One of the better stories from this season. Fun villains and all the cast get to do plenty.

"The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy" writer Douglas Adams' first contribution to the Whoniverse, with a wacky pirate story in some places, but boring political drama in others.

The Doctor's very unlike himself in this. At the start, he's rude and argumentative - as he usually is, but then he turns quite aggressive, electing to blow up the villains! Very strange. Yeah, not overly impressed with the Doctor's characterisation, and there are some brutal murders in here that they disguise as just being "stunned", with K-9 saying they're out indefinitely...Sure. I really liked the scene, however, where the Doctor's trying to get directions, but they'll only talk to Romana because she's pretty - It's sexist, for sure, but amusing nonetheless. The way this story is resolved is too technobabbly, which is disappointing and we didn't even see them get the second segment.

There are so many villains in this, it's hard to keep count - the Captain is probably the best out of all of them, being very pantomimey, which works in a silly romp like this. He's powerful, often showing off and being too confident. His plan reminded me of what people were saying about Ranskoor Av Kolos being unoriginal, and I totally agree! Unfortunately, he just gets murdered after all that build-up. His parrot is very strange, but I'll talk about why later. The Queen was an interesting character for sure, but she was too shouty for me to appreciate her character fully.

The effects for this story are really poor. The model shots are interesting, but the way the parrot kills people is extremely silly, and the flying ship in front of the models was way too disproportionate - there have been far better effects in previous stories, I'm disappointed. Even more mines and caves... dull, dull, dull. I liked the city, though.

Magic people were used for convenience. They were cool, but they didn't have any character except "we can move things". At least that soldier dude was a fun solo companion, I guess.

When I watched this story, I enjoyed it, but there was a lot of lacklustre parts to it that stops the adventure from holding up under scrutiny.

Oh this story is perfect the journey I went through with this as a kid hated it back then cause I just wanted to watch stones of blood but I must say I’m glad my love for this story has grown as I’ve grown up

I wanna give this a 4.5 but there's just enough detractors. But before that: this is one of the funniest stories ever, with amazing dialogue from Adams, fantastic wit, a very fun villain performance from The Captain, and great nuanced performances from both Tamm and Baker. And the premise!!! It's such a cool sci-fi concept executed decently.

But the Mentiads are just sooooo boring. And the Queen Xanxia twist comes kinda out of nowhere and hijacks the entire story, making the final part a bit of a letdown and a drag. More than enough for me to dock half a star.

Oh and on a neutral note: the bad special effects this time made me laugh hard, but I can't really be too critical of ambition

One of the funniest stories in the entire series! It's cheesy, but in the best possible way (as with most Douglas Adams work). I laugh every time K-9 says Romana should make contact because "She is prettier than you are, Master" and when she offers the locals jelly babies, which she got "From the same place you do—your pocket." The trappings of traditional piracy add a wonderful layer of extra silliness (there's a literal plank to walk!), as do the Captain's wonderful costume and incredibly appropriate overacting.

The plot itself has more elements than it strictly needs—a hollow planet that crushes and mines smaller planets is very clever, as is a dying ancient monarch using said planets to rejuvenate herself, and even the overdramatic puppet Captain secretly creating a mechanism with which to destroy her, but by the time you get to the naturally psychic resistance cult who've lost their powers it's getting to be a bit much—but it's such a fun ride it hardly matters.

I love Romana's clever and self-important characterization, and the contrast with the Doctor highlighted when she doesn't hesitate to pick up a gun and shoot a guard. My favorite bit, though, has to be the main fight sequence, which is between Avitron the robot bird and K-9 the robot dog, culminating in K-9 depositing the "dead" bird proudly in the Doctor's hand. This is the best of the show's ridiculousness.