036 The Evil of the Daleks

Started 29-Sep

We watched a strange recon with slow moving recreated scenes featuring a hairy armed young man in a dress as Victoria as prisoner of the Daleks.

No, not weird at all.

Look I'm a fan. It's not a perfect DW story but it's more interesting than most. This is difficult to get into because of it's length and it's involvement and depth and missing episodes are always a major hurdle.

It's the mood and the style that makes DW good. The plots are not amazing or the spectacular-ness of the production (mixed video and 16mm film in B&W). The mood and style feeding an imagined back story is the sign that DW is going well.

This is a very slow burn story. Whole episodes are devoted to scene setting. Scientifically implausible (of course) but then it doesn't make the mistake of depending on it.

This is like a Dickens Daleks crossover story. All the lace and maids and Victorian gentlemen but also the list of the minor characters: Kemel, Terrall, Kennedy, Ruth, Molly, Perry, even Bob Hall. Each has a little bit of character and some part in the plot.

The Daleks are cyphers but they serve the story as villains. For several episodes (2-5) they seem to flit into Maxtible's laboratory through those double arched doors (and presumably are backward and forwards through a wormhole to Skaro) like a head waiter checking on customers ducking into the kitchen (or an ever present wraith like threat reinforcing Maxtible's hegemony.) As the story goes on they develop into scheming buggers and plot mavens.

Waterfield and Maxtible are scientists greedy for power and riches who sacrifice their integrity at a terrible cost. Most of the other characters are merely pawns in this game.

Troughton is fantastically cool as the Doctor now. He manages to seem both scatty and busy and calm but really in command of everything when it comes down to it. Mercurially one step ahead of  the monsters but all over the place and doesn't seem to mind. Wow, that is cool. When it comes to it he will stand up to the Daleks, the Daleks' city on their home world, the Emporer Dalek and can and will do 'em in. And he makes it seem easy.

Jamie grows as a character. He's not a simple peasant like in Underwater Menace or Moonbase. He's now a surprisingly sophisticated and resourceful Ian-type replacement. Very good for the show. Hines plays him with some understatement.and ease belying the acting skill that this actually requires to make the role work. The guy should have gone on to great things maybe.

The story seems like 19th century faffing about till the end of episode 5. Then it soars.

Not a base under siege. The early plot starts as a mystery/search for the Tardis, followed by a desperate situation that sets the Doctor and Jamie against each other. In episode 6 when Maxtible's  house is destroyed and the action moves to Skaro the Daleks take centre stage. Yes, the Daleks' plan is insane (see Antony Tomlinson's review in the comments) and Maxtible's ambition is insane. But the pace and gravity picks up and overwhelms reasoned plotting anyway.


That last episode...
The missing visuals are surely not matched by the telesnaps or the half hearted animated version we saw. A noticeable feature of recovered Troughton episodes is the visual and acting flourshes directors and actors have put into the show. I'll cite Underwater Menace ep2 as one example. Web ep 4 as another. A very different prospect to watch it rather than hear it.

So the lost episode status is crippling but what does that leave us?

Well, spoiler alert... (after 51 years, if you haven't tried to watch this yet then FFS what's wrong with you?!)

A sample of the earthquake plot developments that go down in ep7:

• the Doctor is (definitely) not human (after all), 
• this story is big enough to contemplate escape to another universe or return to his home planet
• the Doctor will let everyone around him perish to defeat these Daleks, 
• these Daleks can do transmutation of metals (they are not bullsh*tting Maxtible) This according  to Sandifer is a metaphor for wizardry and universal magick. BTW the Doctor is not wrong to say that transmutation of iron to gold is possible... but it takes colliding black holes to do it....
• The Doctor says the point is why are the Daleks doing this? But does he answer.. no. Perhaps this is best described as sequel hunting ? 
• the Emporer Dalek reveals the plan is to discover the Dalek Factor and have the Doctor spread it among humans (really the climax to ep 6 but hey)... this is "suspension of disbelief required" time obviously but if you interpret this metaphorically and consider that the Daleks probably view the Doctor as corruptible and coerceable as any other human, I think I can understand why they would try this plan.
• The shock of seeing the destructive effects of Daleks questioning and arguing amongst each other is palpable after 4 seasons of implacable authority.
• ...and Victoria Watefield is the new companion through obvious necessity rather than the usual 'stumble into the Tardis' type reason.

Maybe it will be like the Cyberdummy/Toberman fight in Tomb... if it's ever discovered again.

But maybe that lack of discovery makes Evil ep7 the best example (of many) of living better in the imagination. (What JNT once possibly cynically called the 'memory cheating'.)


This is heady stuff and magnificent too. This is crying out for remake or animation or discovery.

Even the best modern series episodes are at best hoping to be this good.

Top 10 all time, easily. Just a matter of where. It just shades Power because of its scope but they're different sorts of stories. Power is about the misplaced mendacity of humans...In Power, the Daleks are predictable, deceptive but predictable and what they do is inevitable. Evil is about the lengths that Daleks will go to foment, well, their evil on people. The fate is inevitable only when the good guys stand up to them.

Gerry Davis ended his run as Script Editor, Peter Bryant started. He will take over from Innes Lloyd as producer during the next series. Next series features a string of Script Editors, many of whom are very, very DW famous. David Whitaker will do some more scripts over the next 3 years but usually rewrites of other people's story outlines so he's just about finished. Daleks won't be back for 4 1/2 years (Jan 1972). Thanks, Terry Nation and Lynsted Park Enterprises....

Series 4 ended in the UK on the day that colour television began in Europe (on BBC2, 1-Jul-1967). The series showed that change can be good for the show. The quality had picked up enormously. (Series 4 has gone from The Smugglers to this...) The ratings weren't soaring but they had stopped the freefall of the previous year and stabilised at a good enough medium. Overseas sales had picked up a little with NZ now regularly showing these eps and many African countries too.

Doctor Who has entered a roughly 10 year period of sustained excellence that will likely never be matched. This is where Doctor Who has become the best TV show of all time.



ABM Rating 3.81/4.00
LJM Rating 4.25/5.00
SPJ Rating 6.75/10.00  

No. 3 (out of 36)

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