Let’s try the pub!
Terry Nation writing a Doctor Who story about robots wanting to invade Earth isn’t entirely noteworthy, unless, as in “The Android Invasion,” (Story Production Code 4J), those robots are not Daleks. Here, an alien species known as the Krall seeks to take over the Earth as a replacement for their radiation-suffused homeworld. The Krall’s master plan (sorry) involves building a small number of android doppelgängers who will surreptitiously replace key personnel in a British space research center—and, for some reason, in a nearby pub.
Indeed, a good chunk of the four episode story focuses not on the execution (and subsequent foiling) of the planned conquest but rather on the androids learning to pour ginger beer, hop out of lorries, and count out shillings’ change in a replica of the research center and nearby town. For unexplained reasons, the TARDIS materializes near this Potemkin village on the Krall planet instead of on Earth, and while the Doctor is puzzled by anomalous energy readings, he and Sarah have no idea that they are countless light years from their intended destination. Wonky TARDIS circuits are a screenwriter’s best friend, it would seem. Almost immediately, they are set upon by white-clothed helmeted figures with finger guns, and as they rush to escape from these surprising foes, they see a UNIT soldier jump off a cliff to his death for no apparent reason.
Upon examining the body, the Doctor notices that the soldier’s billfold contains brand new money, all the coins scratch-free and minted in the same year. An odd coincidence, repeated once more when the Doctor and Sarah enter the deserted village and find similar fresh currency in the empty pub’s till. More ominously, the pub’s tables hold half-full mugs of beer. Peering through blinds, they see the missing drinkers return, hauled in a truck driven by the same mysterious helmeted figures. The people clamber out of the truck without emotion or sound, then resume their places in the pub. On cue, they all begin talking and drinking once more.
The Doctor and Sarah see the “dead” UNIT solider among them, increasing their bafflement. Our time travellers postulate various theories as to how these people are being controlled and/or re-animated, believing themselves to be on Earth in an actual British town, but they never once consider them to be androids. The viewer, however, has already been tipped off by the story’s title, as well as by establishing shots of the UNIT soldier walking alone in a jerking, halting, mechanical manner. These are robots, android copies of human beings, programmed, for some reason, to drink pints.