America (long story, but BBC America is not actually run by the BBC, so deals do have to be struck) to run the new series, but that deal fell through for some reason.

BBC will be doing another push over the next few months, hoping to get the series on over here when Season 2 goes out in the UK. It may help that Season 2 is in production now, and a Season Three is guaranteed, plus two Christmas specials are in the works, meaning that 41 episodes would be available up front now.

If that push fails, you may see them issuing Region 1 DVDs through Warner later in 2006, but they're certainly holding off for the moment, in hopes that they can find a cable network buyer.

In the meantime, for those who would like the official DVDs and have no problem playing Region 2 PAL discs, all 13 episodes are available on four vanilla DVD releases in the UK currently, and a box set (crammed with commentaries and extras) will be available in November in the UK.


(If you want to know what's going on with Doctor Who, keep in mind that the BBC website can only post what's been cleared for official release. Point your browser at the unofficial home of Dr. Who, Outpost Gallifrey, for the dirt in advance. :D)

[arib.livejournal.com]

You'd look ridiculous with a nose laser. Hell, *anything* looks ridiculous with a nose laser.

I could just see it now:

Ronald D. Moore: Gee, I'm busily reinventing Battlestar Galactica. Y'know what the Cylons need? Forget sexy humanoid bodies, I'm going with the nose laser!

Richard Hatch: I kill you!!

[markbourne.livejournal.com]

Hell, *anything* looks ridiculous with a nose laser.

That's not what they thought after seeing the test footage of the arse laser.

[arib.livejournal.com]

The arse laser would've pushed K9 and Co. past the watershedm reducing their chances of getting picked up even more... :-)

[fizzixrat.livejournal.com]

Ah, so you've met Captain Jack Harkness then. :)

[sorek.livejournal.com]

But "freakin sharks with freakin laser beams on their freakin heads" is cool!

Austin Powers reference for the quote impaired.

[magid.livejournal.com]

Sudden thought: Samantha (from Bewitched) with a nose laser

[markbourne.livejournal.com]

I read somewhere -- man, years ago now -- that what ended up onscreen as K9 and Company's opening theme music was intended by its composer to be only a rough-cut, home-made sample of his proposed theme music, which he'd wanted to be orchestrated quite a lot less cheesily. As I recall.

[sorek.livejournal.com]

"Because, after all, if you're an investigative reporter living in a sleepy English town in the early 1980s, what would you need more than a robot dog?"

So the doctor delivered K9 20-40 years too early. Considering the state of the Tardis during the 4th doctor's reign, I'm impressed he got as close in time and space as he did. Remember, when Sarah left the Doctor, he dumped her in the wrong city and possibly not even in England. Notice how, having a guard dog nowadays can be a fine idea. K9 can stun terrorists, probably can detect bombs, radiation etc. And he's like a real life tamagachi!

In all seriousness, if they had turned this idea into "the extended adventures of UNIT and Sarah Jane Smith minus the Doctor" it could have been watchable.

"And, come to think of it, how did K9 manage to climb up onto that stone wall?"

Same way the Daleks managed to conquer a galaxy without being able to climb stairs. Maybe that's how the Earth won in the end; all other planets were completely handicap accesible? Or maybe he's like R2D2, hidden rockets that are not used for years at a time :)

[fizzixrat.livejournal.com]

Oh, and re: the K-9 & Company credits being on the BBC website...

The folks that run the BBC Dr. Who site do have a sense of humor. :)

[sdavido.livejournal.com]

Dang. If only I read this earlier. I have a copy of the show (legal, thank you), and shoulda made it a birthday party for myself to host an airing!