Eighty-Sixth Entry in the Charles Daniels Unauthorized Programme Guide O' Paradise By The Dashboard Light! Serial 4K - The Brain of Moby - The TARDIS lands on Korn, a surprisingly bleak, stormy, and uninteresting world. The Doctor is outraged, he has has heard the ancient legends of time which tell of how notorious criminals, carelessly tapping into the almighty telephone system of Rassilon, were banished to Korn for all eternity. The Doctor yells at no one in particular, screaming about how he won't be a plaything of the time lords. Instead, in crazed rebellion, he commits himself to sitting in a corner and dialing lots of expensive phone sex services, charging them all to his ever increasing account debt. The Doctor is however a hero, and as such he stupidly gets involved with every random psychopath he comes across. First he discovers Solong, a disreputable galactic plastic surgeon. Then the Doctor happens upon the quasi-lesbian Sisterhood, the guardians of the Sacred Flame. The Doctor knows of the sacred flame as the source of an obscure immortality drug used by the Sisters and the Time Lords. He discovers the Sacred Flame is none other than John Inman of "Are You Being Served?" fame. It seems that John Inman can produce something euphemistically called 'The Elixir of Life'. The Doctor is horrified and disgusted when he discovers the secret source for the substance. The old flame is dying, and the High Priestess, Karen, believes the Doctor is a spy agent sent by the time lords to steal the last few remaining drops of John Inman. The Doctor pleads with her that he has no interest in John Inman's life or death, yet oddly no one is prepared to believe him. Meanwhile, the Doctor discovers that Solong is concealing the still living mind of Moby. An incredibly famous singer and performer from the year 2000. When Moby toured Gallifrey it inspired an irresponsible rash of calls to earth which have never been paid off and from which the Gallifreyian economy has never truly recovered. With the insanely loyal fan base of thousands of god-like temporal aliens Moby became a cosmic villain and honourary Time Lord Second Class. Moby was suppose to have been killed eons ago, but he was REALLY SUPER Evil and super evil people never die, they just come back in sillier clothes. Solong is near completion of a new strange alien body for Moby. However Moby demands the "head" of a time lord. This demand seems easy enough but Solong discovers the Sisterhood about to kill the Doctor. Solong begs the Sisters to leave The Doctor's naughty bits intact. Moby has some delusional theory that EVERY part of a time lord can be used 13 times before it dies out. Solong believes that with the Doctor's anatomy Moby can return to the concert circuit and take worlds one by one in a musical invasion of the Galaxy. In a scene reminiscent of the Rocky Horror Picture Show, Solong and the glowing brain of Moby have a smashing musical number "I've Got A Head For This Kind of Business". The Doctor and Sarah Jane arrive in the castle singing "I've Grown Accustomed To Your Face" and have to confront Moby and Solong head on in a fierce combat of closed harmony. At the end of a rousing rendition of "Glowing Brains Ain't So Bad", Solong's metal hook handed assistant, Meatloaf, busts out of a meat locker, sings about how he needs some good lovin' from Sarah Jane, and is then chainsawed into tiny bits by the entire cast. Moby then challenges the Doctor to a mind wrestling contest. Their painful literal meeting of the minds very nearly kills the Doctor who defeats Moby by only the narrowest of narrow margins. At the death of Moby, The Doctor, Sarah, and Solong sing a last, sad, tear jerking version of "Uncle Boogly Don't Come 'Round Here No More". The Sisterhood is convinced of the Doctor's good faith after he cheers up John Inman by offering the body of Moby for a bit of fun. The Flame is restored to his former brilliance. Unfortunately for the Doctor some of John Inman's elixir is needed to restore his health from the mind challenge. Book(s)/Other Related - Doctor Who The Moby Musical Doctor Mysterio Loco Baldy Undeado Doctor Who - The Song Book Of Rassilon Fluffs - Tom Baker seemed soprano for most of this story Solong: There will be severe pain. Then there would be sear...seear...shears! No one knows where the shears come from, but they cause shearizures." Fashion Victims - John Inman's silly costume as he stars as the 'sacred flame' Goofs - Wait, the Sisterhood is a civilization as advanced as time lords and they don't know what a match is? The scene mentioned in links and references should have been edited out. Technobabble - "Mobytronic energy has been outlawed by the Council of Time!" Links and References - This story directly follows The Android Evasion - the Doctor asks Sarah Jane "Wasn't it weird to see Nicholas in the pub so often? The Brigadier wasn't in that story. I guess he was just stopping in for a pint!" Untelevised Misadventures - The Doctor mentions that he once tried to kill Moby in the year 2000. When asked if this was to stop him fulfilling his destiny as an evil dictator over time and space he replies "No, but there's a good excuse!" Dialogue Disasters - Moby sings about his tortured soul as a brain - Moby: OH LORDY! I am so bored. Woke up this morning, I was so bored, later this evening, I was still bored. Oh Lordy, troubles so hard, everyone knows why I'm so bored. I'm just a brain in a big jar. Oh Lordy, bored in a jar, everyone knows I'm bored in this jar....... The Doctor ordering at the only take away on Korn - Doctor: One order of Chop Suey, the Galactic Emperor! Dialogue Triumphs - Doctor: I thought I recognised the stars. Sarah: You've been here before? Doctor: Well the Loch Ness Monster and I used to go cruisin' for chicks in these parts. Sarah: Near here? Doctor: Well, within a couple billion miles, yes. The Doctor, utterly disgusted by the sight before him - Doctor: The impossible dream of a thousand alchemists, dripping out of John Inman like that...I'm going to vomit any moment. The lack of Prozac on Korn is made all to obvious by - Moby: I am still here. I can see nothing, feel nothing, touch nothing, molest nothing. You have locked me into hell for an eternity. Trapped like a sponge beneath the sea. Yet even a sponge doesn't suck as much as I do! Can you understand a thousandth of my agony? Even if you aren't good at decimals, that's not much. I, who once sang incomprehensible jibberish on MTV to millions, reduced to this - to the condition where I envy a vegetable. Oh good lord I'm pathetic!! DAMN I suck!! WHY!?!?!? WHY!?!? If I weren't a brain I'd cry. God I'm fucking screwed! The classic sex scene between the Doctor and Sarah Jane: Sarah: I gotta know right now! Do you love me? Will you love me forever? Do you need me? Will you never leave me? Will you make me so happy for the rest of my life? Will you take me away will you make me your wife? I gotta know right now before we go any further - Do you love me? And Will You Love Me Forever? Doctor: Let me sleep on it! Baby Baby Let me sleep on it, I'll give you an answer in the morning. Sarah: Will you love me forever? Doctor: Let me sleep on it! Sarah: Will you love me forever?!?!? Doctor: I couldn't take it any longer, Time Lord I was crazed, And when I feeling came upon me like a tidal wave I start swearing to Omigod and on the Other's grave that I would love you to the end of time! (pause) So now I'm praying for the end of time to hurry up and arrive. 'Cause if I gotta spend another minute with you I don't think that I can really survive. I'll never break my promise or forget my vow but Omigod only knows what I can do right now. I'm praying for the end of time it's all that I can do. Praying for the end of time so I can end my time with you! Dialogue Oddities - (ORIGINAL SCRIPT) The Doctor: Moby, your name is still whispered in terror, could you be here, alive? (ON SCREEN) Tom Baker: Sarah, why do think brains always glow green? Is there someone associated with this show who likes the monsters to be green? Viewers' Quotes - "I must say it was a great disappointment to see Solong killed. I would have liked it more if he killed the Doctor and the show was just about him." - I.M Krazee (1979) "I hate it when stories are THIS bad! Glowin' Brains my arse! I feel that stories like this are just dickin' me. A total insult. I mean it! DON'T.DICK.WITH.ME!" - Father James O'Maley (1976) "I thought it was wonderful! We could do with a few more stories like this - give the Doctor some really snazzy dance numbers as he fights off human-like adversaries with an evil singing voice of their own! I don't like bloodthirsty creatures who want to conquer planets just for the fun of it, because they rarely sing about their plans as they rip people limb from limb." - Jim Steinman (1978) "Solong to Solong." - Charles Daniels (2000) Psychotic Nostalgia - "I want someone to save me as a glowing brain. The glowing brains always get the good parts, They get to fly around and attack people. Man if I was a flying brain after I died that would be amazing. WAIT?! My therapist said be pro-active! Why should I wait to die? I'll just yank the bastard out right now!" Tom Baker Speaks! "The Mind of Moby! It's been so terribly long since I've seen that story. Isn't Lis so cute there as she slaps me away and demands an answer? I say, this must have been very challenging to sing. I think what I remember most was the actor who played Solong had this small thermal nuclear device he would bring along. I can't say I totally recall the entire incident, but I recall being terribly excited and on the last day of filming I asked him if we couldn't play catch, or cricket, or some such game with it. Whatever the game was it ended in disaster. I didn't realise how unstable nuclear devices were I'm afraid." Rumors & Facts - The Brain Of Moby was originally inspired when producer Philip Pinchcliffe decided he wanted to do a story which realistically portrayed the relationship between man and inflatable woman, something which he mistakenly believed to had never been attempted in Doctor Who. Pinchcliffe, believing this idea to be essentially crap, passed this notion along to script editor Sherlock Holmes, who in turn was so revolted that he contacted his predecessor, Terrance Dicks. Most sensible people would have thrown away such a bad idea, but Dicks saw the opportunity to recycle previous material, so the project went forward. Dicks had most recently written Gobot (which treated the subject rather more comically than Pinchcliffe intended, the character of the rubber women didn't stretch far enough for his tastes). Holmes suggested Dicks also draw upon the surrealist hippie stage production 'Frankenstein's One Alright Guy' by Dave Cosmo, specifically the "incredibly groovy drug crazed man-makes-the incredibly groovy drug crazed monster" theme, in developing what came to be called The Brain Of Moby. Dicks added further concepts from his Doctor Who stage play, The Seven Keys To My Pants. Dicks' story was about galactic super-criminal Moby, who crashlands on planet Korn while fleeing his enemies. Moby survives but his body is all but decimated. His robotic gay lover, Pimpbot, sets about cobbling Moby together a new body by inviting several contestants from Scrapheap Challenge to design and build a fully functional new body within 10 hours. In essence Dicks basically changed three words in the script and turned it into the BBC to get paid for it all over again. Dicks turned in his scripts just prior to going on holiday and could not be contacted. This was a meticulously planned occurrence, for once Dicks could not be contacted to be told at length what a cheap bastard he was at ripping off previous material and how miserably unacceptable it was. In his absence, Pinchcliffe determined that a robot was beyond the budget of the programme. Why this took him so long to realise is somewhat confusing. Going over the budget for season 13 I am amazed that the paper needed to write the scripts on didn't exceed their monetary limitations. It was on this excuse, a lack of budget, that Holmes was asked to rewrite The Brain Of Moby. The reality that the original script was about as thrilling as long term whippit abuse apparently had nothing to do with it. Because the entire story was constructed around a robotic pimp, Holmes was forced to fundamentally alter the serial, by replacing Pimpbot with the mad scientist Solong and his assistant Meatloaf. Upon returning from vacation, Dicks was appalled by the modifications. Dick felt that this story now deviated too much from the eighty-two times he had previously sold it to various science fiction radio and television series. Dicks was profoundly worried that others would use this as an example against him and expect him to come up with new ideas. Dicks begged for three days and nights to have his name removed from the finished product. Consequently, the adventure was credited to "Robin Bland" -- inspired by Holmes' estimation of Dick's writing style. Serial 4K was unusual in that it was made without any filming whatsoever. In fact anyone who claims to have seen it ever is a complete and utter bastard and liar. The BBC forgot to load the cameras. One addition Holmes made to Dicks' scripts was the inclusion of the "mind battle" between the Doctor and Moby, a scene which continues to piss off fan boys to this day. In the scene in question, images of the Time Lords' past incarnations flash up on the screen as they duel. This includes a painted rendition of Moby naked, a picture of the Fourth Doctor taken at the pub the night before, the Third Doctor in an evening gown, the Second Doctor with a penguin of his head, the First Doctor reading 'Monkey Spank Magazine', and eight other individuals all wearing copious amounts of make up. It was the intent of Pinchcliffe and Holmes that these eight faces represent previously-unseen incarnations of the Doctor before Hartnell's, although this makes no damn sense. I think they should be shot. Pinchcliffe had originally hoped to secure, threathen, then force celebrities to play these "past Doctors", but this did not pan out. The faces used were of Adolf Hitler, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Mao Tse Tung, Alexander The Great, Louis the XIV, Henry VIII and Mary Whitehouse. However, this decision incurred the wrath of Equity, the actors' union, because of the use of non-Equity members for the scene. The BBC broadcasted a special apology to Hitler, Genghis, Napoleon, Mao, Alexander, Louis, Henry, and Mary Whitehose as restitution. The BBC were further surprised when this caused several thousand global agencies, groups, and associations to demand that the BBC apologise for apologising to Ms. Whitehouse.