The Evil of the Daleks
With Polly and Ben rushing back to their normal lives, the Doctor and Jamie set about tracking down who has stolen the TARDIS. Their investigations lead them to an antique shop owned by one Edward Waterfield, who is in fact a scientist from the 1800's brought forward in time to trap the Doctor and Jamie and deliver them into the hands of the Daleks. To ensure the co-operation of Waterfield and his eager partner Theodore Maxtible, the Daleks have taken Waterfield's daughter, Victoria, as a prisoner in Maxtible's house. The Daleks want something called "the Human Factor" which they think will fill in the blanks in their knowledge and enable them to finally conquer Earth for good, and they force the Doctor to help them by subjecting Jamie to a series of tests to isolate the emotions that they are looking for. The result backfires, and the Doctor manages to create three friendly playful Daleks who begin to question orders from their commanders. Everyone is taken back to Skaro and the Doctor finally confronts the Emperor Dalek, and the truth of the Dalek ambition is revealed. The Human Factor spreads amongst the Daleks, though, and rival factions beging to fight amongst themselves, even taking out the Emperor in the end, a carnage the Doctor refers to as "the final end" of the Daleks.
Wow. Out of the whole 7 episodes, I found the last two to be the best of the bunch, when the action returned to Skaro and there was a futher revelation into the "culture" of the Daleks - which is to say the inclusion of the Emperor Dalek. The earlier episodes seem to take their time getting to where they are going; Jamie's trials in Maxtible's house as he tries to rescue Victoria seem to take a while, and the slow pursuit around London looking for the TARDIS seems a bit like padding. Episode 2 exists on the Lost in Time disc so while we don't get to see as much of the Daleks as we would like, we do get to see the Doctor react to their presence. The otehr episodes are all on CD, narrated by Fraser Hines, who finally gets a chance to let Jamie shine. Free from the shadow of Ben and Polly he emerges as quite the hero in his efforts to rescue Victoria. The Doctor has to play it very cool this episode, risking alienating Jamie in his efforts to deceive the Daleks by appearing to work with them willingly. The thing is, they threaten to destroy the TARDIS if the Doctor does not help them, but in The Chase they blasted the hell out of it and nothing happened, so why is he worried? And the Emperor. Huge booming Dalek voice. Huge Dalek! It obviously doesn't go anywhere. There does exist a montage of footage of the final Dalek battle in the Emperor's chamber, so we get to see it briefly, and in its original form, before it returns in Remembrance of the Daleks looking a bit like an egg. Victoria joins the crew after the battle is done; her father died in the Dalek revolution and the Doctor and Jamie adopt her as their new family member. The Doctor at one point ponders returning to his home planet and taking Jamie and Victoria with him should Earth fall to the Daleks, bringing up the question once again of exactly who the Doctor is and where he comes from.
The whole point to the Daleks seeming to wipe themselves out here is for Terry Nation to take them away from the series and try to sell them as a show in their own right. At the time it was decided there would be no more Dalek shows, but as it happened, the Daleks did return eventually in 1972's Day of the Daleks. The season closed, however, with the future of the Daleks in doubt, their return uncertain.
But someone else's return was just around the corner...
NEXT EPISODE : THE TOMB OF THE CYBERMEN
Wow. Out of the whole 7 episodes, I found the last two to be the best of the bunch, when the action returned to Skaro and there was a futher revelation into the "culture" of the Daleks - which is to say the inclusion of the Emperor Dalek. The earlier episodes seem to take their time getting to where they are going; Jamie's trials in Maxtible's house as he tries to rescue Victoria seem to take a while, and the slow pursuit around London looking for the TARDIS seems a bit like padding. Episode 2 exists on the Lost in Time disc so while we don't get to see as much of the Daleks as we would like, we do get to see the Doctor react to their presence. The otehr episodes are all on CD, narrated by Fraser Hines, who finally gets a chance to let Jamie shine. Free from the shadow of Ben and Polly he emerges as quite the hero in his efforts to rescue Victoria. The Doctor has to play it very cool this episode, risking alienating Jamie in his efforts to deceive the Daleks by appearing to work with them willingly. The thing is, they threaten to destroy the TARDIS if the Doctor does not help them, but in The Chase they blasted the hell out of it and nothing happened, so why is he worried? And the Emperor. Huge booming Dalek voice. Huge Dalek! It obviously doesn't go anywhere. There does exist a montage of footage of the final Dalek battle in the Emperor's chamber, so we get to see it briefly, and in its original form, before it returns in Remembrance of the Daleks looking a bit like an egg. Victoria joins the crew after the battle is done; her father died in the Dalek revolution and the Doctor and Jamie adopt her as their new family member. The Doctor at one point ponders returning to his home planet and taking Jamie and Victoria with him should Earth fall to the Daleks, bringing up the question once again of exactly who the Doctor is and where he comes from.
The whole point to the Daleks seeming to wipe themselves out here is for Terry Nation to take them away from the series and try to sell them as a show in their own right. At the time it was decided there would be no more Dalek shows, but as it happened, the Daleks did return eventually in 1972's Day of the Daleks. The season closed, however, with the future of the Daleks in doubt, their return uncertain.
But someone else's return was just around the corner...
NEXT EPISODE : THE TOMB OF THE CYBERMEN
Labels: Daleks, Jamie McCrimmon, The 2nd Doctor, Victoria Waterfield
posted by Sean Hoover @ 8:32 PM
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