Lead Us Unto Robots

I remember two of my dreams from last night. In the last one before I woke up, I dreamed Sanjuro (the samurai from Kurosawa's Yojimbo and Sanjuro) had been hired to defeat the ghosts in the Overlook hotel from The Shining. Something about Sanjuro made him incorruptible by the spirits. I remember seeing Jack Nicholson angrily swinging his axe at Mifune, who easily side-stepped and sliced off his opponent's jeans in one movement, like he did with one of the yakuza in Yojimbo. The rest of the dream had different Overlook caretakers frantically running from Sanjuro.

In the dream before that, I was meeting someone who represented the opposite side of a conflict to a side I represented. They were in a huge, glass cafeteria and I was walking across Rohan, from The Lord of the Rings, to get there. But it was taking a really long time because I was being led by K-9 from Doctor Who.



In "Meglos", the Doctor Who serial I finished watching a couple days ago, I read in the Wikipedia entry that one of the guest stars only agreed to appear on the condition that he be allowed to kick K-9. I also read that the new show runner hated K-9, and it's bothered me seeing the little guy so abused all season, breaking down in just about every serial now. I didn't like K-9 at first, either, but he really grew on me. He seems so content in a role to just please his friends as best he can.

Otherwise, I liked some aspects of "Meglos", but mostly it felt oddly rushed. The whole problem of the civilisation mistrusting the Doctor seemed resolved rather quickly and pointlessly. It's like the characters were just given busy work. Boy, I miss Douglas Adams.



Of course, I recognised Jacqueline Hill right away--here playing a priestess, but I'd first seen her as Barbara, one of the first Doctor's first companions. I was rather frustrated seeing her come back not as Barbara.