Day 467: The Sun Makers Part 2

The Doctor Who production team is quite clearly faced with a dilemma. K9 is an incredibly popular character, and is appealing to children massively. However, his introduction wasn't completely planned, which means that scripts don't necessarily need K9 within them to work. In Image of the Fendahl, for instance, he only appeared in the opening and closing scenes, thus meaning that no rewrite would be necessary for the story. This story, on the other hand, has had the advantage of time, and can thus work K9 almost seamlessly into the plot. Thus, he spends much of Part 1 waiting for the Doctor, and much of Part 2 wandering around with Leela and occasionally attacking guards. Whilst this may very well appeal to children, because of the sheer novelty of seeing a robot dog on TV, it doesn't necessarily appeal to a wider audience, particularly as K9 had a fair bit more character within his opening story. All of that said though, the opening scene in Part 1 featuring K9 is incredibly fun, as he plays chess against the Doctor, and gives hints that the writers haven't forgotten of why we love this tin dog so much. So whilst K9 might not entirely succeed at the moment, I think it's fair to say that we wait and see whether he'll turn out to be a good dog.