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Doctor Who: Remembrance of the Daleks (Review)

Posted on March 13, 2013 by Darren

To celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the longest-running science-fiction show in the world, I’ll be taking weekly looks at some of my own personal favourite stories and arcs, from the old and new series, with a view to encapsulating the sublime, the clever and the fiendishly odd of the BBC’s Doctor Who.

Remembrance of the Daleks originally aired in 1988.

You can always judge a man by the quality of his enemies.

– the Doctor explains why the Daleks needed to be badass again

I think Sylvester McCoy’s tenure in the lead role has been vindicated by history. While he may have been the title character as the show slid quietly into cancellation, there’s no denying the massive impact that the show has had on the hugely popular revival. It’s quite something that the McCoy era managed not only inspire both Russell T. Davies and Steven Moffat, but in two radically different ways. Although it kicks off his second year in the role, you could make the argument that all of that really kicks off with Remembrance of the Daleks, which was also a hell of a way to celebrate the show’s twenty-fifth birthday.

They’ll never keep them clean…

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Doctor Who: Daleks in Manhattan (Review)

Posted on March 12, 2013 by Darren

Daleks in Manhattan originally aired in 2007.

We must evolve! Evolve! Evolve!

– Dalek Sec has perhaps the most out-of-character moment for a Dalek ever

The concept of Daleks in the past is a great idea. However, with the exception of Evil of the Daleks, it is also a bit of a tricky one. Steven Moffat found that out with the first Dalek story of his tenure, Victory of the Daleks, bringing the Daleks to the Second World War. However, Russell T. Davies tried telling a Dalek story set in the past as part of the show’s third season. The Parting of the Ways had featured a Dalek story set in the future, while Doomsday saw the fiends lay siege to modern-day London. Placing the Daleks in 1930s New York seems a staggeringly ambitious proposition.

It’s a hell of a town…

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: Andrew Garfield, arts, Bad Wolf, bbc, Dalek, doctor, DoctorWho, Empire State Building, Great Depression, Helen Raynor, Hooverville, Manhattan, Miranda Raison, New World, new york, russell t. davies, science fiction, steven moffat, tardis, United States | Leave a comment »

Doctor Who: The Dalek Invasion of Earth (Review)

Posted on March 11, 2013 by Darren

The Dalek Invasion of Earth originally aired in 1964.

We are the masters of Earth. We are the masters of Earth. We are the masters of Earth.

– who are the Daleks trying to convince?

Watching the early years of Doctor Who, I often find myself struggling to measure the quality of a show as against its importance to the series as a whole. Sixties Doctor Who has perhaps an unfair reputation when it comes to quality. In fact, as a rule, I’ve been pleasantly surprised on my trips back to the archives for these reviews. However, it’s often much more interesting to look at the context and the legacy of these classic episodes, as the show begins to define what it is and what it isn’t, what it can do and what it can’t do.

In that context, The Dalek Invasion of Earth is a massively important story. It features the first returning monsters of the series (go on, guess!), the first departure of a companion, the first invasion of Earth, the first aliens in London. The list goes on and on. There’s an incredibly vast influence that The Dalek Invasion of Earth has on the half-century of Doctor Who that follows. It’s nearly impossible to deny the shadow that this adventure casts.

However, it’s also a very flawed piece of television, for all its iconic status. Indeed, watching these six episodes I’m more often struck by what is important rather than what is good.

The Daleks of London…

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Doctor Who: Attack of the Cybermen (Review)

Posted on March 1, 2013 by Darren

Attack of the Cybermen originally aired in 1985.

We realise this must be confusing for you.

– Threst tells it how it is

There is a tendency, these days, to be more sympathetic in appraisals of the Colin Baker years. Everybody – including Baker – accepts that his tenure could have gone a lot smoother. Watching Attack of the Cybermen, I can’t help but feel sorry for just about everybody involved. Rewatching Colin Baker’s first season, I can’t help but feel that the problem with this period of the show wasn’t that the production crew were making new mistakes or deviating from good ideas. It seems quite apparent that a lot of the major problems were embedded during Peter Davison’s time in the role.

The problem with Colin Baker’s first year on the show was that the writers and producers allowed those already significant flaws to attain critical mass.

A crushing blow…

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Doctor Who: The Age of Steel (Review)

Posted on February 28, 2013 by Darren

The Age of Steel originally aired in 2006.

Human race. For such an intelligent lot, you aren’t half susceptible. Give anyone a chance to take control and you submit. Sometimes I think you like it.

– oh, Doctor, you kinky so-and-so

I really don’t like Rise of the Cybermen. I think it’s a waste of a potential origin story for one of the Doctor’s most iconic adversaries. However, most of the problems with this two-parter are front-loaded. The set-up, quite frankly, is relatively pedestrian. It’s Doctor Who on auto-pilot. The follow-up, Age of Steel, actually works a bit better. That’s not to suggest that the script is any smarter or any tighter. Indeed, this is very much Doctor Who in big blockbuster mode. However, Age of Steel does have one massive advantage. It has director Graeme Harper working on it.

At least they’re stylish…

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Doctor Who: Rise of the Cybermen (Review)

Posted on February 26, 2013 by Darren

Rise of the Cybermen originally aired in 2006.

Delete. Delete.

– the moment the Cybermen realise they are second-rate Daleks

I’ll freely concede that I am sceptical of the Cybermen. Okay, that’s not fair. I actually really like the early Cybermen stories. However, it seems like Doctor Who really forgot how the Cybermen worked when it turned them into a recurring “once per Doctor” sort of threat. However, they are part of the show’s iconography. The image of the Cybermen marching down the steps of St. Paul’s Cathedral from The Invasion is important enough to earn them a sacred place in the show’s history.

So the return of the Cybermen was inevitable, even before we caught a glimpse of one of their silly helmets in Dalek. Russell T. Davies has generally done a great job revitalising old concepts for the revived series, so Rise of the Cybermen has that in its corner. Unfortunately, I’m not convinced that Rise of the Cybermen approaches anything resembling the quality of Dalek, and I think that Rise of the Cybermen manages the rare feat of turning most of Davies’ strengths into weaknesses.

March of the Cybermen…

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Doctor Who: Revenge of the Cybermen (Review)

Posted on February 25, 2013 by Darren

Revenge of the Cybermen originally aired in 1975.

Then what is it? You’ve no home planet, no influence, nothing. You’re just a pathetic bunch of tin soldiers skulking about the galaxy in an ancient spaceship.

– the Doctor pretty much sums it up

To be fair, the title should the first clue that something is not quite right here.

Tom Baker’s first season of Doctor Who contains two genuine classics in the form of Genesis of the Daleks and The Ark in Space, along with the quite good Sontaran Experiment, but it was bookended by two absolute clunkers. Indeed, Revenge of the Cybermen and Robot both feel like holdovers from the Barry Letts era of the show, and they’d both probably seem a whole lot more entertaining as vehicles for Jon Pertwee rather than Tom Baker.

Sadly, we’ve got what we’ve got, so let’s just try to work through this.

Sadly it’s A bomb, not THE bomb…

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Doctor Who: Tooth and Claw (Review)

Posted on February 7, 2013 by Darren

Tooth and Claw originally aired in 2006.

I want her to say “we are not amused.” I bet you five quid I can make her say it.

Well, if I gambled on that, it’d be an abuse of my privileges of traveller in time.

Ten quid?

Done.

– Rose and the Tenth Doctor are “cute”

There’s something quite interesting at the heart of Tooth and Claw, which might be the best “historical celebrity + monster” mash-up of the Davies era. It’s a wonderful pulpy genre hybrid run-around with Queen Victoria, ninja monks and a werewolf, but it’s also a quite interesting vehicle to explore the way that the show deals with historical characters. After all, Queen Victoria is a British icon, a monumentally important part of the British Empire. It would be tempting to reduce her to a bunch of catch-phrases and a stiff upper lip. It’s a testament to Davies as a writer that he can flesh her out a fully-drawn character.

However, there does seem to be something quite strange about a show that opens with a cheap shot at Margaret Thatcher only to wallow in the iconic status of Queen Victoria.

This year’s Bad Wolf is in Torchwood…

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Doctor Who: The Parting of the Ways (Review)

Posted on January 25, 2013 by Darren

The Parting of the Ways originally aired in 2005.

Everything must come to dust. All things. Everything dies. The Time War ends.

– Rose

And so the first season of Russell T. Davies’ revived Doctor Who comes to a close. If you asked me, it’s the best season of the show that Davies has produced. The year contains a few clunkers, and it doesn’t contain the highest concentration of enjoyable episodes, but I think the first year has a much clearer direction and purpose than any of the years that followed. Although apparently Christopher Eccleston’s departure was only decided after the show went into production, the first season seems like it is constantly building to the death of the Doctor. The entire first season seems to build, logically and rationally, towards that moment.

He’s not all there…

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Doctor Who: Bad Wolf (Review)

Posted on January 24, 2013 by Darren

Bad Wolf originally aired in 2005.

The Dalek stratagem nears completion. The fleet is almost ready. You will not intervene.

Oh, really? Why’s that, then?

We have your associate. You will obey or she will be exterminated.

No.

Explain yourself.

I said no.

What is the meaning of this negative?

It means no.

But she will be destroyed.

No! Because this is what I’m going to do. I’m going to rescue her. I’m going to save Rose Tyler from the middle of the Dalek fleet and then I’m going to save the Earth, and then, just to finish off, I’m going to wipe every last stinking Dalek out of the sky!

But you have no weapons, no defences, no plan.

Yeah. And doesn’t that scare you to death. Rose?

Yes, Doctor?

I’m coming to get you.

– the Daleks, the Doctor and Rose give the Ninth Doctor perhaps his best moment

Looking back at the first season, I’d argue that it’s the most cohesive run of episodes that Russell T. Davies produced on the dhow. Now because of the whole “bad wolf” thing, as that feels a bit like a clumsy link randomly inserted. Instead, as we watch the final episode, it becomes quite clear what Davies was trying to do with his first year on the show. The patterns, the themes, the subtext, the references – it all becomes quite clear. More than any other season of Davies’ tenure, the first season is really one gigantic story – and not just because the show never leaves Earth or the finalé returns to the setting of The Long Game.

The first season is a bridge. It’s a link between the last years of the classic series into the new and revived show as written by Davies. It’s a moment to gather up the dead, tidy away the loose ends and basically manage the stage so that the show can really come into its own. One of the things I loved about Davies’ Doctor Who was how accessible it all was, but it still had all this continuity ticking away in the background.

This first season finalé feels like it isn’t only a conclusion to Christopher Eccleston’s time in the lead role, it’s also closing the last of the dangling threads from the eras of Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy in the eighties. As soon as David Tennant steps into the lead role, it seems the show is entirely and utterly free of everything that came before. It’s a testament to Davies’ skill that we’re not even sure that he’s doing it.