Doctor Who (2005) 1-06: Dalek

Episode:

702

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Serial:

161

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Writer:

Robert Shearman

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Director:

Joe Ahearne

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Air Date:

30-Apr-2005

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This week on Sci-Fi Adventures I'm writing about the 702nd episode of long-running British sci-fi series Doctor Who, called Dalek.

It was inspired by a Big Finish audio drama called Jubilee by the same writer, Robert Shearman. I don't know how similar they are as I haven't listened to it, but it has a Dalek on the cover so I wouldn't be surprised if they show up there as well.

You could argue that it spoils the surprise a bit to put the villain's name right there in the title, but it's basically a tradition. The Daleks turned up in 17 classic serials and 13 of them had 'Dalek' in the name. Plus Russell T Davies has no issues with giving a few things away if it's going to get them more publicity and viewers. If you've got one of the most iconic villains in British television history returning to screens after two decades you don't hide it.

If I remember right, the plan for this episode was that it could work as a jumping on point for people who hadn't checked the series out yet, but were curious about what they were going to do with the Daleks. Since the show's second ever serial the Daleks have been Doctor Who's biggest draw and they're probably the reason it survived its first few seasons. Funny thing is, the Daleks nearly sat this one out, as they're not owned by the BBC and discussions with the Terry Nation estate hadn't been going great. For a while the episode would've been called The Sphere and it would've starred a new, more spherical villain. Maybe we don't live in the worst timeline after all.

I'll be going through the whole episode scene by scene with screencaps and recaps so there'll be SPOILERS here, for this and earlier stories. I'll not say a thing about anything that aired later though. Not even if it shows up in the next time trailer.

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The episode begins with the TARDIS materialising inside a museum located about half a mile underneath Utah, USA. They didn't come here deliberately, they were drawn off-course by a mysterious signal. The year is 2012, which is just 7 years in the future. Well, 13 years in the past now, which would put it around the Eleventh Doctor's third series.

Most of this picture is a matte painting, but the middle bit was filmed on location in an actual museum. Not in the US, it was the National Museum of Wales in Cardiff.

It hadn't been that long since the series had last visited America, as the TV movie took place in San Francisco (and was filmed in Canada). Though before that, the last time the TARDIS visited the States was in... 1966's The Gunslingers I think. Before that there was a visit to the Empire State Building in The Chase, and that's pretty much it I think. So Dalek was the fourth time in 40 years that a Doctor Who story had been set in America.

The Doctor's recognising a lot of alien artefacts here, like a Cyberman helmet which looks like it's from the 1975 Fourth Doctor serial Revenge of the Cybermen. This was a pretty big deal to classic series fans as it's not just reintroducing the Cybermen to the new series, it's pretty strongly implying that the old Cybermen stories happened too. That makes this a continuation, not a reimagining.

Rose notices something too though, a Slitheen's arm! Well, a Raxacoricofallapatorian arm at least, we don't know the owner's family name. This is a really nice moment, as it means classic fans and new fans are both rewarded for their knowledge. And then armed guards have to spoil it by rushing in and pointing guns at them.

OPENING CREDITS

This is one of the weirdest shots of a helicopter coming down that I remember seeing, as we get no hint of where it's landing. I'm not even sure if it's a miniature or not. All I know is that it has the callsign 'Bad Wolf 1', which would've likely caught viewers' attention as it's the fourth mention in the show so far.

1. The End of the World - The blue guy mentions 'bad wolf scenario' to someone.
2. The Unquiet Dead - Gwyneth sees the big bad wolf in Rose's mind. 
3. Aliens of London - A kid tags the TARDIS and has to clean it up in the next episode.

The helicopter's irrelevant though, it's just here to drop off Mr Henry Van Statten.

Early on Van Statten was called 'Will Fences' as a joke (it's like Bill Gates), but I think these days something that rhymed with Elon Musk might be more suitable. The character seems less exaggerated every year.

He's established right from the start of this walk and talk to be immensely powerful, telling his guy that he wants the US president replaced. Who I guess would be Barack Obama. Then he has his guy replaced when he makes the mistake of voicing an opinion. Replaced, mind-wiped, and stranded somewhere beginning with 'M'. Damn man! Though that's a great line.

This is still the same base under Utah and they were still filming on location in Cardiff, but these scenes were shot in the Millennium Stadium (now called the Principality Stadium). In fact most of the episode was filmed here. It's also where they did their script readthroughs. They just really liked this place I guess.

Though now we're on a set back at the show's Unit Q2 soundstage, with a giant painting of Van Statten on the wall that I bet the actor didn't get to take home afterwards. This is one of those 'hero meets the villain and they size each other up' scenes, that eventually leads to Rose complaining about smelling the testosterone.

Rose and the Doctor are brought in and find Van Statten holding an bat wing-looking alien artefact that "the English kid" on the left has just acquired for $800,000. The Doctor shows him it's an instrument and it turns out Van Statten catches on quick. Then he just throws it away, just to annoy him. The guy owns the internet and has more baseballs on his desk than Benjamin Sisko, a million dollar toy is nothing to him.

But there is something valuable to him, his one live specimen: the Metaltron. A guy called Simmons has been torturing it a bit but that hasn't gotten them anywhere so they're going lock the Doctor in with it to see if he has more success. He goes into the dark room and offers to help the alien out. Then the lights come on.

Surprise, it's a Dalek! Well, it's not much of a surprise for old viewers as the episode's called Dalek, but it's a big shock to the Doctor. He demonstrates to new viewers exactly what they should think about this retro R2D2-looking thing by immediately panicking and banging on the door to get out. He'll step through spinning fan blades and stare down a Slitheen with a grin, but this is properly terrifying to him.

Daleks were still a part of pop culture in the UK at this point, even people who'd never seen the series knew what they were, but they'd been parodied about as much as William Shatner's Captain Kirk. So it's interesting that they decided to go with faithful design, even using a classic-style Dalek built for conventions as a base, instead of trying to do a Battlestar Galactica reimagining or making it a Spider-Dalek or something. Sure it's a bit steampunk'd up and has a glowing blue eye, but new Dalek variants appeared in the classic series as well, so there's nothing weird about that.

Personally Matt Smith was basically my first Doctor and I had no attachment to the classic Daleks. I only knew them from comedy skits. But I'm really glad they stuck with the old design here, as they've never come up with anything better. Plus keeping this connection to the previous continuity made the new series feel more legit and gives the classic serials more impact. All the old stories like The Dalek Invasion of Earth, Genesis of the Daleks, Remembrance of the Daleks, they're all in this Doctor's mind right now.

It's even got the egg-whisk gun! It's not working though, no matter how much it yells "EXTERMINATE!"

The Dalek was voiced by Nicholas Briggs who had been acting in Big Finish audio dramas for a while and has continued playing Daleks and other evil robot things to this day. He was actually there on set, using a ring modulator to produce the distinctive voice. He tried to control the flashing lights on top as well, but there was interference or something, so he had to give an operator hand signals instead. Wireless controls always seem to be a nightmare for British sci-fi shows.

When the Doctor realises he's not in danger from the defective Dalek his whole mood switches on a dime and he starts getting into the thing's face, making it back up as far as the chains allow. New viewers really needed those other five episodes to appreciate how out of character the guy is here.

Yeah I suppose that is pretty terrifying from the Dalek's POV. Christopher Eccelston really gets to cut loose and show off his skill here, going from fear, to sorrow, to murderous rage, and he's doing it against a prop.

The Dalek is waiting for orders, but the Doctor explains that it's never going to get any. Because he wiped out their entire race! So that's some new information.

Genesis of the Daleks features a famous scene where the Fourth Doctor holds two wires and questions if he has the right to put them together and trigger the genocide of the Daleks, avert all the evil they'll ever do. Seems like he found himself with a similar choice off-screen, and this time he went through with it. The twist is that the Time Lords all died too. We learned in The End of the World that the Doctor lost his world in the Time War, now we know who they were fighting, and that he was the one who destroyed it. No wonder he's so traumatised.

The Doctor decides to flick a switch on the torture machine and electrocute the helpless prisoner to death, but the guards stop it in time and drag him away.

Meanwhile the English kid, Adam, has been put in charge of looking after the other mysterious intruder, and he's doing it all on his own with no guards and no guns. British viewers may have already known Bruno Langley, as he'd been in Coronation Street, and returned to the soap afterwards on and off. His IMDb page comes to a sudden halt though at the point where he was convicted for sexual assault.

It turns out that Adam is a genius who hacked into the US Defence System when he was 8 and nearly caused World War 3. So he's nowhere near as good as Rose's boyfriend Mickey, who got into the UK system last episode and averted World War 3. She's clearly into the guy though.

Adam decides to hack into his own system to see what's going on with the pepper pot downstairs (he actually calls it that in dialogue!) But when Rose sees that Simmons is torturing it again she wants to rush down and help the poor creature. See, this is why you should always tell your companions about your arch enemies before they meet them.

The Doctor's currently in a lift with Van Statten and his assistant Goddard, chatting about the Dalek. We very almost get a Davros reference, as the Doctor explains that it was genetically engineered by a genius who was king of his own little world. Reminds him of someone else he's sharing an elevator with right now. This unnamed creator removed every emotion from them except for hate, and I guess a little bit of fear, with how it backed away from him.

Turns out the Dalek fell from the sky about 50 years ago (so roughly the same time Doctor Who started airing a serial called The Daleks) and the Doctor assumes it must have fell through time, the only survivor of the Time War. He's seems really sure he's the absolute last one though.

Unfortunately Van Statten's been paying attention and has noticed that the Doctor's the last of his kind as well.

Cut to the Doctor being chained up in his own cell, undergoing a painful scan by an alien device. He really should've seen this coming, Rose did.

New fans got another bit of lore here, as it's revealed that the Doctor has two hearts, which Van Statten wants to patent. He explains that he's the kind of evil genius who only sells things that benefit his bank account. Broadband scavenged from the Roswell crash, yes, a cure from the common cold, no. The Doctor tries to blow on the embers of his conscience by telling him why he's worse than the Dalek, but Van Statten has a great comeback, saying "In that case, I will be true to myself and continue." Man, it really is like trying to talk to Davros.

Van Statten apparently wasn't much of antagonist in the first draft, but when it seemed like they weren't getting the rights to the Daleks and it was going to be about an evil sphere, they needed to build up the supporting characters more. The episode ultimately ended up with a proper Dalek and well developed side characters, which isn't a bad combination.

By this point Rose and Adam have made their way to the Dalek, who's switched back to 'piss Van Statten off by being silent' mode. But it gets a lot more chatty when she says the magic word, mentioning that she's the Doctor's companion.

Daleks spend so much time yelling "EXTERMINATE" and shooting everyone that it's easy to forget that they can be lying manipulative little gits when it suits them. It gives Rose a sob story and says it's glad it met a human that wasn't afraid before it died. Rose didn't get the warning about people touching it bursting into flames, and she puts her hand on the head in sympathy. This turns out to be a mistake.

She doesn't explode into flame, so that's good at least, but for some reason it turns out that all it needed was a sample of her genetic material to start reconstructing itself. There may have been a way the writer could've given this a satisfying explanation, but it's not in this script.

The Dalek's instantly strong enough to break loose of the chains and Simmons rushes in. The Dalek points its plunger at its torturer and Simmons wonders if it's going to sucker him to death. 

Turns out yeah, that's exactly what it's going to do. It grabs onto Simmons' face and crushes his skull. I don't think we've ever had a death by plunger before, so that's something new!

Writer Robert Shearman already had a bit of experience with Doctor Who, as he had written several audio dramas for Big Finish. His wife also had some familiarity with the series, and gave him a list of reasons why Daleks were crap and couldn't be taken seriously. So the episode was deliberately written to counter all the jokes that that people had been making in the 16 years the series had been off air and rehabilitate them as a serious threat.

The Dalek's still trapped in its cage, but there's a keypad so it won't be stuck for long. The Doctor's been released from his cell to help them stop it, and he points out that a Dalek can calculate a thousand billion combinations in one second flat. I kind of hate that line to be honest, because the number sounds ridiculous. 1,000,000,000,000 combinations, every second. He could've just said "The Dalek's casing contains a supercomputer that can brute force the lock in seconds" and I would've been happy.

Not that the calculations needed are all that impressive. It's an eight digit code, so the first combination to try is 00000001, then 00000002, and so on.

The Dalek gets out and the guards outside start firing, with shell casings flying everywhere. The actors were firing blanks on set so they had to have ear plugs in. There are also impact sparks on the Dalek's casing, though they were added as visual effects.

Van Statten yells at them over the radio to stop shooting and damaging his Dalek, but it doesn't seem like there's any chance of either the shooting stopping or the Dalek getting damaged. The other guard tells De Maggio to get the two civilians to safety, as they don't seem to be running in terror. She complies, leaving him to face the thing alone.

The Dalek taps into their computer and drains enough power to shut down the whole West Coast. It also downloads the entire internet, which I guess would be around half a zettabyte big in 2012. That's over 500 exabytes. 500,000 petabytes. 500,000,000,000 gigabytes. That broadband Van Statten got from the Roswell crash must be pretty fast.

Unfortunately it's able to use this power to properly regenerate its casing, with metal bending back into place.

Van Statten's assistent Goddard has the guards move to the Metaltron cage and they open fire, but now that the Dalek's powered up its forcefield the bullets don't even make it as far as the bulletproof armour. There's a slow motion shot to show how they're just disintegrated in mid air. Funny thing is, this effect as added to save money on the effects for bullet impacts.

Van Statten would like his guards to quit shooting his one-of-a-kind Dalek, despite Goddard pointing out they'll die. He's such an unrepentant asshole that he actually tells her that his employees are dispensable.

It doesn't really matter now though, as everyone sent to the cage is now dead. Gunned down by the Dalek's iconic energy blasts.

Hang on, did Dalek weapons actually light up the target's skeleton like this in the classic series? They must have, I remember seeing it in an old video game.

Doctor Who (1963) 25-01 - Remembrance of the Daleks, Part 1

Okay, I've done the research, and the x-ray effect was used in exactly one classic story: Seventh Doctor serial Remembrance of the Daleks. That was the last Dalek story until this one aired 17 years later. That's a long time to go without a proper Dalek killing spree on TV.

Back in Van Statten's office, the Doctor has Goddard arrange for every civilian still down there with the Dalek to be armed. Unfortunately the alien weapons that might be able to hurt the thing are all in a room behind it.

Oh damn, if Rose and Adam had just gone down this staircase instead of up they could've gotten behind the Dalek and reached the alien weapons! And if they quit sticking around to watch people take shots at it they might just have a chance of getting out before the doors close. Rose, you're in Doctor Who, you're supposed to run.

To be fair they're assuming that the Dalek's been defeated by a flight of stairs. Anyone new to Doctor Who can predict how this scene's going to go, it's pretty inevitable, but back in the day this used to be something people joked about. So that's next on the list of things for the episode to fix:

1. A plunger is not a suitable replacement for an arm.
2. Daleks cannot climb stairs.

Doctor Who (1963) 25-01 - Remembrance of the Daleks, Part 1

Actually Remembrance of the Daleks already showed how the Daleks get up stairs back in 1988: they just hover.

The image is a bit dark, but you can see here how little the design's changed over the years. They've tweaked the proportions a bit, added extra detail, changed the colour etc. but it's clearly the same Dalek.

Uh, I don't mean to imply that it's literally the same Dalek.

Doctor Who (1963) 25-02 - Remembrance of the Daleks, Part 2

No, this Dalek made the mistake of meeting Ace in a school hallway while she was carrying a rocket launcher.

Okay Rose, this is what the show's previous companion was doing at your age, so I'm going to have to ask you to be a bit more active here. You don't have to grab an RPG and go full Rambo but it'd be really helpful if you could run away.

The Dalek says "ELEVATE" and then very slowly ascends the stairs. Not because it can't go faster, but because it's a slasher villain and it's having fun.

De Maggio tells Rose and Adam to go while she stays behind and tries to stop it. Full points for heroism, but I'm going to have to deduct points for throwing her life away doing something absolutely futile.

Van Statten doesn't get why the Doctor's not able to negotiate with the Dalek if he's such an expert, so the Doctor explains that all it does is murder people. It's driven by a belief that anything different is bad and must be exterminated. It's an ultra-Nazi inside an indestructible tank and it has just read every comment anyone ever left on YouTube so it's in a 'murder all humanity' kind of mood.

(Yes I know YouTube was launched in December 2005, the episode's set in 2012 so it still makes sense.)

It's a bit hard to see, but there are still lots of guards alive in this weapon testing area and they open fire on the Dalek as it comes into the room. The Doctor tells them on the radio to aim for the eye stalk and hope some of their shots make it through the forcefield, but the commander dismisses his advice, as he knows how to fight "one single tin robot". I suppose no one's told him yet that everyone on the floor below is dead.

The Dalek's already proven it can wipe out a room full of soldiers, but this time it waits for a moment to stare right at Rose (who still isn't running away!) Next it turns on the camera so the Doctor and friends in Van Statten's office can see what it's doing. Then it hovers in the middle of the room and shoots the fire alarm to set off the sprinklers. That's shot #1. Shot #2 electrifies the water on the floor to kill all those guards, and shot #3 kills all the people on the walkway. I guess rubber soles don't help much when you're soaking wet and standing in a puddle.

So it turns that the commander didn't know how to fight one single tin robot, huge shock. Now he and his men have been added to this episode's impressive kill count. It's probably beaten World War III at this point and that also had a room full of people getting electrocuted. This is like an old school Doctor Who serial!

You'd think a guy this rich would have a bigger office.

Van Statten's a bit shocked by the death of everyone standing in between him and the unstoppable killing machine and suggests a new strategy: run. That won't work though, as they apparently can't escape while the helipad has no power.

They can't close the bulkheads and trap the Dalek down there either... unless Van Statten has the computer skills to bypass the security codes and re-route emergency power. Which he does! It's weird seeing someone else do the computer magic while the Doctor watches, but it makes sense seeing as this is the dude's own computer.

The Dalek gets on the TV and explains to the Doctor that it was Rose's time traveller DNA that allowed it to regenerate itself. So that makes slightly more sense now I guess.

It's been searching the internet for other signs of Daleks and has realised that the Doctor's probably right, it is the only Dalek left. There's no one left to give it orders. So it's just going to fall back to its primary order: kill everything. The Doctor asks what the point of it carrying on is. Its people are gone. Everything it stood for is gone.

There's a later episode where the Doctor holds a mirror up to make a point, and his reflection makes us realise that all the things he's saying also apply to him. I'm getting the same feeling from this. (Though the Doctor never needed orders from the Time Lords to give him purpose, so ignore that bit).

The Dalek actually asks the Doctor what it should do, so the Doctor yells that it should kill itself; finish the job and make the Daleks extinct. The Dalek thinks about this for a second or two, replies with "You would make a good Dalek," and then turns the screen off like it's dropping the mic.

Man, you know that you're good at hating someone when a creature designed to do nothing but hate everyone that isn't exactly the same as them tells you 'Damn man, you're as good at hating as I am, you could join the Dalek club'.

So the Doctor and Van Statten get on the unique dual-keyboard terminal to re-route power and shut bulkheads to seal the Dalek in. Van Statten demonstrates his genius by typing "UTAH STATE POWER SUPPLY" over and over.

The Doctor phones Rose to check her position and encourage her to move faster. She asks if he could stop the doors closing, but he tells her that he's the one closing them and he has to get it done before they lose power again. I like this 3D map they've got on the screen by the way. I like the screen too.

They had these kinds of transparent monitors on the set of Star Trek: Discovery as well and they're pretty impressive. Though the hardware hadn't been invented yet in 2005, so these shots are all visual effects.

Always nice to have a giant staircase shot. Reminds me of Ghostbusters.

If you stop and stare at it for a bit you can see the same markings on the floor repeated over and over, so that kind of gives away how they put this image together. But if there's one thing I've learned from this story, it's that you should never stop on a staircase to stare when a Dalek is coming.

There's lots of proper Doctor Who running in this episode, though not quite enough unfortunately. If Rose and Adam had just ran upstairs from the start and didn't stop to look back they could've been at the door three minutes earlier. Instead Adam reaches the door just as its closing and has to roll underneath it.

Rose wasn't quite fast enough.

She gets on her phone to assure the Doctor that it's not his fault and that she has no regrets. Then he hears "EXTERMINATE!" and a gunshot.

This wouldn't be the first time a companion departed midway through a season, in fact it was fairly normal in the classic series. But companions don't get gunned down by a Dalek six episodes in! Okay to be fair, Ian also got gunned down by a Dalek in the sixth episode of the original show, but they only paralysed his legs. There's no way that Rose is dead.

The Doctor's got no reason to doubt it though and he's ignoring her instructions to not blame himself. He said that he'd protect her! Or at least that what he claims here, though I'm pretty sure he only ever warned her that it would be dangerous to travel with him.

Van Statten's kind of powerless at the moment, now that he's lost all his folks with guns, and he's relying on the Doctor to save him. So the Doctor hits him while he's vulnerable with one of the best lines in the episode, saying that all he wants to do is take the wonders of the universe and lock them deep under the Earth. And now he's dragged Rose down with him.

But Rose isn't actually dead!

The Dalek says that it feels Rose's fear. It sounds like a generic bad guy line, but it turns out that it's actually not. It feels the same fear she does. When it took some of her time traveller genetic material it also took some of her, and now it's contaminated. Oops. Did it not read the casing's manual or something? How did it not know that if it used this feature this is what could happen?

This has actually happened in the past as well. Not this exact situation, but Daleks have become more human due to reasons. In this case it's made it more unpredictable and emotional.

Though keeping Rose alive also serves the Dalek's agenda. It gives the Doctor a call and tells him to open the bulkhead as "What use are emotions if you will not save the woman you love?" I mean, it's got him there.

Fortunately Adam made it up to the office in time to tell the Doctor about all the uncatalogued alien weapons in his workshop. He stashed them here in case Van Statten ever tries to mindwipe him and he needs to escape. Honestly, against these guards I think he'd actually have a chance, especially as they're all dead now.

The Doctor mocks him, saying "What are you going to do, throw your A-Levels at them?" He's not impressed with the condition of his weapons either and one of them turns out to be the biggest hair dryer I've seen since Spaceballs, but he eventually finds something he can use.

Some people have pointed out that the line mocking Adam for thinking he can fight back using his intelligence is incredibly out of character for the Doctor, and yeah it really is. But the guy's picking out the gun he likes most while he's saying it, so I feel like the writer knew what he was doing.

I like how the Dalek swings its eyestalk around in the lift and Rose has to dodge out of the way. This Dalek was apparently designed to be her height, so scenes like this would work better. It probably wasn't much fun for Billie Piper to stare directly into that blue light though.

The Dalek's having a bit of an identity crisis now, more confused than anyone about why it hasn't killed Rose yet. It used to be so good at killing people!

It rolls into Van Statten's office and now we finally get the catharsis of watching the bastard get exterminated for everything he's done and everyone that's died because of him.

The Dalek rolls into Van Statten's office, so now we finally get the catharsis of watching this bastard get what's coming for him.

Van Statten claims that all those times he had it tortured, all he wanted was for it to talk, so the Dalek gives him what he wants: "EXTERMINATE!"

Russell T Davies was deliberately trying to make the catchphrase a thing again here. He wasn't concerned it might seem campy, he wanted a script full of 'exterminate' to get kids saying it in playgrounds and I think it paid off.

But Rose interrupts before the Dalek can fire, and somehow, amazingly, talks it out of it!

What I love about this scene is how it takes the monster of the episode and puts us on its side in this scene. Van Statten is such a terrible person that you're kind of rooting for the Dalek to shoot him. We want this son of a bitch to get a well-earned karmic death from the creature he locked up and tormented for years.

Though we don't get the satisfaction, because the Dalek has enough compassion now to show mercy. It's listening to its companion and making the choice the Doctor would've made. All it wants is freedom.

So Rose and the Dalek go up to the top floor, and it blasts a hole in the roof so it can feel the sun.

Then we get this CGI casing opening shot, which looks alright I reckon. I don't really like how it splits down the middle of the front plate though, it's a bit weird.

Here's the real prop, showing the tiny hateful squid within. It's probably surprised a decent number of viewers at the time, who'd seen the iconic Dalek casing almost as much as they'd seen Bart Simpson mugs and Wolverine t-shirts, but didn't know there was a mutant inside.

Just then the Doctor turns up with his big-ass space gun to blast the Dalek into pieces. Personally I wouldn't stand there in the open right in front of an armed and operational Dalek, though I suppose the thing has to take a moment to yell "EXTERMINATE!" before it fires. Also the Doctor has to get Rose out of the way first.

The Doctor reminds her that it's killed hundreds of people in one episode, which is a fair point, but she replies that it's not the one pointing a gun at her. This is also true, as with the case open the gun's actually off to the side.

99.9% of the time anyone pointing a gun at a Dalek is morally justified to pull that trigger, but the Doctor picked the one day where it's just sunbathing. He tries to explain that he has to destroy it, for revenge, but that never sounds good out loud. Rose explains that it's changing and then asks what the hell he's changing into.

This is the third and final conversation between the Doctor and the Dalek and there was a ton of potential for unintentional humour here, with Christopher Eccleston acting his heart out and the Doctor finally showing some proper grief over all his people being dead... to a woman and a tiny mutant blob. But it really works I reckon.

In the end the episode's not about the Doctor defeating his nemesis, it's about him putting the gun down, because now he's travelling with a companion who can help bring him back to his senses.

Unfortunately the Dalek's not entirely changing for the better either. The DNA it's gotten from Rose makes him impure, so it's become what it hates. It can't live like this and wants Rose to order him to die.

So she does, and it exterminates itself with the balls all over its skirt, giving us our mandatory explosion for this episode. I'm sure the things must have another purpose too as Daleks rarely have a reason to self-destruct, but they get the job done. So I guess we're not getting a Dalek companion this season then.

It's still a bit surprising that Van Statten survived, though he doesn't quite get away with everything he's done. There's still a few guards left and they're more inclined to listen to Goddard right now after two hundred of their friends just died. So she orders them to wipe his memory and dump him somewhere beginning with 'S' to live his new life as a homeless junkie.

Okay that has to be the nastiest thing a 'good' character has ever done on this series. Goddard needs a Rose to tell her that revenge isn't good! Though it is sometimes very satisfying, especially at the end of an episode like this.

Adam comes over to warn Rose and the Doctor that Goddard's going to have the whole base filled with cement. Like, right now. I don't know where she got hold of 53 floors worth of cement so fast, but it seems like a sensible precaution considering how world-ending these alien relics can be sometimes.

I don't like the way Adam delivers his lines here, but I haven't really liked him all episode, so that's nothing unusual. I'm sure he wouldn't like the lines I've been saying about him.

Rose tries to persuade the Doctor to let Adam come with them, saying that he's always wanted to see the stars, but the Doctor's got a good comeback, saying that he should stand outside then. In fact I bet you can get a great view of the stars from here, away from all the light pollution. But the Doctor relents and lets him come, so now he's got two companions again! Or maybe Rose has her own companion.


CONCLUSION

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Dalek pretty much gives you exactly what it says on the tin. If you want to see a Dalek on a rampage, you'll come away from this satisfied. The episode's on a mission to rehabilitate the villains after years of skits and jokes, and almost everyone who mocks or underestimates the creature dies a horrible death.

The episode makes it very clear that all Daleks do is hate, and they kill anyone that they hate. They're so damn evil that when the last surviving Dalek finds itself growing into something better it has to exterminate itself for not being pure. And then for its next trick, the episode makes us sympathise with the creature! It could've made Rose seem a fool for falling for its deception and inadvertently freeing it, but instead it shows how valuable her compassion is.

So far in the series Rose hasn't been all that useful. In episode 2 she was locked in a room most of the time, in episode 3 Dickens saved the day, in the 4 and 5 Mickey saved the day. But here we get to see why the Doctor needs a companion around in his travels. Just having an extra pair of hands around can be helpful, but he also needs a proper friend to talk to, someone he can trust who's not afraid to talk him down. Someone he wants to be a better person for. He doesn't need someone who'll let a Dalek loose on the world, but hey she was doing the best she could with limited knowledge.

Plus the Doctor didn't actually help at all in this situation either. If you took him away for the second half of the story basically nothing would've gone differently. But it's not a story about people saving the day, it's a story about people, and we learn a lot about the Doctor here. His arc is the heart of the episode, mirroring the Dalek's metamorphosis, and Christopher Eccleston gives his strongest performance of the series so far as a wounded man lashing out at his opposite. The other Last Survivor of the Time War.

It helps that the dialogue is great (when people aren't talking about the Dalek downloading a billion internets every millisecond, or whatever). You don't get powerful moments with a traumatised hero confronting their arch-nemesis if the script isn't arming them with powerful lines. And Murray Gold gives the story a more grown up score than some of the previous episodes. It's just a quality piece of TV production all around.


RATING

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Dalek is such a highly regarded episode that it doesn't matter what rating I end up giving it, I'll still have to justify why I'm rating it so low. It's a 'Top 20 episodes of the whole 60 years of Doctor Who' level story.

I've already mentioned a few of the things that bothered me, like some of the dialogue, Rose standing around instead of running, Adam being a smug Wesley Crusher etc. Plus there are other episodes I enjoyed more. So I'm going to give Dalek an overall rating of...

8/10.

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NEXT EPISODE

I'm alternating between Doctor Who's 2005 and 2025 seasons, so the next episode is Ncuti Gatwa story Lucky Day!

Actually no, I've got a better idea. I'm in the mood for more Daleks so I'm going to go crazy and review the season 8 Peter Capaldi story Into the Dalek. Like I'm not busy enough already.