The Chenka sisters visit an army training base where new hierarchy protocols are being tested…

Roland Moore kicks off the new set of adventures on Kaldor, featuring Nicola Walker’s Liv Chenka during the year she “took off” from travelling with the Doctor. It’s a fast paced tale with various different parties having their own agendas, and yet another experiment by the Company proving to have some rather unfortunate side-effects when made operational. Indeed, as Liv points out more than once, it seems as if the Company is ignoring a large number of events where the Robots are doing things they shouldn’t be – so hopefully this is something that’s being addressed in the remaining eight stories.

Silas Carson is given a meaty role as the commander of the base opposite Walker and Claire Rushbrook, who gives her robot voice a palpable menace without it ever actually changing inflection – the implacability and unthinking adherence to logic making it much more chilling. Joe Kraemer’s sound design and score tighten things up as the robots’ hold on the base increases (come on, that’s hardly a spoiler – what do you think is going to happen?!), and Ken Bentley ensures that we’re always very clear exactly where we are within the base.

Verdict: Although the trope of “robots go bad and attack” is inevitably getting a lot of use, Moore comes at it from a different angle, providing a taut tale. 8/10

Paul Simpson

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