The Power of Kroll - Classic Doctor Who review

✔ SUPPORT ✔
Patreon: / councilofgeeks
Tip jar: PayPal.me/coun...
✔ SHOP ✔
Merch: www.teepublic....
Book that I Wrote: a.co/d/atfibBA
✔ SOCIAL MEDIA ✔
Twitter: / councilofgeeks
Facebook: / councilofgeeks
TikTok: www.tiktok.com...
Instagram: www.instagram....
Twitch: twitch.tv/councilofgeeks
✔ OTHER PROJECTS ✔
Podcast feed: councilofgeeks...
✔ CONTACT ✔
E-mail: [e-mail]
Mail:
Council of Geeks
PO Box 4429
St. Johnsbury, VT 05819

[@LaurenceGill2000]

I genuinely just came to the channel like "did I miss that power of Kroll review?" And it was 5 minutes old

[@ianmcintire6696]

One good thing about Power of Kroll - it pulls a reasonably smart trick (done earlier by The Rescue and later by Castrovalva) by having the dude in the crappy-looking monster suit actually be (drumroll please) a dude in a crappy-looking monster suit!

[@BulbasaurRepresent]

I never forget how long a story is. Never - for some reason, the knowledge of how many episodes a story is just sticks in my brain, even if I remember nothing else about that story. I remember barely anything about the Power of Kroll. But it is the one story where I always forget how many episodes it is, because the only thing I remember is it feeling like it just dragged on and on. So I really thought it was a 6 parter until you mentioned it being 4 parts.

[@rowanc88]

The final Whoniverse appearances of both John Abineri and Philip Madoc - both terrific actors who had turned in multiple great performances in the series, sadly ending their journey on this piece of swamp muck!

[@nekusakura6748]

This Was also the Last 4th Doctor Serial that Robert Holmes wrote (and wouldn't write another DW serial again until 'The Caves of Androzani').

[@DiM2404]

Thing with Holmes is, he’s going to be angry at SOMETHING, when he’s angry at his marginal tax rate, you get the sunmakers. When he’s angry at the script editor and the production team, you get this.

[@davidson8939]

*grabs cane* I watched this on PBS at least twice. You young thing!

[@voltijuice8576]

Lionheart FTW!

[@tenmark7055]

"It was set in a swamp." Yeah... it certainly was!

[@Yan_Alkovic]

Honestly I may just have extremely low standards but I actually did not find it awful. Like it wasn't great, but I wouldn't say it was completely unenjoyable. Maybe I'm just a sucker for the setting, but I just found the atmosphere very compelling and easy to sort of lose yourself in, and Tom Baker gave a great performance. Like, you gotta give him credit at least for the glass-breaking scene! But yeah I get that people like to harp on the visual effects, but still. Fun times.

[@MidnightChimey]

My main memory of this story is that I don't really remember anything about it. For a story involving a giant squid monster it was remarkably tedious

[@andrewbowman4611]

What's interesting to me is the fact that another KZbinr who's marathoning the original run of the show absolutely loved this one. He's a New Zealander going by the name Dirvinator; if you want an alternative viewpoint, that might be of interest. Just tell him Andrew Bowman sent you.

[@cindydott452]

I loved the aluminum canoes with plants glued to them to try and make them look hand made.

[@natsmith303]

All two times I've seen this, I was reminded of the scene from The Sound of Drums where the Doctor demonstrates the perception filter for Martha: my brain simply refuses to pay attention to this story.

[@moribundtoot8183]

Your utter despair with this story is both heart felt and unfortunately hilarious at the same time.This story has no redeemable qualities at all. Thanks for such a great review.

[@rosecarlene7275]

This was one of the first fourth doctor stories i saw as it was the one the library i went to had. I was so confused by what was going on. I saw this a few times like in 2014 and I don’t think i’ve rewatched it since lmao. I remember bad special effects and the one group just chanting “Kroll! Kroll! Kroll!”

[@stephenreed2093]

I first saw the Key to Time stories out of order due to availability on VHS back in the 90s. This was the last one I saw, but I found it wasn’t as bad as its reputation. The location filming is great. I actually grew up near the location. The cast is very good. It is just some very cheap set design that lets it down. The monster effects aren’t that bad either. I can see this one getting updated effects on the Collection Blu-ray set.

[@IsaacKuo]

Low point or not, I still liked the humongous creature and the tentacle SFX. I think it could have been an okay 2 episode story.

[@thebitterfig9903]

When I first watched it in my day, we had SLP VHS tapped off of PBS. It still didn't look any better.

[@neilmcdonald9164]

Lol been waiting for your review of this one...Philip Madoc,in the last and least of his 4 roles,was originally due to play the Base Boss🎩

[@ftumschk]

It's ironic that the brilliant Philip Madoc bookended his otherwise excellent Doctor Who TV appearances with two crappy stories - The Krotons and Power of Kroll - both written by the otherwise excellent Robert Holmes.

[@MalamuteX]

Well, if you go by my standard rewatches of the Key of time series, you would think there were only 5 keys to the key of time series. :-)

[@user-vg5cp2ru1f]

Despite it's flaws. Some of the themes in this story reminds me of the British occupation of India. If you research the history of the East India Company. You will see why.

[@benflay6038]

Wait till season 17😅 Love the tenticle acting interesting here they put a wood tardis in water note lanps missing to .and yeah no one thought can we do this in who tradition.

[@meander112]

Engagement for the engagement god!

[@chrispalmer7893]

Haven’t seen this for 20 years, but I remember The Armageddon Factor as being the worst of the worst - essentially unwatchable. But yeah, there’s also the yikes factor in this one. And it’s another in the tradition whereby every couple of years the show would say “Do we have the technology to do a really big monster?” And the answer was never “yes”, but they did it anyway.

[@MidnightChimey]

Oh no Armageddon Factor is mainly just disappointing, because there are some golden ideas in there, but it meanders and goes nowhere

[@chrispalmer7893]

@@MidnightChimey Like I said, it's been a while. I just remember the Armageddon Factor as being a six-parter than is five parts too long.

[@tbcmallett]

Something my Mum pointed out, during the chanting the krullites are out of time with the music. That is what I remember aside from Tom Baker playing with a flaccid tentacle. Not a good one.

[@paulshorney3465]

This was pretty bad even then,but this season's fair makes it look like Shakespeare!! Fun fact the actors who played swampies used a green dye that took about 3 weeks to totally remove from their bodies!! Lol

[@ftumschk]

Graham Williams was taken ill for this story, and John Nathan Turner stepped in to oversee the production. JNT recalled in his autobiography that he felt the giant octopus looked dreadful and, effects-wise, there was "a total discontinuity of scale".

[@johnboren8928]

I think K-9 looked at the script and decided to take the week off.

[@IronSalamander8]

This one is bad, but I find Armageddon Factor worse, it drags on longer, and has a lot of issues that make it worse for me. The first 4 stories of the key to time are so much better than these last 2! Philip Madoc was supposed to be the leader of the refinery folk, but he ended up in that lesser role, and apparently he wasn't happy with that. It's too bad, as he's a fantastic Who regular ever since Troughton's time.

[@Concreteowl]

I was genuinely impressed with Kroll.

[@josgibbons6777]

Robert Holmes wrote many Who serials, but this was his least favourite. He didn't return until years later with The Caves of Androzani, arguably the best classic serial. Part of the blame for this one goes to him being given a "big scary monster" premise, which wasn't his preferred style.

[@nekusakura6748]

Someone like Robert Sloman would have been a better choice to write it.

[@paulhammond6978]

When Vera got to the mention of Rohm Dutt the gun runner, I suddenly realised there are a number of similarities between this and Caves of Androzani. Bob Holmes liked the gun runners.

[@qwert_511]

Watching this instead of the legend of Ruby Sunday rn

[@jayanderson9375]

Guess I need to rewatch 😎

[@arthurward2067]

I vaguely remember watching this as a kid, and then over the years hearing of its reputation, so when I finally saw it again probably 20 years my expectations were so low that i ended up enjoying it. With that said all criticisms it's received are accurate, and I suspect if I watched it again I'd really not be able to enjoy it at all

[@someguy3752]

Screw it. I like this one. It's miles ahead of The Armageddon Factor and is possibly even better than The Androids of Tara.

[@drkenata5807]

Androids of Tara has better dialog, better villain, and a generally silly but fun plot. Power of Kroll has Kroll..Kroll..Kroll...Kroll..Kroll...........

[@R.senals_Arsenal]

Funny thing is, because of difficulty catching up on back-issue stories in the 80s as a kid, I read the Target Novelization before seeing the episode, and I thought it had some solid stuff in it. Yeah, it did Not go so smooth on screen!! It was a mess. As an adult I see the broader problems with the story for tribal tropes. Imagine cutting an ep from Tara, and 2 from this, you could have had a whole 3 parter extra of something else this season. Like shoehorn in a red-herring story where they don't get a segment.

[@GabaSaminu]

YOU CERTIFIED✅

[@neilmcdonald9164]

Saw whole season on original showing in 1978 and several times since...this stinker has always been so🎩

[@chriscollins5581]

I watched this one on original airing before they had dvd’s. So I didn’t get to watch behind the scenes.

[@kylejones8289]

Power of Kroll is one of my guilty pleasures. It is terrible, but it is so awful that I find it funny. KROLL IS MIGHTY!!!!!

[@alfje5492]

I remember the rear-projected Kroll vividly, but I've consciously blocked out the 'swampies'... yeah, this is a pretty bad episode.

[@HotDogTimeMachine385]

Hooked in the first minute!

[@Morphstock]

Well I liked it!

[@oldsouplegs7384]

There are some.... unfortunate interviews with the white actors playing the swampies on the dvd...

[@Tymbus]

I love this story for no good reasn

[@Rmlohner]

And yet it got the highest viewing numbers of the season, go figure.

[@natbarmore]

…and yet this is my favorite of The Key to Time stories. Well, this one or The Pirate Planet. Stones of Blood is 3rd. I think I just like giant octopus monsters. 🤷🏽‍♀️ I think my nostalgia helps me look past the racism and see what I _think_ was intended to be an anti-colonialist story, done by people who didn’t even recognize their own colonialist/racist assumptions. But this is one of the seasons that I like _all_ of the stories. My least-favorite this season is probably Androids of Tara, and even that I still think is good, just a bit lackluster and certainly not great.

[@paulhammond6978]

No, I thought this when Vera was talking - we are in the 70s. Progressives are anti-colonial at this stage, but still aren't seeing the problems with portraying the natives as savage superstitious killers who like a human sacrifice. "Face of Evil" did so much better at portraying a tribal society where the people have actual characters.

[@deebeedaydreamer]

I have seen this one a couple times but it's completely purged from my memory. The descriptions brought back nothing. When notoriously janky effects don't even stick with you, that's a problem.

[@kubzania]

Honestly I remember being happy that the rascists were shown as such And then nothing else positive lol

[@Donnagata1409]

Well, for me it was rather "hilariously bad", so I enjoyed it somehow. Not that you don't have a point...

[@Venemofthe888]

This story feels like it was a last minute put in to make up the episodes or something cause this feels like a first draft and almost everything is terrible

[@user-gj9uq3kb7y]

this the Ribos operation and the finale are meh

[@dmpenfold4536]

It's terrible, but you're still going to get people saying it's better than any "woke" episode with one of those "woke minorities" as the Doctor. 🤦

[@HBHaga]

Yeah, The Power of Kroll is a definite stinker and it covers the full range of bad from full cringe to LOLwhattheheckisthat?!

[@michaellevenson2200]

Vera you've not seen Talons ? I understand why, the racist portrayal in it is unnecessary, it was easily avoidable BUT don't miss a Tom Baker classic. It is Dr Who meets Sherlock Holmes. We even have the 4th Doctor in a deerstalker, plus Leela at her most wonderfully violent and belligerent. It's absolutely the sort of adventure that Conan Doyle could have written. One obvious aspect spoils it , but the rest is near perfection. As for Kroll, the jankiness doesn't bother me, the story is just too slow and the characters Fenner and Thawn are just boring. Best bit, the escaping from the rack with The Doctor doing his Nellie Melba wine glass trick.

[@Elwaves2925]

I agree, even with it's problematic portrayal it's still worth watching for the Holmes aspect. Although they may end up wanting to rip it apart because of that but it's still worth it.

[@nekusakura6748]

Putting aside the Racism of that Serial, I also think it's too Long at 6 Parts.

[@BreakRoomofGeeks]

I’m not planning to miss Talons. I just haven’t gotten to it yet.

[@Elwaves2925]

@@BreakRoomofGeeks Cool and good to hear.

[@AnotherScifiGuy]

My least favorite Tom Baker story by a country mile. The only one of his I call borderline unwatchable. Not my least favorite story of classic who, but close. I was nodding along in agreement to so much of this video.

[@dogblessamerica]

This is one of those episodes I always skip, it just looks inexcusably bad.