Sara Kingdom, Woman of Action

So what if Sara Kingdom only got one story? There's still oh so much to say about this action heroine of the future. Let's take a closer look at the comic I mentioned in my last post about Sara: from the pages of The Dalek Outer Space Book, by Terry Nation and Brad Ashton, published in 1966 by Souvenir Press and Panther Books, here are the further adventures of...

Or I suppose the earlier adventures, really, since she died in her first actual appearance. So whenever you encounter a story about Sara Kingdom, try to forget about how she died a horrible, horrible death. Think of the good times, like when she beat up two random crooks with her inexplicable superhuman strength. Should have brought eight of your friends, punks!

Sara's a leading member of the Space Security Service, where military discipline has grown so lax that everyone's on a first-name basis. (I blame the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell.) Sara lived (lives? will have lived? were had liven?) in the latter half of the 40th century, when technology was going through a severe retro phase. (Listen closely, you can hear the ping of the space-radar.) Lem's got a mission for Sara on the planet Vara, but there's a problem...

Curse you, science! They're right, though. Any person who breathes thin atmosphere for five minutes will be a humanoid. I can't question that. I can question Terry Nation as to what exactly he thinks a humanoid is. Because whatever he thinks it is, he's wrong. But he's just following the first rule of writing for 1960s British sci-fi comics - if a word sounds sciencey enough, it means whatever you want it to mean. Kids are dumb! They don't know!

Take two, they're small.

Alloys! That sounds like something a scientist would be an expert in, let's go with that. Look, there he is, on the space-television! I wish I got cool channels like that. I don't get the main Vara channel with my basic package, I just get Vara Latino. I can't understand a thing they're saying but the music's fun.

Sara's given her brief - rescue the professor. Her ship is disguised as a meteor to escape detection. But before she leaves, she's got one last question...

And here we encounter the second rule for writing 1960s British sci-fi comics - the violence must be frequent, bloodthirsty and, above all, casual. Do not pause to reflect on the necessity of any violence you may inflect. Kill the innocent scientist? Okey-dokey, Lem!

Here are two of the pathetic oxygen-deprived humanoids, carrying on a conversation, making rational decisions and operating technology. Poor mindless bastards. I hope Sara's able to pull off a convincing impersonation of one. Thank god for those oxygen sweets.

If Terry Nation doesn't know what a humanoid is, I guess he's not going to know that any plants that evolved in an oxygen-low environment probably aren't going to need a whole lot of oxygen.

I would ask what use is it to dump all of these rare metals into one big melting pot, but for all I know that's exactly what they do in a metal works. What the hell do I know? I just feel bad for the humanoids who had to work the rancidium mine. It smells awful in there.

Yup, thank heavens for that radioactive space suit. That'll keep you nice and cool.

The narration box is sparsely used in this story, and here seems to be cropping up because Sara, being unconscious, cannot teach us the science behind this panel herself. Do I even need to point out the ways in which it's wrong? Not that oxygen toxicity isn't a very bad thing, it just doesn't cause your five senses to go haywire. (Unless you count a detached retina.) I think he's thinking of LSD. (Although who knows what's really in those oxygen sweets?)

Sara's unconscious body is carried to a lab, where a mysterious scientist in a welding mask and his lumpen assistant prepare to perform an undescribed "experiment" on her. But Sara starts to come around...

Imagine seeing THAT first thing when you open your eyes. Curly Joe is right - the butanic gas (or, as non-humanoids call it, butane) will certainly put her to sleep again. I don't know how rigid she'll be, though, at least at first. How long does it take for that to set in after she asphyxiates? 

We're never told what the experiment was going to be. As far as I can piece together, it seems like they were trying to see what happens when you pour molten metal over an unconscious woman. Results: inconclusive.

Sara makes short work of the scientists - you can see the creepy welder's mask guy getting a molten bath above, and she handily dislocates his assistant's spine using only her thumb. Next she leads three guards on a merry chase, smack into some kind of giant metal-cutting machine.

And with a witty parting quip our heroine neatly bisects her persuers lengthwise. Slice! I particularly like the look of pleading on the middle guy, as he looks to the uncaring Sara, horrified at his imminent gruesome death.  Sorry, fella! That's what you get for being a bad guy in a '60s British sci-fi comic. Should have passed your O-levels.

Sara tried to bluff her way past the guard stationed at the Professor's room, but he's not buying. So she gets him high. No, really.

Huffing! Is there any problem it can't solve?

Under the influence of a truth drug, and with an oxygen tank connected to his...shoulder? back?...to keep him from turning into a humanoid, the Professor of Alloys is working out a formula. You can tell he's thinking hard from the radiation lines emitting from his forehead.

Because god forbid we see a Dalek in this story. So anyway, yeah, non-corrosive metal. Because Daleks corrode in low-oxygen atmospheres. What, you didn't know that? Some Doctor Who fan you are.

The Daleks' Master Plan. Step 1: Build non-corrosive casing. Step 2: ? Step 3: Profit! World domination!

Yes, thank you, mysterious jump-suit lady! Leaving the Professor with a couple of oxygenating sweets and instructions to finish his formula for a new alloy the exact opposite (what's the opposite of steel?), Sara heads back to the smelting pot.

To be fair to the overseer, whether the Professor finished the formula or not is irrelevant to the shocking lack of security in this slave camp. But the good news spares the guard a bitch-slap. The Professor, his usefulness outlived, is put to hard labor.

Why doesn't Sara pass herself off as an overseer? They're dressed identically. Anyway, Sara and the Professor somehow manage to sneak away...

Yeah, human compassion, whatevs. Get with the times, Prof. Now hang on to the undercarriage of this mining cart as it carries us to safety. Uh...you do have the strength of ten men too, don't you?

I can just say "pour in the formula" and you guys know what to do, right?

Sara and the Professor had already escaped, and the formula was safe from the Daleks, but there were bad guys still alive and the comic was almost over, so KA-BOOM!

"Yes, thank you, Professor, for ignoring my nonsense about completing your formula the exact opposite and instead doing something that would work. I'm so glad I didn't have to kill you! Ha ha ha!"

Companions: Sara Kingdom

Sara Kingdom

(Jean Marsh)

When the producers of Doctor Who decided to kill off new companion Katarina, the writer of the serial in which she was to make her swan song was given the task of quickly introducing a new companion to take her place for the remainder of the story. That story was The Daleks' Master Plan, a twelve-part epic by the Daleks' original creator, Terry Nation. Nation had big plans for his creations; buoyed by their popularity, he pitched a pilot to American TV networks. When nobody bit and the pilot remained unproduced, he dusted off and reworked some of the concepts from it for use in this Doctor Who story, including one of the heroes of the original piece, Space Security Service agent Sara Kingdom.

Sara's tenure on the show was short-lived - nine episodes, all contained within one story. When she meets the Doctor she's convinced that he and Steven are criminals; she's been told so by her boss, Mavic Chen, the Guardian of the Solar System (unbeknownst to Sara, he himself is secretly in league with the Daleks). What's more, he convinces her that her brother, Bret Vyon, is a traitor; when Sara next encounters Bret, she shoots him dead without giving him a chance to explain. Bit rash, that. An accident with an interplanetary transporter sends Sara off with the Doctor and Steven; she learns that she's in the wrong and that her brother was innocent. Whoopsie. To make things right, she joins the TARDIS crew in their attempt to stop the Daleks' evil scheme.

The crew suffers through a few detours along the way, owing mostly to the Doctor's inability to steer the TARDIS properly. One such trip leads to an encounter with fellow renegade Time Lord the Meddling Monk in ancient Egypt.

The Doctor steals some components from the Monk's TARDIS, and he's able to finally (twelve episodes in) get them where they need to go. Sara helps the Doctor steal the Daleks' time destructor, a devastating weapon. Not knowing Sara would disobey his instructions to seek shelter in the TARDIS, the Doctor activates it - it destroys the Daleks, but also ages Sara to dust.

Of course, as we learned with Katarina, death is never the end for a Doctor Who companion - not when there's fan-fiction officially licensed tie-in media stories to be written. Although Sara only appeared in one serial, there's a handy gap right around episode 7 where plenty of other adventures can be shoe-horned in by the determined author. In recent years Jean Marsh has reprised the role for Big Finish Production, narrating months of unseen adventures taking place in that tiny gap.

In fact, thanks to Terry Nation, Sara was having her own spin-off adventures decades before devoted fans would make it the norm. In 1966, Nation repurposed more of his discarded Dalek pilot into The Dalek Outer Space Book, featuring stories of the Space Security Service versus the Daleks - including a short comic featuring our heroine.

Don't fuck with Sara Kingdom, boys. She kills Daleks for a living, she's not going to be bothered by a couple of thin-headed hoodlums.

Sara was a great companion; it's a shame her dismal fate was predestined, especially considering her replacement was (shudder) Dodo. She was a strong woman of action, sensitive, smart and handy with a ray gun. She had a great rapport with the Doctor and Steven, and her role as the action hero of the trio (sorry, Steven) didn't preclude a bit of fun - just listen to the three of them having a ball in the Christmas special episode The Feast of Steven, in which Sara's mistaken for an actress on a 1920's Hollywood film set. At the end of the episode, the trio celebrate the season by getting their drank on. Sara was anything but one-note.

Like Katarina before her, killing Sara off seems like a missed opportunity. It would have been a lot of fun to see how the character developed, particularly in the more-than-capable hands of Jean Marsh, a wonderful actress, arguably the most famous actor to play a companion in the classic series. She's perhaps best known in America for her role in the TV sitcom adaptation of the movie 9 to 5. Oh, and Upstairs, Downstairs. She won an Emmy and some Golden Globes for that, I think. But mostly 9 to 5. 

I speak of Sara as a companion, but her official status has long been a source of debate amongst fans. She was never intended to last past this story, the BBC did not consider her the new "Doctor Who girl", and Jean Marsh herself insists to this day that Sara was not a proper companion. But for nine episodes she certainly felt like one - she traveled in the TARDIS, got caught up in more than one adventure (even if it was under one umbrella title), and, if not officially considered a companion by the Who office, was at the least intended to fill the role of girl companion for this story.

My position on the subject of whether Sara Kingdom counts as a companion is a firm "Who gives a shit?" Why not count her? It's not like there's such a thing as an "official" companion anyway, really - the new series has made that abundantly clear. Is Jackson Lake a companion? I guarantee in thirty years or so there will be officially licensed stories set between The Next Doctor and Planet of the Dead in which Jackson and Rosita finish their Christmas dinner with the Tenth Doctor and are whisked away by him for a whole string of adventures we just haven't heard about yet. So why not Sara? If it means more Doctor Who stories, I'm all for it.

Companions: Steven Taylor

Steven Taylor

(Peter Purves)

In The Chase, when the Doctor, Ian, Barbara and Vicki were captured by the Mechanoids (basically giant geodesic spheres with flamethrowers) (so, basically awesome), they found themselves imprisoned alongside Steven Taylor, a spaceship pilot from the 23rd century (or thereabouts). They believed Steven died during their escape, so Vicki and the Doctor were understandably surprised when, after saying goodbye to Ian and Barbara, they found Steven waiting for them in the TARDIS.

Steven had gone back into the city to rescue his stuffed panda HiFi, who had been his only companion during his two-year imprisonment (like Tom Hanks' volleyball, only more adorable). Steven survived the destruction of the Mechanoids' city and slipped into the TARDIS while nobody was paying attention. Here's Steven with Vicki and HiFi at the start of his next story, The Time Meddler:

Adorable, right? Enjoy the picture, it's the last interesting thing you'll see about Steven Taylor.

Steven was brought in to replace Ian as the leading man, the action hero (Barbara, of course, was irreplaceable). And he fits the bill fine - young, strapping, handsome, and utterly and completely generic.  He's not a bad companion, he's fills a storytelling niche and Peter Purves does a good job with the material he's given. But after his exciting introduction, he doesn't do a whole lot; at least, nothing unexpected if you're familiar with his stock type. He gets very little in the way of character development - he's just kind of there.

Here's the new crew, hiding cheerfully behind a rock. Posing for publicity photos is fun!

Steven's development was not aided by the fact that his first few scripts were originally written for the previous TARDIS crew. In his next story, Galaxy 4, his role in the story and most of his dialogue were originally written for Barbara. As a consequence, he spends most of the story held hostage while the Doctor and Vicki get on with the business of saving the planet.

See? They even gave him one of Barbara's cardigans to wear.

He spent the next story, The Myth Makers, being all action heroey in the Trojan War, and getting near-mortally wounded for his trouble. Vicki departs in this story, and she's replaced by Trojan handmaiden Katarina, who carries the wounded Steven into the TARDIS.

More on Katarina next time, but suffice it to say, she doesn't last long. In the next story, The Daleks' Master Plan, she's quickly replaced with Sara Kingdom, who also doesn't last long. Steven was very, very lucky to have gotten out of that story alive.

All these deaths in the space of one story wear a bit on Steven, so the TARDIS takes him and the Doctor to Paris, where they can chillax in some fine BBC period clothing and get their drank on.

Except it's Paris in 1572, and the story is titled The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve, and ten thousand Huguenots, including all the drinking buddies Steven just made and the cute serving girl named Anne Chaplet he had his eye on, are all about to be brutally slain in a weeks-long purging that will see the streets of Paris run red with innocent blood. Because fuck you, Steven Taylor.

Every companion gets their lesson in the futility of changing history, and this was Steven's. He's furious at the Doctor for making them abandon their new-found friends to their fate, and when the TARDIS materializes in 1966 London, he storms out, determined to leave his travels with the Doctor behind forever. Ah, you say, that sounds like characterization to me! Well, no, because right away he spots some policemen running towards the TARDIS and comes back to warn the Doctor, who promptly takes off. On board the TARDIS with them this time is new companion Dodo Chaplet, and Steven convinces himself that, since they have the same last name, Dodo must be Anne's descendant, so Anne must have survived the massacre, and all is well. The Doctor is so happy Steven has stopped bitching about the constant slaughter that comes with a life in the TARDIS that he doesn't point out how staggeringly unlikely Steven's hypothesis is.

Here's the new team in Dodo's first full story, The Ark. Steven doesn't do much in this one, except almost die from catching Dodo's cold. It's a nice picture, though, isn't it?

Steven gets to have a bit more fun when the crew goes up against The Celestial Toymaker. The Doctor is sidelined for most of the story (the producers were considering letting William Hartnell go, as he was becoming more and more difficult to work with), so Steven and Dodo took the lead, playing the Toymaker's deadly games in order to win back the TARDIS.

Sadly, most of this story is lost, but it sounds like it was pretty good. Steven got lots of action in this one, and doesn't he look nice in color? Score one for you, Steven Taylor.

I take it back. In The Gunfighters, the trio visit Tombstone just in time for the gunfight at the OK Corral. They meet the Earps, the Clantons, Doc Holliday and Johnny Ringo, bullets fly and people die, and Steven dresses like he's going to a Western-themed costume party at Liberace's house. Luckily, the Doctor passes them all off as entertainers, and even more luckily - and inexplicably - Steven can sing and play the piano. There's an awful lot of gunfighting in this story, and Steven doesn't take part in any of it. Ian would have taken out the entire Clanton gang with one bullet...sigh. I miss Ian.

But all mediocre things must come to an end, and Steven's next story, The Savages, was his last. On an unnamed future world, the Doctor negotiates peace between a race of scientific Elders and the primitive Savages they've been exploiting. For some reason the two tribes invite Steven to stay with them and become their leader - I suppose when choosing a leader after years of conflict, "vaguely nonthreatening" seems like a pretty attractive quality. Steven accepts, bidding the Doctor and Dodo farewell.

I've probably been overly harsh on Steven - he was perfectly serviceable, as male companions go. He was just bland, and it's hard to find anything funny or interesting too say about bland people.

Oh, I've got something. In the tie-in novel The Empire of Glass, set in 1609 Venice, Steven teams up with playwright Christopher Marlowe, who makes a pass at him. Steven ignores it, though, because otherwise something interesting might happen.

Merry Christmas, Hideous Creature... Merry Christmas!

On Christmas Day, 1965, the first Doctor, along with his companions Steven and Sara, took a break from battling the Daleks to celebrate the season. After toasting his two friends, he turned to the camera and said:

"And incidentally, a happy Christmas to all of you at home."