The Robots of Death ( TV story ) The Robots of Death was the fifth story in season fourteen of " Doctor Who " . It saw the Super - Voc , Voc and Dum robot s make their first , and only , televised appearance . The serial was based on the works of Agatha Christie , with a series of unexplained murder s . Chris Boucher was asked to write " Robots " after another serial fell through . He was chosen as his work on the preceding story , " The Face of Evil " , had been widely appreciated . It was Philip Hinchcliffe who pushed the idea of a " robot story " , despite script editor Robert Holmes ' opinion that they were dull . Holmes was confident that he could produce a good script for an enclosed space , as the crew were aware the serial would be a studio bound one . Hinchcliffe suggested a setting akin to the machines featured in the 1965 sci - fi novel , and so the sandminer s were created . Tom Baker was reportedly highly critical of the script . He complained to Boucher during the initial read through and later voiced his derogatory opinions of the story to director Michael E . Briant . According to Briant , this was because Baker wanted the Doctor to display certain characteristics of his imagining . ( DOC : " The Sandmine Murders " ) Synopsis . The Fourth Doctor and Leela land aboard a sandminer , whose crew are being murder ed one by one . Plot . Part one . On a distant planet , a huge sandminer vehicle , Storm Mine 4 , is slowly scraping the surface of a vast , barren desert in search of precious mineral s . The sandminer is manned by nine humans and numerous robots — black " Dum s " that cannot speak , pale green " Voc s " , and a silver " Super - Voc " which controls all the " Dums " and " Vocs " . The robots conduct a routine scan of the area and locate a large sandstorm , which the Commander , Uvanov , decides to pursue , as the storm will bring heavier and more valuable minerals such as lucanol to the surface . One of the crew , the disliked scientist Chub , is going to collect an instrument package . Uvanov is angered at Chub for taking so long , and Poul goes to look for him . The package is stuck , and Chub sends for a robot . V45 arrives but is acting strange . V45 strangles Chub , killing him . In the corridor , Poul hears Chub scream . He finds Chub ' s body . Poul goes to the control deck and tells Uvanov about the murder . Uvanov does not want to go to investigate it , as they will loose the storm , but the other crew make him go to investigate . They find a strange object on Chub ' s hand — a " corpse marker " . At about this time , the TARDIS materialises in one of the scoops . After the Doctor and Leela emerge from the TARDIS , it is removed by a large mechanical arm as it is blocking the scoop . Later , the Doctor and Leela are brought out of the scoop by two robots and locked in a room . The Doctor uses his sonic screwdriver to unlock the door and goes in search of the TARDIS , while Leela finds Chub ' s body being taken away by some robots . The human crew suspects the two time travel lers of murdering Chub , and tensions increase when it is found that they have left the room in which they were locked . The Doctor and Leela are separated , with the Doctor finding a second dead man , Kerrill , in a hopper which starts to fill with sand that buries them both . . . Part two . The Doctor survives by using a blowpipe poking up through the sand through which he breathes . Both he and Leela , who has found a third dead man , Cass , and a " Dum " robot which can secretly speak , are recaptured . Commander Uvanov orders them to be locked up in the robot storage bay , on suspicion of killing all three humans . Poul believes the Doctor and Leela to be innocent , so he frees them and shows them where Chub was murdered . There , the Doctor convinces Poul that a robot may have killed the meteorologist . While this is happening , a female crewmember named Zilda is murdered , who accuses Uvanov of murder over the tannoy system . Poul — sent to Uvanov ' s quarters to investigate — finds the Commander bending over Zilda ' s body . He has him confined to his quarters on suspicion of murdering Zilda . Shortly afterwards , the engineer , Borg , who is responsible for controlling power to the motors , is found dead , and the sandminer ' s engines begin to run out of control , threatening the vehicle with destruction . A frantic Toos shrieks , " She ' s going ! " Part three . The Doctor saves the miner by cutting off the power to the motors . Once the sandminer has stopped moving , sinking under the sand dunes is imminent . Dask sets on quickly repairing the damaged — and sabotaged — controls so that the miner can continue on its way . The Doctor goes to see the " Dum " robot that Leela claimed could speak , D84 . The robot reveals that it and Poul are undercover agents for the mining company . They were placed on board the miner as a precaution to threats of a " robot revolution " by a scientist called Taren Capel , who was raised by robots and considers himself to be one . D84 itself is unique in the fact that it can function autonomously from Super Voc SV7 ' s commands and appears to possess a high level of logical reasoning . The Doctor and D84 search for proof that Taren Capel is on board and find a secret workshop where the robots ' programming has been changed to enable them to kill humans . The Doctor arranges for all the remaining humans to go to the command deck . Uvanov arrives after escaping confinement to confront the Doctor , but he is surprised to see a robot enter the workshop . It proves to have orders to kill the Doctor and grabs him by the throat . . . Part four . The Doctor and Uvanov escape and head for the control deck . Someone ( presumably Dask , whose responsibilities include robots ) shuts down all of the robots whose programming has not been changed , leaving just the killer robots and D84 operational . Looking around the miner , Leela stumbles on Poul hiding in the storage bay : he has gone mad and is suffering from robophobia . She then tracks down Toos in her quarters , who has just been attacked by another rogue robot , and takes her to the control deck to join the Doctor and Uvanov . The human crew are surprised by D84 ' s arrival carrying a near - catatonic Poul , but the Doctor explains the pair ' s real functions as undercover agents . Looking at his Chief Mover , Uvanov sadly remembers another crewmember losing his mind to robophobia years earlier who ran outside to escape them and died ; it was Zilda ' s brother , hence her accusation of murder . SV7 — whose programming has now also been changed — tells them to come out and die , but Toos and Uvanov decide to defend themselves . Dask is later revealed to be Taren Capel , intent on " releasing [ his ] " brothers " ( the robots ) from bondage to human dross " and " programming them with an ambition to rule the world " . Taren Capel orders his modified robots to destroy the remaining humans and the Doctor and Leela . Uvanov and Toos get to work on modifying some Z9 explosives to destroy the robots . In the storage bay Leela finds a damaged robot with its hand covered in blood — which the Doctor reasons is Borg ' s . He had been the only one strong enough to even try to fight back , and he may even have sabotaged the engine controls in a suicidal attempt to destroy the miner and all the killer robots on board . The Doctor dismantles the damaged robot and creates a final deactivator — a device that will destroy any still functioning robots at close range . In the process , he tries to explain to Leela how robophobia works . Robots do not display any body language , which the sensitive Leela had already picked up — calling them " creepy mechanical men " — and despite the fact most robots are built in humanoid form , some people are so unnerved that they become terrified of them . The pair head back to Taren Capel ' s hidden workshop , where the Doctor hides Leela with a canister of helium gas , telling her to release it when Taren comes in . The Doctor hopes that this will change Taren ' s voice , so his robots — unable to recognise him — will not obey his orders and turn on him . Taren arrives and damages D84 , but the robot is able to activate the Doctor ' s device to destroy a killer robot , knowingly sacrificing itself in the process . Leela releases the helium gas , causing Taren ' s voice to become high - pitched and squeaky , and Taren is killed by SV7 when it fails to identify his voice pattern . The Doctor then destroys SV7 with a laserson probe . The robot threat over , and a rescue ship coming to collect the surviving humans , the Doctor and Leela return to the TARDIS and leave the sandminer . Story notes . BBC repeat . On 24 December and 31 December 1977 , the BBC repeated " The Robots of Death " as a holiday season special during an interval between its broadcasts of " The Sun Makers " and " Underworld " . The four episodes were edited together to form two approx . 50 - minute episodes . This is the earliest known occasion in which " Doctor Who " was broadcast in this format , which would be attempted again with " Resurrection of the Daleks " , then again for one season in 1985 , and finally become the standard beginning in 2005 . Home video and audio releases . DVD releases . Released as " Doctor Who : The Robots of Death " , this was the first " proper " title in the BBC DVD range of " Doctor Who " DVDs . It marked the debut of the " roundel " template that didn ' t prove popular with fans ( although it has remained to date as the DVD template ) and is the only one in the range not to feature production subtitles . The continuities were meant to be an Easter Egg , but an error was made by the Authoring House and they were included as a regular menu item . This early DVD release lacks subtitles . Released : Extra features : Rear Credits : Notes : A special edition of " The Robots of Death " DVD was released on the " Revisitations 3 " boxset , on 13 February 2012 . Other stories in the boxset are " The Tomb of the Cybermen " and " The Three Doctors " . The special edition features these extras : VHS releases . This story was released as " Doctor Who : The Robots of Death " . Released : Notes : This story was released in an edited movie - format . Notes : This story was released unedited .