Hogan Reviews

The Horns of Nimon is a hard one to talk about because technically, in every way you’d normally judge a story, it’s pretty crap. The story is quite dull, the acting quite poor, the costumes, even for the time, are quite naff… yet despite all of that I do often enjoy the story, mostly because of the odd dichotomy of Tom Baker doing a few serious takes while the character of Soldeed eats so much scenery that you kind of have to applaud him for it. So let’s take a look and see where my opinion lands on this watch through…

The story opens focusing on a spaceship led by two pilots who are desperate to deliver their cargo to the planet Skonnos, so desperate that the co-pilot (Malcolm Terris) pushes the ship beyond its abilities and causes it to breakdown, killing the main pilot in the process. At this point The Doctor (Tom Baker) and Romana (Lallah Ward) are worried about the fact that the TARDIS had just materialised near a black hole so they attach it to the Skonnos ship with a force field and board it to see if they can help get it moving again. There they find the cargo: a group of young adults from the nearby planet Aneth who are to be sacrificed to the all powerful Nimon when they arrive at their destination. They also find crystals called Hymetusite that are deadly under… most conditions, really. The co-pilot (who for the record made me laugh as every time he walked out of the cargo hold he’d turn around just to call the Anethians “scum” before going about his business again) forces The Doctor and Romana to help repair the ship, and when they do thanks to The Doctor and K9 back in the TARDIS he kidnaps Romana and puts her in amongst the Anethians and guns the ship, leaving The Doctor and his ship to tumble towards the black hole.

“Don’t make fun of my crap looking “space gun”, you scum!”

Romana soon bonds with the leader of the young people of Aneth, Seth (Simon Gipps-Kent) and his love interest Teka (Janet Ellis) as they arrive on Skonnos. It’s here we’re properly introduced to Soldeed (Graham Crowden), who is the only person on Skonnos allowed to talk to the Nimon (voiced by Clifford Norgate), who are large horned beast-people who talk with a weird modulation effect and walk around like they haven’t used the bathroom in sixty years, and Sorak (Michael Osborne) who is the leader of the Skonnos military and honestly doesn’t really do anything beyond being the person Soldeed can talk to so the audience can be let in on what’s happening. Basically their planet has been ravaged and their technology is failing but the Nimon has promised them their own tech in exchange for the crystals and sacrifices. Romana and the Anethians are sent into an ever-changing labyrinth and meet the Nimon but luckily The Doctor has saved himself and materialised the TARDIS nearby and manages to distract the Nimon allowing them all to escape. So yes, a Minotaur-like creature in a maze with Athenians / Anethians… it’s not a subtle reimagining of the classic Greek myth!

Soldeed’s devotion to the all-powerful Nimon is somewhat shaken when two more Nimon pop out of a portal it created, but as the reward is still on the table should he find the escaped sacrifices he doesn’t think too much about it. The Doctor and co. meanwhile find out the truth: the Nimon are a nomadic race who travel from planet to planet, draining all their people of life under the guise of offering help and then create a portal to another planet and do the same again. As they fiddle with the device Romana is accidentally sent to the planet Crinoth, the previous planet the Nimon husked, while The Doctor, Seth and Teka are cornered by an approaching Nimon…

Well… I mean, the head bit isn’t too bad… right?

As I mentioned at the start of the review, the story is fun in a cheesy, campy way but even so watch too much of it in a row or while not in the right mood and it can be an unpleasant experience. The first time I watched it I loved it because it was new Tom Baker Who so, of course I did, the second time it was a disappointment because I had these fond memories and it turned out it was actually pretty crap. Subsequent watches, including this one, have landed somewhere in the middle so long as I go into watching it with the right mindset because there are some bits to enjoy, so long as you smirk at the flaws rather than get angry at them…

The Continuity:

Our heroes discuss what to do next (spoiler: it’s “try to defeat the Nimon”)

The Nimon reappeared in the Eighth Doctor audio “Seasons of Fear”, which is a personal favourite of mine. A “relative” species of the Nimon appear in the Eleventh Doctor TV story “The God Complex” and the Third Doctor TV story “The Time Monster” also features a minotaur in a labyrinth and other Greek myth stuff like this does, though in a more traditional, less sci-fi setting…

Overall Thoughts:

You didn’t think I’d go the whole review without a picture of Soldeed did you? Heavens no!

“The Horns of Nimon” can easily be someone’s least favourite story or someone’s guilty pleasure, so it’s definitely one of those stories you have to watch for yourself. As for me? It’s more a guilty pleasure but I will admit each rewatch takes some of the sheen of it, while I love Soldeed and Tom Baker is on rare-for-the-period fine form, but the YA cast are pretty bad and Lallah Ward can’t be arsed most of the time. I smirk at the cheesy costumes and effects but that may be a downer for some… Hmm… I guess I’ll take the cowards way out and give it a score right in the middle!

While Romana is running around the ruins of Crinoth she runs into its last survivor in Sezom (John Bailey), who gives her a mineral called Jacenite that’s deadly to Nimon. Romana returns to Skonnos in time to see The Doctor and Seth having knocked out the increasingly delirious Soldeed and got hold of his staff, and once Seth places the Jacenite on top of the staff it becomes an effective weapon again the horned beasts.

I wonder what all those YA extras are doing now…

Meanwhile Soldeed reaches peak OTT insanity and the self-destruct system for the whole complex is set, leading to The Doctor, Romana, Seth, Teka and the other surviving Anethians to flee the complex in the TARDIS just in time to avoid the explosion. The remaining Nimon are either killed in the blast or left on Crinoth as it breaks apart due to their own actions, while the Anethians are sent off on their own ship to further their own adventures.