The Horns of Nimon Part Four

The one where Romana visits a planet ravaged by the Nimon...

It's the last episode of this story, as well as the last episode of Season 17. It's also the last episode made in the 1970s, the last episode produced by Graham Williams, the last episode script edited by Douglas Adams, the last episode featuring David Brierley as the voice of K-9, the last episode scored by Dudley Simpson, the last episode to feature the diamond logo, the last episode to feature the original Tom Baker titles from 1974, and the last episode to use the Delia Derbyshire arrangement of the theme tune. It's also the last episode to see Tom Baker wearing his original multi-coloured scarf, and the last Fourth Doctor episode to crack 10 million viewers (or get anywhere near it). That's a lot of lasts.

Of course, it wasn't planned to be the last of any of these things, but following the loss of the sixth and final story of Season 17, Shada, thanks to industrial action, The Horns of Nimon inherited them all. I won't be reviewing Shada on this blog because it was never finished or transmitted in the way it would have been at the time. To all intents and purposes, Shada was aborted and only forms part of the Doctor Who canon thanks to subsequent recreations in audio and animated form. I think I'd find it hard to review an audio Shada or cartoon Shada in the same context as I have the rest of the series, so I'll leave it to one side, just as happened back in 1979.

Back to Skonnos. Or rather, Crinoth, which I assumed in my review for part 3 was the Nimon homeworld, but in actual fact is just as much a casualty of the locust-like Nimon as Skonnos is. Romana is accidentally transmatted to Crinoth in the Nimon capsule, and there she meets the aged, weakened Sezom, played by the marvellous John Bailey. It's a lovely cameo performance from Bailey, who'd previously played Victoria Waterfield's father Edward in The Evil of the Daleks. Here, his heavily made-up face is lined and weary, and his performance reflects the state of a man exhausted by the consequences of welcoming the Nimon to Crinoth.

Sezom is essentially Soldeed a bit further along the line. Sezom also welcomed a singular Nimon to his homeworld and offered tributes in exchange for knowledge and technology, but the Nimon ravaged and drained Crinoth to the point where they are ready to move on to the next world, namely Skonnos. Bailey and Lalla Ward work so well together. It's great that these last few stories have allowed Ward to have quiet moments of "proper" acting with guest stars such as Jennifer Lonsdale, Simon Gipps-Kent and here, with John Bailey. He is so good, he puts Graham Crowden to shame. "I allowed the Nimons to come here," he says ruefully. "I worked for them, became their... creature." The very slight pause before that last word, and the slight emphasis of disgust in his delivery, outdoes anything Crowden turns in across all four episodes.

By contrast, Crowden goes all-out loopy in part 4, as Soldeed unravels at the sight of not one, not two, but three Nimon. His final stand-off comes against his former nemesis, the DoctoRomana, who spits her venom at Soldeed in a way only Lalla Ward can. "They're parasitic nomads who've been feeding off your selfishness and gullibility! You've brought it on yourself!"

Cue Crowden completely tipping over the edge full-throttle, pulling his face with really weird-looking fingers, and ramping the camp factor up to 13. "My dreams of conquest!" he screams. "You will die for your interference!" He milks his death scene like any good Shakespearean thesp would. This death scene is immortalised in my memory from when I first saw it as part of the Resistance is Useless clip-fest in 1992. Once witnessed, I doubt anyone can forget it.

The Nimon look their silliest in this episode, swaying about like they're on a ship at sea, grumbling all the while and spouting ridiculous things like "Pursue them!", or best of all: "Kill him - but not yet. Later you will be questioned, tortured and killed!" To which the Doctor replies, wonderfully: "Well I hope you get it in the right order."

The Nimon are played by actors with amusingly inapt names: Robin, Trevor and Bob. It just makes me laugh to think of a big scary Doctor Who monster played by a man called Trevor, but it's no worse than Robots of Death being played by Gregory, Miles and Jeremy!

One more note about the Nimon: I was scared of them when I was little. It seems crazy now, but they were big, black monsters with laser horns who roared and had fearsome voices. I don't remember watching the actual story as a kid, but I did see them on display at a Doctor Who exhibition circa 1980 (Blackpool?), and they terrified the four-year-old me!

But seeing them here, lumber their way slowly along corridors "pursuing" their quarry, they're far from scary. There's very little haste in these chase scenes, because the Nimon can't move fast, and K-9 can only go at 3mph as he leads the Doctor's party out of the labyrinth!

What is nice is that young Seth, the pretender prince of Aneth, gets to be a hero at last. As he told Romana in part 2, he never wanted to be a hero, and in truth, he isn't the bravest of boys. But here he gets to do some proper Luke Skywalker heroism, shooting Soldeed (twice) and Nimon, thus earning simpering Teka's blind devotion all the more. It's a shame we don't get a farewell scene for Seth. I could imagine an alternative future where he joins the TARDIS crew instead of Adric. In that alternative timeline, Seth would still end up getting killed by the Cybermen, but we might feel the loss all the more with Seth Gipps-Kent instead of Matthew Waterhouse. And who knows, becoming a Doctor Who companion might have changed the course of Gipps-Kent's career, and with it his life? Maybe he would have lived longer, and would be attending Doctor Who conventions in 2020, at the age of 62...

More observations:

• There are a lot of S's in this story. As well as Skonnos and Soldeed, you've got Seth, Sorak and Sezom too. Just saying...
• Sezom's demise is tragically inevitable. Not only does Sezom save Romana's life (more than once), he also saves the planet of Skonnos, and by default, the entire universe. RIP Sezom of Crinoth, and RIP the marvellous John Bailey (1912-1989).
• "Doctor, I don't know what you think you're playing at, but - ooh, help!" Yet again, Lalla Ward manages to make a comic strip line of dialogue feel natural.
• Few of the laser effects actually manage to hit their targets, a problem common throughout Season 17. People react and collapse, but the lasers often miss them, or stop short, a sign of the technological limitations of the age, I suppose.
• Soldeed calls Romana a "meddlesome hussy"! I'm not sure that's quite the right word to use in a family show!

The episode, and with it Doctor Who's 1970s era, ends with a very big (and impressive) explosion, which seems appropriate. But The Horns of Nimon seems reluctant to let go, clocking in at a whopping 26m 45s. However, BBC1 did extend Doctor Who's slot to half an hour for this episode, before we could at last say farewell to the decade with a final shot of Lalla Ward's cheeky, girlish grin.

The Horns of Nimon is the campest of Season 17's run, but it still has its attractions. It's a pretty good story, and on the whole the cast take it seriously (Tom Baker and Graham Crowden aside). The monsters are disappointing, but still not without their plus points, and the whole thing is never less than entertaining. It's just not, on the whole, terribly good. But Doctor Who is supposed to be fun, and Season 17 is fun, fun, fun all the way. Before embarking on Season 17, I regarded it with some trepidation as the nadir of Tom Baker's tomfoolery. But actually, it's not that bad, only quite silly, and sometimes searingly intelligent. If you're looking for big ideas with laughs along the way, 1979 is where to look.

Doctor Who would return with a very different look seven months later. Brace yourselves...

First broadcast: January 12th, 1980

Steve's Scoreboard
The Good: John Bailey's cameo as Sezom makes the entire story worthwhile.
The Bad: Soldeed's death scene is the very height of camp, and not in a good way.
Overall score for episode: ★★★★★☆☆☆☆☆ (story average: 5.5 out of 10)

LOOKING BACK: For my appraisal of Doctor Who in the 1970s, click here.

"Would you like a jelly baby?" tally: 24

NEXT TIME: The Leisure Hive...

My reviews of this story's other episodes: Part One; Part Two; Part Three

Find out birth/death dates, career information, and facts and trivia about this story's cast and crew at the Doctor Who Cast & Crew site: https://doctorwhocastandcrew.blogspot.com/2014/08/the-horns-of-nimon.html

The Horns of Nimon is available on BBC DVD as part of the Myths and Legends box set. Find it on Amazon - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-Legends-Monster-Underworld/dp/B002SZQC98/