Kerblam! (TV Story)

Matt Strevens

***Kerblam!*** was the sixth serial of Season 55 of *Doctor Who*. It was written by Sarah Dollard, directed by Nida Manzoor and starred Jemma Redgrave as the Fifteenth Doctor, Rebecca Root as Joanne Tilley & Ravin J Ganatra as Anderson Stenhouse.

## Synopsis

When the Doctor receives a mysterious call for help packaged with a delivery from Kerb!am, the galaxy's largest retailer, she & her companions get to work in finding out the cause of the distress. However, is the human 10% of the workforce rebelling against the robots, or is there a much more complicated plot going on? She later finds out the system types all the slips, including the one she got. Why is the system needing help?

## Cast

* The Doctor - Jemma Redgrave
* Joanne Tilley - Rebecca Root
* Anderson Stenhouse - Ravin J Ganatra
* Judy Maddox - Julie Hesmondhalgh
* Dan Cooper - Lee Mack
* Jarva Slade - Callum Dixon
* Kira Arlo - Claudia Jessie
* Charlie Duffy - Leo Flanagan
* Voice of Kerblam - Matthew Gravelle

## References

### The Doctor

* The Doctor gets a package containing a recorder, bubble wrap and a packing slip.
* The Doctor describes prejudice against robots as robophobia.
* The Doctor has two hearts.
* Anderson says she bet the Doctor was the sort of kid to poke a stick into a wasp's nest to see what happened.
* The Doctor says she doesn't like bullies, conspiracies and people in danger.
* The Doctor uses venusian aikido.

### TARDIS

* The Kerblam Man can teleport into the TARDIS.

### People

* Anderson says that they used to put funny notes inside the trainers at his old workplace.
* The TARDIS team's false credentials says they're relatives of the First Lady.
* Judy Maddox is Head of People and says she made a Person error.
* Daniel Cooper calls one of the TeamMates Les.
* Judy mentions her father.
* Anderson used to work at the SportStack warehouse.
* The Doctor mentions a person called Roger Wilco.
* Anderson is put on Kerb!am's Premium Maintenance team as cleaner.
* Daniel and Joanne work in "fulfillment".
* The Doctor and Kira Arlo work in "packaging".
* Kira mentions her mum and dad.
* Daniel has a necklace lacquered with Arcadium that he got from his daughter.
	+ He jokes that she is Kerb!am's Head of Finance.
* Daniel says he was a rubbish husband to his wife.
* Daniel calls a TeamMate Basil and jokes that he used to be a pole dancer.
* Jarva Slade is Warehouse Executive.
* Anderson gives his age as 310.
* Missing Kerb!am employees include Rhys Fenjh, Arien Elgyum, Jax Harkall, Irsa Moyner, Zaff Pillax, Ra Mon Sheshter, Bagola Thotum, Basog Thotum, Kamel Wmoyna and Chinello Zoogul.
	+ Employee Looper called Chinello's mum to check on Chinello.
* Charlie Duffy works at Maintenance and is Graham's Maintenance Mentor.
* The people during the current shift is designated Team 9.
* The Doctor mentions Agatha Christie.
* The TeamMates lies to Kira, telling her she's Employee of the Day.
* The Doctor says Charlie is not an activist because of what he's doing.
* All employees are sent on two weeks paid leave.

### Business

* Kerb!am is the biggest retail warehouse of the galaxy.
* Kerb!am is a certified Ten Percent People-Powered Company.
* The TARDIS team gets to see a book called Printed Artefact being packed.
* Ever since the People Power protests, the Kandokan labour laws ruled that at least 10 percent of the workforce are actual people.
* Kerb!am maintenance has 198 Safety Rules. Number 198 is to not drink the cleaning fluids.
* Kerb!am Safety Rule 1 is to not climb onto the conveyor.
* Every piece of bubble wrap contains a tiny gaseous bomb.

### Technology

* The Kerb!am Men transports via teleport pulse.
* Judy Maddox has an electronic clipboard.
* The Doctor uses the psychic paper.
* Daniel says machine learning has failed.
* The Induction scanner allocates work details based on fitness, stamina, dexterity and mental assessments.
* The Kerb!am workers all wear GroupLoop ankle monitors. They function as a way of reporting work productivity of each individual back to The System.
* The fulfillment workers use product scanners.
* Kerb!am has a large network of conveyors moving boxes around all over the warehouse.
* Kerb!am Men and TeamMates have built-in speech circuits.
* Kerb!am has a night mode installation.
* Kerb!am has had multiple types of Delivery Bots.
* The Delivery Bots have receptor codes.
* The Delivery Bot version 1.0 is known as Twirly.
* Twirly mentions ear mufflers, pencil sharpeners and cola bottles in his pre-set info-speech before it runs out of juice. And after a recharge mentions cushions.
* The Doctor tells Twirly to look past new upgrades, firewalls and security patches to find the base code.
* The Doctor connects a DIN connector to Twirly.
* The Delivery Bots have teleport circuits.
* Slade has a gun with an energy pack.
* Charlie has a Kerb!am Man trigger device.

### Jargon

* Kerblam it is a very common phrase used at Kerb!am.
* Humans are also called organic workers.

### Locations

* The planet Kandoka has a Moon on which Kerb!am is located.
* A door at the back of the lobby at Kerb!am is labelled Home Zone. This place is a hologram garden used for free time and lunch breaks.
* Kerb!am has a Warehouse Floor with "fulfillment" at sections 1-100 and "packing" at sections 101-200.
* Kandoka is home to a human colony.
* Kerb!am also has a Final Checks area which packs the parcels and sends them onwards down to Dispatch which is where the postmen picks up the packages for delivery.
* Joanne gets sent to pick up an antique lamp at Section Triple Nine Double Five Slash Seven.
* Kerb!am gets its power drained down to the Foundation levels.
* Kerb!am has a Maintenance store.
* A sign says Sector D4 is the Canteen and Maintenance.
* The Doctor says it's not the first time she's hidden inside a panelled alcove.
* Kerb!am has an enormous package shifting area.
* Kerb!am also has a Disinfection Post which sprays disinfection on the packages.
* Kerb!am further has a Laser Quarantine Chute, which shoots beams as a Hygiene Defence if the disinfection fails.
* Foundation is below a massive liquidisation tank.

## Continuity

* The Seventh Doctor encountered an advertising drone promoting the Psychic Circus on the planet Segonax (TV: *The Greatest Show in the Galaxy*)
* The Doctor uses her psychic paper as a reference. (TV: *The Vampires of Venice*)
* The Doctor notes that "some of [her] best friends are robots", echoing the words of her previous incarnation. (TV: *Technophobia*) Some of these friends have been K9, (TV: *The Invisible Enemy*, et al.) & Kamelion. (TV: *The King's Demons*, et al.)
* The Doctor mentions meeting Agatha Christie, in an encounter with wasps. (TV: *The Unicorn and the Wasp*)
* The Doctor has previously been employed by organisations and individuals. (TV: *Spearhead from Space*, et al.)

## Home video releases

### DVD

* This story along with the other stories in Season 55 were released as *Doctor Who: The Complete Fifty-Fifth Season* in 2020.

### Blu-ray

* This story along with the other stories in Season 55 were released as *Doctor Who: The Complete Fifty-Fifth Season* on Blu-ray in 2020.