 Kamelion is, in many ways, The Doctor’s
most tragic companion, possessing so much potential - both
in reality and in The Doctor’s fictional universe -, and yet lacking
the ability to explore so much of it due to circumstances beyond his
control. A completely
artificial companion in both contexts - he was actually a
remote-controlled robot specifically designed for Doctor Who rather than
a man in a costume
-, Kamelion’s opportunities to participate in the TARDIS’s
travels were limited from the beginning due to the death
of the only member of the production crew who truly understood
how to operate him
before his first episode was filmed, restricting his role
in the series from the start.
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| The King's Demons |
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In the context of the show itself,
Kamelion was a shape-shifting artificial life-form designed by an ancient
race, possessing
a pseudo-metabolic extension into the fifth dimension that
would allow him to store or draw
on additional mass to suit varied body forms, who was discovered
by The
Master when he was temporarily trapped on the planet
Xeraphim in the
distant past. With Kamelion’s programming causing him to be automatically
loyal to the strongest mind in his immediate vicinity, Kamelion
was swiftly taken over by The Master, who used him as his puppet in various
schemes
across the universe, Kamelion’s ability to completely transform
his physical appearance - even his ‘default’ form was merely
a disguise, although we never learned precisely what he would
look like without any disguises - making him an invaluable
tool. However, although
Kamelion lacked the ability to defy The Master, he still
possessed some degree of free will, causing him to become
increasingly uncomfortable
with the roles The Master forced him to play, leaving him
longing for an alternate to The Master even as his nature
compelled him to obey the
Time Lord.
Kamelion eventually appeared
to gain his freedom when The Master had him pose as King
John in an attempt to alter the outcome of
the signing of the Magna Carta. Although the ‘king’ initially
attempted to use the arrival of the TARDIS to further The
Master’s
ambition to discredit the king, with the king introducing
the Fifth
Doctor, Tegan
Jovanka and Turlough as
his ‘demons’, The
Doctor eventually saw through The Master’s deception, subsequently
discovering Kamelion’s
true identity. In a battle of wills between the two Time
Lords, The Doctor appeared to win control of Kamelion away
from The Master, Kamelion subsequently
expressing a keen interest in remaining with The Doctor despite
Tegan and Turlough’s initial distrust of him due to his origins.
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| The King's Demons |
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Although
automatically designed as a slave, Kamelion demonstrated
a certain degree of free will even when under the control
of another. A particular example of this can be seen when
Kamelion was briefly taken
over by the criminal psychopath Maximillian Arrestis while
investigating strange goings on at a time-travelling restaurant
in the far future ("The
Crystal Bucephalus"), subsequently being ordered to turn into something
dangerous to threaten Arrestis’s enemies. Although Kamelion obeyed
the order by transforming into a Sculti - a race that generated
a bio-electric field capable of shutting down the human brain
-, he neglected to inform
Arrestis that the same field could also shut down the energy
weapons that Arrestis was using, allowing The Doctor to gain
the upper hand in
the subsequent confrontation and send Arrestis - who had
been rescued from the moment of his own death - back to the
point in time where he’d
come from. Despite the fact that he had prevented any serious
damage being done, this adventure prompted Kamelion to resolve
to remain inside
the TARDIS from then on until he could be certain he would
not be a danger to his fellow companions in case another
being managed to take control
of him.
After this, Kamelion was generally
left alone in the TARDIS by the others baring a brief occasion
when Tegan had him
assume the form of the Fourth Doctor to show Turlough what
The Doctor looked like when
she first met him after their meeting with The Doctor’s first three
selves ("The
Five Doctors"), unintentionally causing Kamelion
to overload as he tried to access Tegan and Turlough’s subjective
experiences and impressions, prompting The Doctor to provide
him with a casket to shield him from data he couldn’t process properly
("Qualia").
Kamelion’s leisure time was generally spent linked up to the TARDIS’s
databanks and learning more about its adventures, finding
a certain similarity in their histories given their mutual
background as shapeshifters serving
the same master. However, he played a more active role during
The Doctor and Turlough’s investigation of a British expedition
to a mysterious hunting park on the Moon in 1878. Although
the park was protected by
an energy shield designed to contain an atmosphere that disrupted
Kamelion’s
systems when he left the TARDIS, after The Doctor, Turlough
and the expedition members shut down the field, Kamelion
was able to rescue The Doctor when
he nearly suffocated in the crater as the oxygen began to
fail, subsequently posing as a vision of Prince Albert to
convince Queen Victoria to abandon
further efforts at space travel after helping The Doctor
and Turlough defeat the ruthless Vrall before they could
launch a full-scale assault
on Earth ("Imperial
Moon").
Shortly after this, however,
Kamelion’s
legacy as The Master’s ‘tool’ came
back to haunt him. Having recently been shrunk to the size
of a doll while trying to increase the power of his Tissue
Compression Eliminator,
The Master was forced to use a remote control room to enhance
his still-present telepathic control over Kamelion, influencing
the android to take the
TARDIS to the planet Sarn, where The Master could use the
numismaton gas - a powerful healing agent if channelled properly
- generated by
the planet’s core to restore himself. Despite the best efforts
of The Doctor, Turlough, and new companion Peri - whose will
proved powerful enough to temporarily override The Master’s control
over Kamelion on brief occasions - to free him from The Master’s
influence, Kamelion finally asked The Doctor to kill him
to prevent him from ever being used
against his friends again, The Doctor reluctantly complying
with his request by using The Master’s own TCE ("Planet
of Fire").
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| Planet of Fire |
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Even after this tragic loss,
however, Kamelion’s legacy
remained. Although The Master once attempted to use his and
The Doctor’s
link to Kamelion to ‘encourage’ The Doctor to die during
his fifth regeneration - The Doctor requiring telepathic
assistance from his former companion Nyssa to find the necessary
strength to find the
mental manifestation of the Watcher in his ‘dream’ ("Circular
Time: Winter") -, Kamelion himself made a brief, unexpected
return to aid the Fifth Doctor and Peri when they found themselves
participating in the search for the mythical treasure of
Rovan Cartovall ("The
Ultimate Treasure"), lost for centuries on the planet Gelsandor
and guarded by the mysterious Seers. Due to his link with
the TARDIS and his partial existence in other dimensions,
a portion of Kamelion’s
personality remained despite his physical death, the Seers
using that fragment to create a new body for Kamelion in
the form of the unicorn-like
armoured creature known as Red (His body was based on Peri’s thoughts
of heroic dogs and knights). Although his body proved to
be too unstable to last for long, Kamelion died content after
he was able to help The
Doctor and Peri face the challenges of Gelsandor, saving
Peri from a crashed ship, driving away insane villagers who
threatened to execute
The Doctor, and protecting them and their allies from a deranged
android.
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Gerald Flood was born in Portsmouth, the son of a Naval
family. He was a wireless operator during the Second World
War and worked as a filing clerk after the War ended until
he landed a job with the
Farnham Repertory Company.
He toured in rep, and appeared
in productions including Hamlet, Power and Glory and Charley's
Aunt.
In 1960 he
performed in The Complaisant Lover at the Globe
Theatre and went on to appear in The Formation Dancers, Children’s
Day and There's A Girl In My Soup.
In the
1960’s he
appeared in a science fiction series Pathfinders
in Space (1960), and its sequels Pathfinders
to Mars (1960-1961) and Pathfinders to Venus (1961).
Other television roles followed, including The Ratcatchers (1966/67),
Third Time Lucky (1982)
and (after Doctor Who) Bleak
House (1985). He also guest starred
in episodes for shows like Randall
and Hopkirk (Deceased) (1969), Steptoe and Son (1970),
Tom Brown's Schooldays (1971),
Paul Temple (1971) and Return of the Saint (1979).
His
film roles included Black Beauty (1946), Patton (1970), Smokescreen and Frightmare (1974).
He
died in April 1989.
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