K-9 Set For Autumn Premiere

Doctor Who will recieve its third spin-off this autumn, and it will once again feature one of the Doctor's favourite companions, K-9. The Sarah Jane Adventures will also feature K-9 for half of the series this autumn, but the new Who spin-off, dubbed K-9, will air with the character in all 26 episodes. That's right, 26. Not unlike recent Sky Movies animated series Star Wars: The Clone Wars, the spin-off will consist of 26 30 minute episodes, with no overriding story arc other than the main characters and possible villians. The logo is shown above left, although this is a pre-production image.

So, when in our fave sci fi show's continuity will K-9 take place? We've been told that the K-9 we meet in the spin-off will be "the K-9 from The Invisible Enemy, the original you might say!", so in other words Mark 1, but how his life will fit into Who remains to be seen after he is damaged during the first episode, and "regenerates" (no, not literally) into a new and sleeker form. After the first episode, there will be several time travelling adventures for the robot dog and his new gang, including them meeting none other than Robin Hood, the British legend from the time of King Richard the Lionheart. There will also be a reference to Who for diehards in every episode.

The new show will air on Jetix (a paid channel found on Sky) this autumn. The synopsis goes like so: K-9 follows a reptilious warrior named Jixen through a space time portal, while a human named Professor Gryfin works on a space time manipulator. Jixen and K-9 both fall through, and K-9 narrowly stops Jixen, but at the cost of his robot body. At the end of the two part opener, Feast of the Merons, K-9 becomes disoperational, and must give Starkey instructions to rebuild and regenerate his metal self into a new form (above right). Are you going to watch K-9 when it airs in autumn?