YMMV / Doctor Who S16 E4 "The Androids of Tara"

• Magnificent Bastard: Count Grendel of Gracht is an ingenious, powerful Aristocrat who will stop at nothing to become King of Tara. Drugging his mens' wine, Grendel kidnaps Prince Reynart to ensure he will miss his coronation, forfeiting his right to the throne. Having his soldiers replace the Imperial Palace guards and his agents infiltrate the crowds to make it appear the people support his claim, Grendel ensures the Archimandrite will have to choose him, preparing to fake reluctance to win over the other nobles. Foiled by the Doctor and an android duplicate of the Prince, despite his android assassin backup plan also failing, Grendel nevertheless manages to postpone the coronation and nearly manages to kill the Doctor. When Romana escapes his clutches, Grendel personally rides into Reynart's base with the flag of truce and destroys the duplicate of Reynart before recapturing Romana and escaping. Forcing Romana to impersonate Princess Strella, Grendel tricks the Archimandrite into believing Reynart is dying and wants to marry before it's too late, planning to afterwards marry her and become king. Defeated after a lengthy duel with the Doctor, Grendel dives into his moat and manages to swim to safety, escaping into the night.
• Special Effects Failure: Even compared to the other creatures that have appeared on Doctor Who, the beast that menaces Romana looks utterly atrocious. Some have suggested the Fan Wank theory that the beast isn't even a real monster — just one of several luckless peasants the Count pays to roam around in the countryside in a papier mache costume so that he can shoot at them for fun and/or "rescue" naive damsels from them.
• WTH, Costuming Department?:
  • The planet Tara gives new meaning to the phrase Planet of Hats, with the absurd royal crown, the spiked helmets, Romana's apparently fashionable giant purple hat, and above all, the Archimandrite's tall, sparkly, rainbow-coloured hat.
  • In Paul Cornell's sequel "The Trials of Tara" in Decalog 2: Lost Property, the Taran Is the Answer to This Question "Yes"? question is "[i]s the Archimandrite's hat not silly?"

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