With the help of cast members John Leeson, Elisabeth Sladen and Louise Jameson, former producer John Nathan-Turner, and such Doctor Who fan experts as David J. Howe, the history of K-9 as concept, companion, and marketing icon is explored, as well as the robot dog’s bright future in his own adventures.
written by Paul Tams
directed by Roger Stevens
music by Alistair Lock
Review: This amusing little documentary is a nice history of the Doctor’s faithful robot dog, with tongue planted firmly in cheek (particularly with regard to K-9’s “extermination” of ex-producer John Nathan-Turner, who ended the dog’s reign on Doctor Who and has remained a target of fan scorn since the series ended in 1989). The actors’ memories of the character range from fond to frustrated, with Lis Sladen taking up most of the latter end of the spectrum due to her playing second fiddle to K-9 in 1981’s K-9 & Company, the only official BBC-produced spinoff of Doctor Who. (For the first time, some of the other plans for K-9 & Company as a potential series are revealed by Nathan-Turner and writer Terence Dudley, as well as an in-depth retrospective on why the popular pilot episode didn’t catch on like wildfire.)
Also intriguing are the glimpses into the potential future of K-9-as-franchise, particularly the all-CGI-animation pitch reel voiced by none other than Tom Baker himself. (Baker, the only Doctor who shared screen time with K-9 in “official” Doctor Who, is conspicuous by his absence in this production, represented only by vintage film of a convention appearance at Longleat in 1983.)
Some of the guests who reminisce about K-9 are a little out of place. Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred only starred alongside the mechanical mutt in 1993’s generally-ignored charity reunion show Dimensions In Time, and yet they’re interviewed at length about the frustrations of acting alongside the radio-controlled dog.
Overall, though, the light tone of K-9 Unleashed! saves the show from annoying viewers too much with its minor discrepancies. And truthfully, it’s startling that no one made a documentary about K-9 until 2000, given the popularity of the character in its late 1970s heyday. It’s a good, fun look at a facet of the Doctor Who story which has remained largely unexplored from the behind-the-scenes angle.