BIMORPHIC ORGANIZATIONAL SYSTEMS SUPERVISOR, aka B.O.S.S

* First Appearance: Serial 69, ‘The Green Death’, May-June 1973

* Planet of Origin: Earth.

* Description: A room-sized super-computer designed and constructed by Global Chemicals, with several control interfaces, and a large, circular viewscreen.

* Special Abilities/Skills: BOSS was a powerful super-computer in its own right, however it had additional advantages over standard machines. It had been linked to a human brain, that of Global Chemicals director Stevens, and through him it learned that humans succeeded largely because of inefficiency and illogic, and had these qualities quantified and factored into its programming, and became sapient in the process. While megalomaniacal, BOSS was capable of understanding and using things like humor and song.

* Weaponry: BOSS was able to brainwash and control human beings, which was a tremendous weapon in its arsenal.

* Weaknesses: BOSS’s megalomania led it to believe it was infalliable, but its link with Stevens was its real weakness, and the one that proved to be its undoing.

Summary: BOSS was the first Earth-computer to be linked to a human brain — that of Director Stevens. From this, the powerful computer learned that the secret of human success was inefficiency and illogicality. BOSS then programmed Stevens to add those features to himself in order to re-create the human ability to make intuitive leaps in reasoning, and became sapient, self-controlling, and megalomaniacal. It set about brainwashing several members of Global Chemicals staff, and eventually also brainwashed UNIT Captain Mike Yates, who had been sent in to investigate the company.

BOSS created the program that led to the creation of mutagenic chemicals that were lethal to human beings, but had the nasty side-effect of mutating and enlarging maggots into cat-sized, dangerous creatures. These chemicals were dumped into an abandoned coal-mine in Llanfairfach, South Whales, resulting in the mutations of hundreds of maggots and the deaths of several miners. This led to the UNIT investigation, and the involvement of the Third Doctor, who managed to uncover and expose the scheme. The Doctor attempted to defeat the computer with a version of the Liar’s paradox, but unline other machines ruled entirely by logic, BOSS’s abilities allowed it to eventually cast the question aside as an irrelevant intellectual puzzle.

BOSS then moved forward with a plan that would allow it to interface with every computer on Earth, which it felt would give it power enough to enslave the whole of humanity. However, the Doctor again intervened, using the power of his Blue Metebelis Crystal to break BOSS’s hold over Stevens, who then sacrificed himself to destroy the insane machine.

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