Doctor Who: The Cannibalists

The Eighth Doctor Adventures #3.6

by Jonathan Morris, Paul McGann (Narrator), Sheridan Smith (Narrator)

The Haven hangs in space. A vast star city, devoid of life. Organic life, that is.

From their high spire, looking out over silent streets and empty plazas, the Assemblers are waiting for the day when the humans arrive. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting...

When the TARDIS brings the Doctor and Lucie to the Haven, it seems like Assemblers' long wait might be over. Living beings! Without batteries! Protocol be praised!

Except — they're headed for the lower levels. They don't want to do that. That's where the Cannibalists live. And if the Cannibalists catch them — well, they won't be living beings much longer...

Genres: Doctor Who, Audiobook, Science Fiction, Time Travel

Audio CD

First published August 31, 2009

About the author

Jonathan Morris is one of the most prolific and popular writers of Doctor Who books, including the highly-regarded novels 'Festival of Death' and 'Touched by an Angel' and the recent guide to monsters, 'The Monster Vault'. He has also written numerous comic strips, most of which were collected in 'The Child of Time', and audios for BBC Audio and Big Finish, including the highly-regarded comedies 'Max Warp' and 'The Auntie Matter', as well as the adaptation of Russell T Davies’ 'Damaged Goods'.

Recently he has started his own audio production company, Average Romp. Releases include a full-cast adaptation of Charles Dickens' The Chimes', an original play, 'When Michael Met Benny', and three episodes of a SF sitcom, 'Dick Dixon in the 21st Century'.

For details visit www.averageromp.com

He also originated his own series, Vienna and script-edited the Nigel Planer series 'Jeremiah Bourne in Time'. He’s also written documentaries and for TV sketch shows.

Librarian note:
There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name

Reviews

[Emilija · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a standalone story about cannibal robots on a space station. I did quite like the idea of the story, and I wish that it could have been a bit longer to explore more aspects of these robots, plus, I could actually understand them. I have issues every time there's a Cybermen story because I just can't understand them / hear them properly, so it was nice to have a robot plot that I could actually understand.

[Jack · Rating 3 out of 5]

7/10
Verdict: Optional

Very fun and light story, light in a sense of 'a light meal.' Some great side characters and a consistent flow aside from zig zagging between plot threads.

[Julia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Haven è sospesa nello spazio. Una vasta città stellare, priva di vita. Vita organica, cioè.
Dalla loro alta guglia, affacciati su strade silenziose e piazze vuote, gli Assemblatori aspettano il giorno in cui arriveranno gli umani. In attesa. In attesa. In attesa...
Quando il TARDIS porta il Dottore e Lucie ad Haven, sembra che la lunga attesa degli Assemblatori sia finita. Esseri viventi! Senza batterie! Il Protocollo sia lodato!
Però... sono diretti verso i livelli inferiori. Non dovrebbero farlo. Lì è dove vivono i Cannibalisti. E se i Cannibalisti li catturano - beh, non saranno esseri viventi ancora per molto...
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Il titolo sembra più inquietante di quanto non sia in realtà, perché a dire il vero questa è una storia abbastanza leggera. In una stazione spaziale, due distinti gruppi di robot sono presenti: gli Assemblatori che restano fedeli al loro Protocollo e attendono con impazienza l'arrivo degli umani per poter ricevere ordini, e i Cannibalisti (passatemi questa traduzione) che sono impazziti e hanno iniziato ad attaccare gli altri robot per rubarne componenti per i propri upgrade. Lungi da essere i tipici androidi meccanici e privi di emozioni, il primo gruppo ricorda una massa di fanatici in attesa di una profezia, mentre i secondi una gang di strada sadica e senza scrupoli; tuttavia, nessuno di loro è particolarmente intelligente, tanto che faticano a distingue i robot dalle creature organiche andando a creare più una situazione comica piuttosto che di suspance.
Con Lucie separata dal Dottore per un breve periodo, quest'ultimo è affiancato da un robot abbastanza adorabile che scrive poesie in linguaggio esadecimale. La trama è piuttosto lineare senza troppe complicazioni e la risoluzione abbastanza semplice, anche se riserva qualche sorpresa. Direi che è una storia carina e senza pretese.

[David Layton · Rating 3 out of 5]

"The Cannibalists" is almost unremittingly loud and violent. It starts with a gang of thug robots tearing apart another robot, with much shouting and screaming. It pretty much continues on that note for the next hour. Phil Davis is rather wasted as Titus, leader of the thug robots, since all he has to do is shout in nearly every scene. The useless trio of good robots is voiced such that it is difficult to distinguish the three. Phil Jupitus puts in a good performance as Servo, the robot poet. The story itself has interesting background. The location is Haven, a large, orbiting colony, or so it would seem. It turns out that the humans set the robots to build the colony, but the humans for unknown reasons either never really arrived to take charge, or were wiped out before the station's completion. This leaves the AI robots on their own. Some programming glitch gives the robots individual personalities, and allows a few robots to gain independence from the orders of the main computer. These independent robots go on rampages where they track down other robots and cannibalize them for parts. It is interesting enough. I just found all the shouting and screaming quite irritating, with violent scenes that carried on just a bit too long.

[Leila Anani · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Doctor and Lucie end up on a robot space station - where evolution has produced various types of robot - Servos (good droids that look like vacuums and live for protocol), Cannibalists (evil droids) who kill and repurpose other robots for their own survival, Minerva, the space station operating system, and one unique robot who composes poetry in his spare time.

Sheridan steals the show and gives a very human connection point to what is quite an alien story. Other voice cast includePhil Davis and Phil Jupitus. It's a lot of fun for a robot story that doesn't feature Daleks, Cybermen or Vocs. Very much a stand alone this doesn't offer much in the way of character development or expansion of the who verse but still, the evil cannibalists are ace.

[K · Rating 3 out of 5]

誰もいない宇宙ステーションに到着したターディス。そこには宇宙ステーションを組み立てるロボットたちが完成した宇宙ステーションに人間が訪れるのを待ち続けていた。

建造途中に人類から忘れられ3000年放置されていた組み立てロボットたち。なぜかお互いを壊し合うロボットが途中から発生し、リセットされる。それを繰り返しているうちに相手を破壊するのではなくただポエムを読みたがるロボが誕生した。

8がポエムを読みたがるロボを気に入り、リセットからどうにか守ろうとする。ドクター、そういうのに弱いからなぁ。
新しい種族としてこれからどんな発展をするのかな？

箸休め的エピソード。

“プロトコール！プロトコール！”とプロトコルをここまで連発されると今度からプロトコルって言葉をみるたんびに思い出しそう😅

[April Mccaffrey · Rating 3 out of 5]

An enjoyable story to pass the time. It was very Douglas Adams inspired with the robots, and right off the bat we start with a robot torturing another robot?

Except for Lucie and the Doctor, all characters in this story here are robots on an abandoned space station.

All praise the protocol!

[Josh · Rating 1 out of 5]

I’ve got to be honest, I really didn’t like this one. I feel like this and previous stories from the EDA’s Series 3 should be half the length that they are. Then they’d be short and punchy, being more memorable.

[SuperPiggy5000 · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5/5

After the last few disappointing episodes of series 3, this was a breath of fresh air. Insane robots, hexadecimal poetry, and an interesting time loop. Had a lot of fun listening to this one, and is a standout episode for Lucie.

[Danny Welch · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very Douglas Adam's-esgue, a nice little clever story that passes through the hour easily, really enjoyed it. 8/10

[Aaron G · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic audio drama and very inventive. A story where all characters (excluding the Doctor and Lucie) are robots. Definitely worth the listen and will listen to again.

[Steven Shinder · Rating 4 out of 5]

Today I learned Sheridan Smith and Phill Jupitus share a birthday. The latter's Server character is an interesting robot who loves poetry. Makes for fun interactions.

[Alyce Caswell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of this is enjoyable but some of it feels tired and uninspired. I think I'll just say it's average and leave it at that.

[Gabriel Mero · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one was okay.

[Charles Mitchell · Rating 4 out of 5]

excellent story

[Zach · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great. I love how the story builds in a way that rapidly changes your perspective of the robots and the world.

[Jamie Revell · Rating 4 out of 5]

In many respects this is a pretty standard Doctor Who story, with the Doctor and Lucie arriving at a space station inhabited entirely by robots whose society is in a state of terminal collapse. The fact that all of the guest characters are robots is unusual, certainly, but other than that there's nothing ground-breaking in the story.

Having said which, it's well done, and the title characters do provide a degree of menace. Some quite brutal scenes with the cannibalists devouring their kin are balanced by elements of humour (notably Phil Jupitus as a robot writing poetry in hexadecimal machine code). The ending is a fitting one for the show, perhaps reminiscent of the sort of thing we got in the 4th Doctor's era - although you'll probably spot it coming a mile off.

A good, solid story that works well, even if it is lacking in any great ambition.

[Mel · Rating 3 out of 5]

"While all the other robots were driven to Cannabalism you were driven to write poetry".

Was a pretty great line for the Doctor. But I have to admit this audio didn't really do it for me. It was quite gruesome with death and torture but played more for laughs as it was done with robots with comedy accents. I think I just have a slightly different sense of humour to Jonathon Morris as all his funny audios I just don't get. This reminded me a lot of Babblesphere actually.

[Shaun Collins · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jonathan Morris continues to impress me, not only with his grasp of how to write Who (which is tricker than you think) but his sense of humor. Most of his stories have a quirkiness to them (he's been compared to Douglas Adams in delivery) and this one is no exception. Cannibalistic ROBOTS?!? Lead on sir, I'll follow you anywhere. Paul McGann shines as usual. For a more detailed review, visit http://travelingthevortex.com/?p=8531

[Nicholas Whyte]

"I was very unimpressed with The Cannibalists at first: I hate cute anthropomorphic robots and this seemed to be just a story of the Doctor and Lucie saving the nice robots from the nasty ones, enlivened by Phil Jupitus' performance as the nicest of the nice ones. But there is a brilliant twist at the end which made me very glad I had stuck it out."

[Steven · Rating 3 out of 5]

This one rather hearks back to the days of Douglas Adams as story editor on WHo, with lots of over the top writing and acting, loutish characters, and much gurning noise. Some people like that, but for me it tends to bring back bad memories of the series at its rackety worst.

[Tabitha · Rating 4 out of 5]

"I've got hurty feet"... I've got to remember that.

Right off the bat this story starts off quite brutal. It's very much a lesson in learning from your mistakes. All in all enjoyable, although the ending was a bit predictable.

[Gayle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Listened to this last night in bed. Have to admit it was a bit creepy listening to robots been forcibly dismantled and taken apart by the Cannibalists.

The story was good, nice ending.

[CR · Rating 5 out of 5]

Seriously scared me!

[Steven · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sweet story of machines developing a soul ...

[Christopher Hatch · Rating 5 out of 5]

Easy the most enjoyable story from Season 3 so far.