The One Hundred and Thirteenth Entry in the Charles Daniels Unauthorized Programme Guide O' SITFUSO http://listen.to/sitfuso Serial 5Q - Meg Lost - The Doctor is summoned to the planet Tigella to do battle with the most deadly enemy anyone in the universe has ever encountered -- a catcus. Not just any catcus, but a bad ass catcus with an attitude. The Al Capone of the Cactus Kingdom if you will. The leader of Tigella, Zastor Smith, who has become concerned about disputes between his people's two opposing factions - The Punks and the Hippies. Neither of the factions is particularly employable on Tigella, a planet filled with factories and manufactured goods. For cheap laughs the Punks tend to smash the expensive machinery that runs Tigella's economy - While the Hippies seem to just sit around, smoke a lot of dope, and run all the machines at a very laidback pace. Zastor has attempted to give lots of free dope to the punks and has subjected the hippies to some inspiring heavy metal songs primarily concerned with Satan worship, but to no avail. The hippies have formed a very loose union and the punks have simply taken to smashing things more slowly. Somewhere, in the grey areas, in the border of this conflict, is a catcus. It's actual importance to the plot is never fully explained or explored and to be frank probably never existed in the first place -- but the Doctor is convinced that a random catcus, who he has taken to calling Jerrold, is somehow responsible for this whole mess. The Doctor and Romana manage to interrogate the catcus and come to the conclusion that Pink Floyd are, were, and will be the best band ever devised by sentient creatures. The catcus seemingly has no say in this -- but the scene seems only loosely connected to the larger picture of the story anyway. The Doctor returns to the main city of Tigella, which is, for some reason called San Francisco. At a small book store the Doctor discovers the "device" which he claims gives the catcus it's horrific potential -- a mysterious dodecahedron. The Doctor affronts a store clerk asking him how he came to possess such a powerful and ancient artifact. The store clerk seems unaware of the true horror of the dodecahedron. The Doctor explains that in the right hands a dungeon master could calculate a Dwarf's weight in coins, make rolls against a saving throw, and even calculate the damage inflicted by a magical attack. The Doctor is escorted out of the Roleplaying section of the book store - but not before he pockets the 12-sided di. The Doctor, although hindered by his complete lack of sanity, is able to use the dodecahedron di he shoplifted to formulate an understanding of the situation at hand. After explaining his theory to Zastor Smith, he is politely invited to leave the planet. In a shocking twist, at the end of the episode, ex-companion Barbara Wright emerges from behind the catcus and says - "The Doctor is gone. Now my plan can continue!" and bursts into insane fits of maniacal laughter. What the hell this means, and why she seems to be talking to a catcus, is never explained. And even if it was -- I turned off the video at this point and started watching Powerpuff Girls. Book(s)/Other Related - FASA's Doctor Who Roleplaying Adventure Book Catci Of Science Fiction, Volume 2 Dungeons & Dragons - Revenge of the Minotaur Fluffs - Tom Baker seemed prickly for most of this story Goofs - The Doctor roles an 8 and reports that he has made his saving throw -- is he unaware that this is NOT correct for his character? Or is he just LYING to the DM? In episode one the Doctor says he's never seen a 12 sided di before, but in episode three he recounts that he and Gary Gygax came up with Dungeons and Dragons one pot-filled afternoon in 1973. I just can't leave this section without mentioning this - The enemy of this serial - WAS A CATCUS!!! Technobabble - The Doctor: Now, to calculate the total, let's start from the sum of all possible throws of 4 dice, without the minimal die removed. This sum is equal to 6^4 * 14 = 18144. Then, let's remove 6^4 = 1296 because of the first point removed, 5^4 because of the second point etc. Eventually we get: 6^4 * 14 - 6^4 - 5^4 - 4^4 - 3^4 - 2^4 - 1^4 = 15869 Romana: Okay, but can my Elf pick up the sword, or am I too encumbered? Doctor: Umm...oh yes, I forgot what we were doing. What did you roll again? Romana: A five, two threes, and a seven. Doctor: Oh, yes, well, in THIS universe, yes your elf can pick up the sword. Links and References - The Doctor assures the audience DIRECTLY that the catcus in question isn't the stupidest villain he's ever faced, and reminds everyone of Q-tip (Serial 4G) Untelevised Misadventures - The Doctor says he can't be SURE what Jesus thought about Dungeons and Dragons, but says he seemed to like GURPS. Groovy DVD Extras - If you go to the "Cut X-Rated Material" menu under the Special Features menu, and click to the left of "Nude Tom Baker Pics" you will find the stats for Nyssa from Goth Opera -- this character sheet can be used with any version of Vampire: The Masquerade. Dialogue Disasters - Romana: Doctor, it's just a catcus. Doctor: No Romana, this..is the CATCUS OF DEATH!!! Dialogue Triumphs - Zastor: Some fifty years ago I knew a man who solved the insoluble by the strangest means. He sees the threads that join the universe together and mends them when they break -- but Dirk Gently isn't available, so I asked this wanker in the silly scarf. Dialogue Oddities - (ORIGINAL SCRIPT) The Doctor: There are warring factions on this planet, poised for total destruction. (ON SCREEN) Tom Baker: Tell me Zastor...do you trust catci? Viewer Quotes - "Meg Lost was the sort of story that you should just take behind the barn and blown away." - Over Reacting SF Fan Magazine, May 1981 "If you take into account that this is a story about a cactus that APPARENTLY wants to take over the entire universe...it wasn't TOO BAD for that sort of story." - Apologist FanBoy Magazine, June 1981 "This story presented a basic division between two ways of looking at things - Those people who see the world in terms of social conflict between different classes of people. And those people who blindly blame cacti for world affairs." - Political Science Journal, "How The Green Bastards Ruin Everything" "What a load of crap!" - Father James O' Maley (1980) Psychotic Nostalgia - "Ever been in the desert, hiding a body? Hiding from the cops? Its time that those evil desert plants get exposed. Its time to show them for what they are -- sexy." Tom Baker Speaks! "Ah yes, this story was a personal favourite of mine. We shot this episode in a small village which actually had a small pub, one of the few pubs in England at that time, from which I had not been completely barred from. That was a good four or five minutes, I truly enjoyed myself. And after they kicked me out, I stole all their metal barrels with the red and green stripes, right out of the back of the place, and dragged it all back to my hotel room. Some may frown on petty thievery, but when I was a poor miserable child living in the slums, I would slit your throat as soon as look at you, I would. Those were the best days of my life." Rumors & Facts - When Christopher H Bidmead became Doctor Who's script editor at the start of 1980, he discovered that his predecessor, Douglas Adams, had burnt almost all the sets and smashed most the studios cameras and electrical equipment. Douglas also left him with few workable scripts and little information on what writers to contact. Bidmead was desperate to safe guard whatever material he still had intact, or at least not overly scorched. Bidmead trusted an assistant named Meg to safe guard all scripts and planning documents. The second serial of season 18 needed to be completed quickly and without a hitch for the series to keep on schedule. Sadly on the day they were due to start rehearsing, the cast and crew were given a short hastily written note with the words "Meg Lost!!!" in frantic and nervous letters. The scripts had been left in the back of a double decker bus in central London and had not been seen since. In the noble spirit of the BBC and following the actor's creed that the show must go on - the process continued. This sadly left the actors to their own devices to create a rough and loose story as they went along. Tragically the person with the most influence on the development of the plot was Tom Baker. Against the advice of the director, the technical crew, his co-actors, and members of the public simply passing by, Tom Baker decided that the villian for this piece should be his catcus, Jerrold, which he had been growing in his flat for 5 years in the hopes that it would yield potent peyote. Driven insane by his circumstances, Bidmead turned to an actor he knew named Andrew McCulloch, who with colleague John Flanagan had begun pursuing mafioso hit opportunities. Enthusiastic about the possible commission, Flanagan and McCulloch put together a plan to assassinate Tom Baker. Producer John Satan-Turner was enourmously impressed by the scheme - but it all fell through when they discovered that BBC policy insisted that they use an official BBC gun when killing BBC employees - however all of their guns were deeply defective as they hadn't been cleaned since 1862. They abandoned the plot as quickly as Tom Baker. "Looking back on it, it probably would have been better if we had given the catcus some lines." - Chris Bidmead (1987)