Nobody can accuse the television series "Doctor Who" of being environmentally unfriendly; they were always happy to recycle used material. "Terror of the Autons", the first serial of the eighth season, is essentially a remake of "Spearhead from Space, the first serial of the seventh season. Once again the Nestene Consciousness, an "incorporeal intelligence", is trying to conquer the Earth, starting with Britain, by using "autons", remotely controlled plastic robots. The autons were brought back because they had proved popular when "Spearhead from Space" was broadcast the previous year, but someone at the BBC clearly realised that incorporeal intelligences do not make very satisfactory villains and that the Doctor needed a more corporeal enemy to fight.
Enter the Master. This serial was the first to feature the evil renegade Time Lord, a sinister figure dressed in black, who was to be a regular villain in the next three seasons (and doubtless would have been a regular fixture for much longer but for the tragic death of actor Roger Delgado in a road accident). His role in this particular adventure is not always easy to understand, because it is never really explained why he is assisting the Nestene Consciousness or how its planned conquest of the Earth is likely to benefit him. Nevertheless, the Master was a welcome addition to the series. Moriarty to the Doctor's Holmes, his appeal to the viewer was that he was one of the Doctor's own people, with a similar intellect and a similar level of technology at his disposal. He presented a greater threat than any human adversary ever could.
I was less happy with another new characters introduced in this serial, the Doctor's new companion, Jo Grant. His previous companion Liz Shaw had been a brilliant scientist and as close to the Doctor's intellectual equal as it was possible for a human to be. She had not, however, proved popular with the viewers and had been written out, and someone decided that her replacement should be as unlike her as possible. Katy Manning's Jo is capable of loyalty and courage, but comes across as a stereotypical dumb blonde bimbo. (She failed science at A-level and only got a job with UNIT because her uncle pulled strings on her behalf). I must admit that in 1971, when I was only a child, I probably did not fully appreciate the differences between Liz and Jo and did not understand their implications, but now that I am rewatching the programme as an adult the substitution of an intelligent woman by an unintelligent one seems like an unnecessary backward step.
"Terror of the Autons" is not really my favourite "Doctor Who" adventure. It is too similar to "Spearhead from Space", and as in that serial many of the details (killer daffodils!) struck me as more surreal than scary. The scene where one character is killed off by a weird little plastic doll struck me as particularly bizarre. It is, however, worth watching as the first appearance of Delgado's masterly Master.