K9 (Doctor Who)

Did You Know?

• The K9 series was a blend of live-action and a CGI K9, each episode 30 minutes long, made by Jetix Europe and Park Entertainment.
• The BBC opted out of involvement in the K9 spin-off to focus on Torchwood, meaning BBC-owned characters did not appear.

Televised appearances

K9 Mark I first appeared in The Invisible Enemy (1977) as the creation of Professor Marius in the year 5000. It travelled with the Fourth Doctor and Leela until The Invasion of Time (1978), when it remained on Gallifrey with Leela. The last scene of that serial introduced K9 Mark II, played by the same prop. K9 Mark II first appeared on-screen in The Ribos Operation (1978), exhibiting greater mobility and danger-sensing abilities. It travelled with the Doctor and Romana. In Warriors' Gate (1981), K9 was severely damaged and could only function in E-Space; the Doctor gave it to Romana when she stayed there. The character later appeared in remakes of the unfinished serial Shada alongside the Eighth Doctor. The 2009 K9 television series stars the original K9 Mark I, which undergoes a 'regeneration' process, losing its memory of adventures with the Doctor, and is transported to London circa 2050 by Professor Gryffen. This upgraded K9 gains a head-up display, flight capability, and more powerful lasers.

Other appearances

Dave Martin wrote four children's books titled The Adventures of K9, published by Sparrow Books in 1980, in which K9 travels alone for unexplained reasons. In 1985, Martin wrote Search for the Doctor, a gamebook featuring the Sixth Doctor and Sarah's K9 (assumed Mark III at publication, later identified as Mark IV) being reunited after Sarah's death. The short story 'Moving On' in Decalog 3: Consequences and the audio play Mirror, Signal, Manoeuvre indicate that K9 Mark III broke down and Sarah could not repair it. Another short story, 'Tautology' in Doctor Who Magazine #194, suggests Mark III's motherboard is passed down through Sarah's descendants and eventually reaches Professor Marius, creating an ontological paradox. The Virgin New Adventures novel Lungbarrow features K9 Marks I and II meeting on Gallifrey during events involving the Doctor's family house. The Big Finish anthology Short Trips: Zodiac includes 'Jealous, Possessive', in which Marks I and II each consider the other inferior, an attitude occasionally hinted at in the Gallifrey audio series.

Conceptual history

K9 was conceived by writers Bob Baker and Dave Martin to narrate while miniaturised clones of the Doctor and Leela were inside the Doctor's body in The Invisible Enemy. Martin's dog had recently been run over, and K9 was a car-proof tribute. The character was not originally intended as a companion, but producer Graham Williams retained it to appeal to younger viewers. Initial plans for a small actor in a robotic Dobermann costume were rejected in favour of a radio-controlled prop designed by Tony Harding and built by the BBC Visual Effects Department. The Radio Control Model Centre in Harlington, owned by Derek Wales, built the electronics and operated the dog on set. The robot suffered technical problems, with radio controls interfering with cameras and vice versa; on location, it could not traverse uneven terrain, requiring workarounds such as concealed twine or wooden planks. The innards were redesigned twice, first with Slough Radio Control, whose employee Nigel Brackley supervised the prop, and later by designer Charlie Lumm, who enlarged wheels and switched to FM signals. By the time the improved model debuted in State of Decay, the decision had been made to write K9 out in Warriors' Gate.

Cultural influence

An unspecified K9 unit appeared with the Seventh Doctor and Ace in a 1990 episode of Search Out Science, and another appeared in the 1993 charity special Dimensions in Time. In the 1998 computer game Fallout 2, a damaged robot dog named K9 uses similar speech mannerisms and can join the player's party. In the 1999 series Queer as Folk, a K9 model is given as a birthday present, operated by visual effects assistant Mat Irvine. In I'm Alan Partridge (2002), Alan Partridge recalls purchasing the rights to K9 contributing to his mental breakdown. The South Park episode 'Go God Go XII' (2006) features a parody robot dog called 'K-10'. K9 appeared on a Doctor Who-themed edition of The Weakest Link in 2007, answering correctly but voted out unanimously due to producer instructions. NASA's Ames Research Center has named two Mars exploration robots 'K-9' and 'Gromit'. Several individuals have built personal K9 robots, from radio-controlled units to computerised autonomous versions. K-9 Mail, an email client for Android, references the robot in its name and logo.