Writer: Robert Shearman
“The stuff of nightmares, reduced to an exhibit”
No prizes for guessing what this one’s about.
In my humble opinion, ‘Dalek’ marks the first time that an episode from the revived portion of the show executes every mark flawlessly. If you’re one of those readers who likes the whole thing boiled down into a simple numerical score, this one is a ten out of ten, no questions asked. You don’t have to read any further.
But please do, otherwise, this is all rather pointless.
‘Dalek’ takes the Doctor and Rose to the year 2012, the not-so-distant future. Underneath Salt Lake City, Utah, they find themselves inside a subterranean museum. As the Doctor walks the dimly lit hallway, we see that the museum is filled with very particular exhibits. Slitheen claws and Cybermen helmets and all other horrors, trapped in death on display as little more than a trinket.
This opening scene is a brilliant tone-setter for what will follow. The Doctor, surrounded by his history, every horrifying creature he has ever bested, every civilisation that he saved by thwarting them, and now they’ve all been reduced to exhibits to be gawked at and kept in deep storage. Nothing I can write sums it up better than the Doctor himself.
“I’m getting old.”
At its core, ‘Dalek’ is a story for both the classic fan and the newcomer. For the former, it serves as a terrifying return to form for the most iconic and classic villain in Doctor Who history, drawing eye-opening parallels between the Dalek and the Doctor, both rendered the very last of their kind. For the latter, even though they undoubtedly have at least some idea what a Dalek is and what a Dalek does, this episode serves to showcase their uncompromising hatred and overwhelming power.
As for the aforementioned parallels between the Dalek and the Doctor, this for me is the most interesting and arresting part of the entire story. In many ways, the two are very similar, having both undergone intense trauma at the hands of the other. However, it is the way the Doctor chooses to change following the Time War, and the way the Dalek is programmed to continue on regardless that truly sets them apart. The Doctor’s compassion is endless and cannot be wavered, even in the face of the extermination and extinction of his species, and the Dalek must conquer and destroy with extreme prejudice, even without an empire to serve or a commanding officer to obey.
The interpersonal conflict between the Dalek and the Doctor also serves to demonstrate what a destructive force the Dalek is, beyond even the physical. The Doctor’s endless compassion comes to a grinding halt when the realisation that the Dalek, chained up and powerless at his mercy, is the last of its kind. Eccleston’s acting chops shine through in perhaps one of his best subtle moments as the Doctor. You can almost see the gears turning in his head, realising that the destruction of this Dalek would mean the end of the entire race forever before he mounts an assault against it.
In many ways, ‘Dalek’ provides two antagonists, in both the titular villain and the owner of the museum, Henry Van Statten. While the Dalek is arguably the same as the Doctor, albeit, with different moral codes, Van Statten is entirely the Doctor’s opposite. He shows an incredible ignorance of the fascinating history that surrounds him, viewing the Dalek not as the bringer of hell on earth that it is, but as a commodity to be exploited and profited from. A great exchange between the Doctor and Van Statten, when the Doctor teaches Van Statten how to play an alien instrument and he simply tosses it aside, serves to illustrate this point in a visual sense. The Doctor’s wonder and respect for the universe and its secrets are endless, while Van Statten remains totally egocentric.
The Dalek is restored to power when Rose Tyler unwittingly places her hand upon its casing, believing that it is pain and is remorseful for the actions of his fellow Daleks. The energy from the Time Vortex that Rose now carries from her travels with the Doctor brings the Dalek back to life and power, but takes more than a little bit of Rose herself with it, developing a sense of compassion that stops the Dalek from murdering Rose. While the Dalek murders many in this episode, gunning down entire squadrons, its mercy towards Rose and its understanding of concepts such as beauty and empathy set it apart from the others of its kind.
The characterisation of Rose in this episode is fantastic, because of how her relationship with the Doctor begins to affect the way she reacts to situations. Her attempts to mirror the Doctor’s compassionate nature begins the destructive conflict of the story, and yet she is the reason that the Dalek is thwarted; the very woman who restored it to power removes its uncontrollable bloodlust, and condemns it to a living death, which rather quickly translates into a literal one. Adding this level of depth to Rose allows the audience to realise that, not only is the Doctor not perfect, but neither are the companion characters. Despite the point being driven home that the people that travel with the Doctor give him a reminder for what he fights for, they are only human, and they make mistakes. Ironically enough, these mistakes usually come from trying to be like the Doctor.
My favourite line in the entire episode speaks to the stark contrast between what a Dalek should be, and what this Dalek has become:
“This is not life. This is sickness.”
The Daleks are not like any other Doctor Who villain. No other villain erodes his empathetic qualities quite as they do, and this line tells you exactly why. Other villains have shown some scope and capacity for change, but despite the numerous stories in which the Doctor attempts to reform a single Dalek or the Daleks as a whole, it consistently proves to be an insurmountable and downright impossible task.
The Dalek dies, casing exposing the mutated creature inside, in a thin ray of sunlight. On a metaphorical level, hope for a better type of Dalek and the implication that, even for the most twisted and hateful creature in the universe, redemption is possible. However, the more literal reality is that the Dalek’s tempered hatred and scope for compassion go against its very DNA, and so death is the only possible option.
All in all, a beautiful story, ironically because of its inherent darkness. The Doctor wins, as he always does, but at what cost? The universe gifted him with the insight into a Dalek with a heart and took it away just as quickly, and in doing so, forced him to face a much darker side of himself, one he works very hard to hide. For good reason.
10/10
Joe Porter 