The conclusion of the E-Space Trilogy with my favorite Doctor, the 4th, Tom Baker is the most interesting with the bunch, this one dealing with time travelers, and getting them back into N-Space, as well as the fate of Romana (at least in her televised presence). A very very enjoyable adventure of the 4th doctor. Well worth checking out.

A slaver vessel, piloted by humans, and navigated through time and space by the lion like Tharil, who are also it’s slave cargo, has become trapped at the nexus between E-Space and N-Space, when it’s navigator named Biroc (David Weston) manages to flee from the ship. Biroc comes upon the Tardis, which has also become mired in the space between the two spaces. Biroc appears inside the Tardis, doing something with the controls, though he is out of phase with The Doctor (Tom Baker) Romana (Lalla Ward), Adric (Matthew Waterhouse) and K-9 (John Leeson). Biroc warns them that the people who follow should not be trusted, and then runs off. The Doctor sets off after him, with Romana and Adric left behind, worried about K-9 who has had his memory wafers damaged by the winds of time in this strange part of space.

REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS…

Rorvik (Clifford Rose) the ship commander knows they are losing money, so when they detect another object in the strange void, they head out to check it out, and go with a backpacked size mass detector in search of the Tardis. When they arrive, Romana comes out to talk to them, and convinces them to head back to their ship to check out their damaged warp drive. Rorvik becomes convinced that Romana is time sensitive, and wants to use her as the ships next Navigator to get them back to N-space with their precious cargo. Adric and K-9 head after them, though have some trouble as K-9 is not functioning well at all.

The Doctor has found some ruins in the void, and finds inside an abandoned banquet hall, with skelletons, and robotic knights knows as Gundans, and he learns they were built by slavers who enslaved the population here. K-9 arrives and helps the doctor repair a Dundan, but then Rorvik arrives with is men all armed, and takes over. The Gundan returns to life, and walks through a solid mirror, and wants the Doctor to explain, so he walks up to it, and also goes through the mirror, which the non–time sensitive humans cannot do.

On the slave ship, a wounded Tharil named Lazlo (Jeremy Gittins) who the humans hurt when trying to revive him to use as a new navigator escapes and frees Romana from the Navigators chair. Romana hides and finds Adric. The two work out that the ship is made from Dwarf Star alloy, the remains of a collapsed star, making it incredibly dense, which is the only thing that can hold the time shifting Tharil in one timeline. The two find the damaged K-9 who informs them that the void is collapsing in on itself thanks to the shear weight of the slave ship, so distances are quickly shrinking, and soon they will be nothing at all. Romana ends up leaving K-9 and Adric and going through the mirror, following Lazlo.

The Doctor found Biroc behind the mirror, and followed him to a mansion and banquet hall from another time, well in the past, where the Tharil are notorious slavers of the gateway who were later overthrown by the Gundans, and their society decayed. The irony being that they are now used as slaves.

Romana shows up, and as the story finished they are thrown back into the decayed version of the banquet hall, where Rorvik once again takes them prisoner.

The Doctor realizes that it is the weight of the slaver ship causing the problems in the void.

Adric has hidden himself inside the coverings of a cannon called the MZ, powered by the warp engines, which the slavers are going to try and use to cut through the mirror, but Adric uses it to free The Doctor and Romana, and the 3 of them flee. Rorvik decides to use the gun on the mirror anyway, but destroys the gun. He then decides to use the ship’s engines to blast the mirror open, but of course the backlash destroys the ship and it’s crew, but not before the Tharil have been freed by Lazlo and Romana who has an empathy for these time sensitizes.

Since Romana already does not want to return to Gallifrey, she elects to go through the portal back to E-Space with the Tharils to help free them from their bonds of slavery. The Doctor gives her K-9, who also has plans for the Tardis to help her on her quest.

The Doctor and Adric them use the information given by the Tharils to travel back to N-Space.

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Great to see the fate of Romana, and i love seeing stuff heavy with time problems, as ti really does show more about the Timelords, of which we really know so little.

A fun and interesting story, that ends an enjoyable series.