The Leisure Centre

The One Hundred and Twelfth Entry in the Charles Daniels 
Unauthorized Programme Guide O' Jazzercise 

Serial 5N - The Leisure Centre -         

 The planet Argolis is devastated, the surface of the planet is 
uninhabitable following a twenty minute nuclear war between the 
Argolins and their enemies the Foamasi.  No trace of civilization
remains on the planet Argolis -- except for a single Leisure 
Centre which was once in a fashionable part of down town, but now
is located in the middle of a barren and hostile planet experiencing
nuclear winter.  
 The Doctor, while rummaging through his pockets, discovers a 10 day
free pass to the Leisure Centre, and decides that Argolis sounds 
like a jolly lovely place to go.  "Relax in our olympic-sized 
swimming pool, completely sheltered from the nuclear fall out. 
Enjoy scenic vistas of destruction visable from our observation 
deck."

 What the Doctor doesn't know is that a strange Argolian, named 
Pangol, plans to rule the entire universe with revenues from the 
Leisure Centre.  To this end the Doctor and Romana are given the 
hard sell of a lifetime by Pangol.  Pangol attempts to convince 
them that they both need to buy the Leisure Centre's own brand of 
multi-vitamin, which he assures them is a lot better than any other
vitamin in the entire universe, and for proof he mentions just how 
super shiny the bottle they come in is.  He tries to convince them 
that they both need special one-on-one exercise sessions, 5 times 
a week, at a generous 1,000,000 Quatloos an hour.

 The Doctor and Romana muck about in the pool for 10 days, and then
prepare to leave.  Pangol's plan seems doomed, he relied solely on
the stupidity of people with free 10 day passes to fuel his money
empire and eventual conquest of all creation.  In desperation he
offers to give Romana and the Doctor a free training session on
the weight machines, but the Doctor reprograms the weight machines
into killer androids whom are dangerously addicted to chocolate.
The "chocolate nutrition bar" dispensers on floors 3, 4, and 5 are 
smashed, depriving Pangol of still further funds.

 Pangol realises that his dreams for conquest are at an end. 
 To celebrate his victory, the Doctor goes to shower with the other
men and K9.  
 
Book(s)/Other Related - Doctor Who And the Gym of Death
                        Boogaloo: The Revenge
                        K9, Robot Exhibitionist

Fluffs - Tom Baker seemed sweaty for most of this story

Goofs -  K9 was written into this story, and appears on camera

Technobabble - 
"It's time for my double quasi-cardioid fizbinn exercises!"

Links and References - 
After only 3 seconds of crunches the Doctor is delirious and calls
Romana - "Sarah", "Susan", and "Jamie", respectively.

Untelevised Misadventures - 
The Doctor causally mentions that he was Adolf Hitler and his dog

Groovy DVD Extras -
A scene, probably cut for time, when the Doctor is heaving
for air and calls Romana "Ian".

The cut scene with Tom Baker singing in the last Karaoke Bar 
in existence is thankfully not included.


Dialogue Disasters -

Doctor: It's savage, it's horrible.  How such an advanced
        society can indulge in such barbarism.
Romana: Nuclear conflict is distasteful.
Doctor: What?  Don't you see what's right in front of your
        eyes?  Sweatin' to the Oldies, Volume 97!  
Romana: Is that bad?
Doctor: Is that bad?!  Is that bad?!  Do Kangaroos have teeth?
Romana: Yes, I'd imagine.
Doctor: EXACTLY!


Dialogue Triumphs -

Romana: I don't understand.  Nothing survived the holocaust,
        except this Leisure Centre?
Doctor: Oh yes!  They were very careful for just such an 
        eventuality, triple lead lined protected you see?
Romana: But..WHY?
Doctor: Well imagine how disappointed you'd be.  You've spend
        all this time and effort exercising, getting fit, just
        to be vapourized while running on a tread machine..it
        would be disastrous for morale, not to mention for business.


Dialogue Oddities -

(ORIGINAL SCRIPT)
The Doctor: Ah!  Chronotonic Exercise Feedback!  How Invigorating!

(ON SCREEN)
Tom Baker: AHH!!  MY BACK!! SHUT THIS THING OFF!!


Viewer Quotes -
"I hope that the average member of the public doesn't get the wrong 
idea from this story -- our Vitamin bottles are MUCH more shiny."
                              - 48 Hour Fitness (2001)

"Good activities lead to a good Christian mind.  I'm often found
in gym showers, just enjoying the smell of it all."
                         - Father James O'Maley (1980)

"Tom Baker again seems very calm, cool, professional.  I think
he's actually a lot like Cary Grant."   - Loony (1982)
 
"GIRRRLS!!  SPANDEX!" 
   - Charles Daniels, impersonating Father Jack (2003)


Psychotic Nostalgia -
"Why pay hundreds of dollars to some club to exercise?  I
get all the exercise I need digging graves and wrestling
badgers.  Ain't hurt me none.  When are they going to bring
Leela back?  Somebody needs some killin'."

Tom Baker Speaks!
"Ah yes, a cruel deception. A certain Doctor Who monster, to whom
I was married, felt I needed a bit more locomotion and lifting
of heavy objects in my lifestyle.  And I think everyone on the
production staff was at that time, slightly unhappy with me for
SOME reason, and so they wrote a story to torture me with very
shoddy ill-built BBC exercise gym equipment.  Still, I got the
final laugh, I licked the exercise equipment after every take,
covered it with my tongue, until no one else would touch it
and they had to throw it all way.  That was easy enough for some
of the smaller weights, but I wouldn't want to ever have to go
through that entire exercise bicycle affair ever again.  I felt
very found of that bicycle, when they crushed it.  It was a warm
and imitate relationship that far outstripped anything I've ever 
experienced with another human being.  I called it Mandy."


Rumors & Facts -

 Just when it seemed Doctor Who was truly established, a rock
of style and sophisication, a genre in it's own right -- the
rules all changed.

 In the eighteenth season Doctor Who underwent a complete mutation.
All of these changes stemmed from one man - John Satan-Turner.
A mysterious figure that has been lied about and misunderstood
for decades.

 Most noticably, the infamous and beautiful "time vortex" title
sequence which inspired so much wonder and mystery in Doctor Who 
was knifed viciously in the back one lonely evening in a pub called 
"The Kebab and Calculator".  The opening title sequence stumbled 
out of the pub, by now it's lungs were aching for air, when 
John Satan-Turner laughed gleefully and stabbed it again.

 Satan-Turner explained away this insane behaviour as "a bold
gesture" and insisted that he wanted "An innovative and unique
opening title sequence, like none other ever seen in science 
fiction".  Satan-Turner's bold vision was best described as
"a star field".  Ironically every single science fiction series in
history features a star field in it's opening.  Fans were left to
conjecture that maybe John Satan-Turner assumed Doctor Who was
a Sherlock Holmes-style murder mystery programme.  Other, wiser 
heads, correctly deduced that Satan-Turner was simply a moron.

 Next Satan-Turner dropped the staple theme of the series, Ron 
Grainer's theme of pure loveliness, for a theme which apparently
was taken from the demo key on a cheap Casio 855F keyboard.
Also Dudley Simpson, whose highly distinctive incidental music was 
for so many years a staple ingredient of the series, was dropped
in favour of whatever boy band Ian Levine was managing that week. 

 And then, most of all, and most noticably (forget what I claimed
was most noticably a few paragraphs ago, I was a mad man back then)
was the addition of question marks to the Doctor's outfit.  This
has long enraged fans, and I, eager to dig up dirt on JST, decided
to investigate -

 Kenneth Bridge (Life long friend of Satan-Turner) told me this
in a private interview (January 2003):

 "Oh yes, the punctuation problem.  Well, you must understand that
as a young boy John always wanted to please and be accepted.  And
there was this English teacher he had, as a young man, who he felt
a very deep affection and longing for.  He desperately wanted
to be respected and noticed, but he was appalling bad at English.
He kept getting the worse possible marks because his punctuation
was so atrocious, and this lead to a deep frustation.  And I could
tell, even then, that he became focused, if not totally obsessed
with question marks.  In the early days I think it might have been
under control, but as this relationship went on, the feelings that
he had for his English teacher, and the feelings that he had for
punctuation got mixed up.  
  I used to go with him to parties, of people who were, you know 
-- sexually attracted to punctuation. It might sound very odd, 
if you haven't really explored that, but I think everyone can agree 
that exclamation marks are very exciting, arousing even.  
Exclamation marks get your attention, they grab you, they say 
"HEY, LOOK AT ME!".  And from there it's very easy to slip into 
say a question mark fetish. I mean they are so mysterious, 
so taboo, what's going on here?  Will it feel naughty?  
Will it feel nice? Will I be embarassed?  
 Anyway, after awhile I saw he was moving onto the harder stuff,
y'know, semi-colons, colons, dashes, ellipses, and finally even
curly brackets - whatever the hell that's about!  I think that, in
his heart of hearts, he never really found anything more fulfilling
than that basic question mark enigma.  I know we used to watch 
videos with hot, oily people rubbing up against giant styrofoam
question marks of all different colours.  
 Really, I feel perfectly comfortable with it all.  The only time
I've had any problem was when I found John groping a few backslashes
in a seedy bar in Soho.  He really hit a low there."