Tony Robinson’s Marvelous Machines review: Baldrick, black holes, and why we’re all in the wrong universe, writes CHRISTOPHER STEVENS

Tony Robinson’s beautiful machines

The dog house at Christmas

Forget JFK and Area 51, Covid vaccines and alien lizards in the royal family. The most entertaining conspiracy theories are generated at the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland.

This particle accelerator, which analyzes the subatomic structure of the universe, caused such alarm among sci-fi neurotics when it was switched on in 2012 that some believed it would create a black hole and swallow the Earth.

Conspirators claim that this was only averted when a time traveler from the future jumped back here to make some crucial adjustments… which they say explains why the LHC is so often ‘closed for maintenance’.

But last year, when scientists at the Nuclear Research Institute started looking for evidence of so-called “dark matter,” the online forums really went crazy. Apparently a ‘wormhole’ has opened up in another ‘timeline’ and now we’re all stuck in the wrong universe.

Although best known as Baldrick, here Tony Robinson gave us insight into how the particle accelerator works

Tony had so much fun and his enjoyment of these devices is so infectious that I am already looking forward to the next series

It’s the kind of universe where anything that can go wrong will, which probably explains the sudden rise of horrors like the Big Brother revival and the final series of The Crown.

Although best known as Baldrick, here Tony Robinson gave us insight into how the particle accelerator works and why it has captured the internet’s overactive imagination, in the final volume of his Marvelous Machines (Yesterday).

With the help of four physicists enjoying a Monty Python moment, he demonstrated the Collider’s premise. Sir Tony was a subatomic particle, a proton, running in circles while the scientists pretended to be fickle electrons – first attracting him with a come-hither look, then repelling him with a grunt.

After a few circuits, Tone was approaching the speed of light, which must have been good for burning calories.

I always thought this massive underground facility looked like a Bond villain’s lair. In fact it looks more like a Victorian pumping station, with endless tunnels and massive metal pipes bolted together.

It could be a futuristic device envisioned by Jules Verne or HG Wells. No wonder science fiction fanatics find it ominous. One more big bang and we will find ourselves in a dimension where men wear handlebar mustaches and women wear whale bones.

Tony’s other views on the future were disappointing. The world’s first electric two-seat airplane was a can so light it seemed to have no doors.

Essentially it’s a Sinclair C5 with balsa wood wings and a 45 minute battery life. I don’t see EasyJet buying a fleet of these.

He also drove around the mountain roads of Wales in a 13bhp water-powered sports car. Very clever, but any sports car that can’t keep up with a Citroen 2CV will find a limited market.

Tony had so much fun though, and his enjoyment of these devices is so infectious, that I’m already looking forward to the next series.

If it doesn’t get recommissioned in this universe, I may have to apply to visit an alternate dimension.

Everyone can imagine a perfect parallel universe. For Lynne, an NHS nurse, this is the one in which her boyfriend is Hollywood actor Gerard Butler.

She visited Woodgreen Animal Shelter, at The Dog House At Christmas (Ch4), hoping to find the next best thing. “I’m sure we don’t have Gerard Butler in our system,” the cheerful receptionist warned her.

In the most touching story, a grieving man and his daughter adopted an adorable Patterdale cross called Crackers, which had been abandoned on the side of a busy road.

It is an eternal wonder that dogs can ever learn to trust people again after such an experience. But with a little love and a Christmas sweater, Crackers was wagging his tail again.