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 Daleks! What do we know about them? They've been in our lives for 41½ years now, we've seen their Genesis, witnessed their slaughtering of untold millions, been spectators as their home planet was atomised by the Hand of Omega. But what do we actually know about the Daleks, how they think, what their thoughts turn to when they aren't rampaging throughout the cosmos killing every non-Dalek thing in sight? The answer is - very little. Last weekend changed that a bit. We were witness to the longest one-on-one Dalek session since that sink plunger made dear old Jacqueline Hill shrink back against that wall in abject terror just before Christmas 1963. We have a rather self-absorbed anally retentive American billionaire to thank for this (not to mention a slightly camp bespectacled Welshman & a cracking script from Rob Shearman).
Henry Van Statten, owner of the Internet in the year 2012 is a collector of all things extra-terrestrial. He says this is because he wants to touch the stars, but, as with Cassandra in The End of the World & the Slitheen in Aliens of London / World War Three, in reality it is all for profit. His collection is impressive nonetheless. He has various alien artefacts from musical instruments to weapons, from hairdryers to Cyber-heads & Slitheen arms. And he has a Dalek, although he doesn't know it. He has called it a Metaltron, presumably forgetting he isn't in the 1940s, & he is blissfully unaware of just how dangerous it really is. Mind you, he can be forgiven for this in some respects, because this Dalek, as far as we know the very LAST Dalek (only of course, it won't be, will it???), has been somewhat incapacitated in its journey through time & space, maybe during the Time War, maybe as a result of its arrival on Earth. Either way, it makes a rather pathetic example of its species, chained, tortured, alone & weaponless. It refuses to communicate with Van Statten & his cronies. Not because it can't, but, with typical Dalek arrogance, because it doesn't consider them worthy of communication, because they cannot provide it with any information that would be of relevance to it. Of course, it still listens. Every day, to everything said in its presence. It just hasn't heard anything of any use. Yet.
Then, one day in 2012, Van Statten gets a couple of uninvited guests. The Doctor & Rose arrive some 50 metres below ground in Van Statten's private museum in Utah, coaxed by a distress signal the TARDIS has intercepted. They have just enough time to check out a few exhibits, of which Rose recognises the arm of a Slitheen, which must have survived the blast at no. 10 last week & the Doctor spots pieces of meteorites, moon dust, the milometer from the Roswell crash in '47 &, for us, the highlight of our brief glimpse, the head of a Cyberman from The Invasion (or some other story we haven't seen) "the stuff of nightmares reduced to an exhibit" remarks the Doctor, when the Doctor sets off the alarms & some unbelievably efficient security guards capture them & take them to Van Statten. Our first glimpse of the billionaire shows us a man so far up his own back passage you question if he has ever seen daylight. One of his lackeys makes a questionable opinion & Van Statten has him fired, his memory wiped & he is dumped somewhere beginning with M. He expects everyone to laugh at his jokes, in the way that ancient monarchs needed to be toadied to. When shown how to play the musical instrument by the Doctor, he discards it as so much worthless junk, more interested in how he can exploit the knowledge of the traveller before him. As for Rose, he notices her, but pays her no heed whatsoever, to her intense annoyance. This is not a nice man & we just know that somewhere in the story, this trumped up little upstart will get his comeuppance. The Doctor squares up to this American, each attempting to get one over on the other. "Blimey, you can smell the testosterone!" mutters Rose to no-one in particular. Van Statten palms Rose of on Adam, a self-proclaimed genius who clearly fancies the pants off her & he shows her some of the artefacts he has tucked away. He confides in her that, in his not immeasurable opinion, all the rumours & speculations about alien existence & life on other planets is true, which of course is very funny to the audiences at home because Rose has already, been there, done that! He says he would give anything to see it first hand, giving Rose an ideal opportunity to invite him along for a ride at the end of the story. She clearly likes him, but conveniently pays little heed to his reckless streak. He claims to have nearly started WWIII for a laugh. Signs of trouble to come, methinks!
The Cage. A sealed room next to the museum section of the base. Protected by the most technological security locks & home to Van Statten's only living specimen, although its inhabitant does not regard what it is doing currently as living. It endures its confinement, waiting patiently for the opportunity to return to its former strength, to rejoin its race & terrorize the universe once more. Waiting. Always waiting for the one chance it needs. For the information that will stir it from its myopia. It is kept in darkness mostly. What does it think? How does it pass its time? One thing will soon become apparent. It suffers, terribly. Comeuppance perhaps for the millennia of torment its species has caused throughout time & space. We see it for the first time, chained, sterile, useless, & we feel no pity for it, for it deserves no pity. Yet.
Into the darkness walks the Doctor & the door behind him is sealed. Before it closes he sees on the workbench before him various cutting tools. He quickly deduces what kind of 'questioning' Van Statten has been putting this living alien creature through & is disgusted. He apologizes to a small circular blue light hidden in the darkness nearby & tells the creature that he is here to help it. "I'm the Doctor", he proclaims. It was for precisely this kind of information the Dalek was waiting. After 50 years of torment & useless information its senses come alive again. The hatred rises within it & its stirrings bring the lights up in The Cage. As he sees his worst nightmare before him, the Doctor's eye widen & his reaction neatly mirrors that of Jabe's when she discovers what his race is.."Impossible!!!" The Doctor had believed the Daleks to be dead.all of them. without exception. As expected all along, it was they who were the enemy of the Time Lords in the Time War. The two races had apparently wiped each other from existence in their battle, yet here, in a small bunker in North America, stood the sole survivors from each side (don't believe it myself..don't believe it, don't believe it, don't believe it!). From this point in the episode onwards, the Doctor is irrational, terrified; completely out of character, yet still behaving as many of us would in his situation. The Time War has changed him, alienated him from the rest of the universe & here, before him, stands the Enemy. An enemy with which he is all too familiar. Locked in a room with a Dalek screaming "Exterminate", facing certain death. His attempts to open the security door are frantic, yet, after a few seconds, he realizes he is not only still alive, but in no danger. The Dalek's gun is inoperative. The Doctor's relief is paramount. He laughs, he beams, he shouts "Fantastic" (for a change, but here we all agree with him). The Dalek simply looks forlornly at its useless weapon. "Powerless. The great space dustbin!" taunts the Doctor, his anger now rising to the surface. "How does it feel" he moves towards the Dalek, which backs away, itself now frightened, for all Daleks know how dangerous an adversary the Doctor is...now more so than at any time in their history.
There follows one of the most intense scenes in Doctor Who's long & illustrious history. One for which fans have cried out for years. The Doctor locked alone in a room with a defenceless Dalek and on this occasion there is even more tension in the air because of recent events between the two enemies. The Doctor taunts the Dalek, questions its very reason for still existing, and tells it that it is the last of its kind. "Ten million ships on fire. The entire Dalek race wiped out in one second. I watched it happen..I MADE IT HAPPEN!!!!!!" The Doctor is almost screaming into the Dalek's eyestalk, clearly taking great delight in this encounter with his oldest & deadliest enemy. "You destroyed us??" the Dalek sounds stunned & the Doctor just stops in his tracks, turns away & is forced to admit the magnitude of his actions, "I had no choice," he says quietly. "And what of the Timelords?" asks the Daleks as everyone stares, transfixed by this event unfolding before them, Van Satten & Goddard on the monitor outside, 8½ million people at home in Britain, many millions of others later on video, repeat showings, overseas broadcasts, A hundred million eyes caught, motionless, silent, watching this powerful piece of drama. "Dead" the Doctor almost whispers, "They burned with you. The end of the last great Time War. Everyone lost." The Dalek fights back, it calls the Doctor a coward, but the Doctor is ready for that one, his fighting spirit surfaces again & he turns smiling to face the Dalek, pointing out that it sent out a distress signal "Help me.poor little thing!" There is no-one else coming, he points out, because there's no-one else left.
"I..am..alone!" the Dalek sounds defeated. Its eyestalk drops. "Yep" the Doctor smiles & the disdain in his voice is clear. "So..are..you!" points out the Dalek, almost sadly as the Doctor's expression drops again. "We are the same." To be compared to a Dalek is about the biggest insult the Doctor could ever receive & he wheels around,
furious again, coming right up to the Dalek, until he realizes that maybe, for a brief moment, they could be the same. He can be like a Dalek if this monstrosity before him is to cease to exist..if the last of the Daleks (supposedly!) is to die like its brethren. "I know what you deserve" he grins at the metal shell, which merely watches him, helpless, powerless to do anything to stop him. "Exterminate" says the Doctor calmly & pulls a switch on the console, which causes the Dalek to be electrocuted.
"Have..pi-ty!" shrieks the Dalek (I didn't think they understood the meaning of the word & clearly the Doctor is with me on that one) "Why should I?" he spits back "You never did!" This is definitely one of the high spots of the season so far, along with the Doctor's "The world is turning" speech from Rose, the scene where he cries with Jabe in The End of the World, the pre-title scream from The Unquiet Dead & the Big Ben moment from Aliens of London. Indeed, every story has had a stand-out moment so far, but Dalek has more than just one & is so cleverly paced & darker than anything else so far that it stands out above the rest, particularly after additional viewings.
Van Statten & his people rush in to rescue the Dalek (mad fools, if only he knew what was to come!) as it screams in pain (something it does a lot throughout the story). The billionaire demands the Dalek to communicate with him, but the Dalek has said all it wants to say for now. "Recognize me!!!" shrieks Van Statten, but the Dalek stays mute. The American orders Simmons to make it talk, using whatever means necessary & the technician sets to work with his drill again, causing still more screams from the Dalek. Van Statten feels no pity or fear. The creature in The Cage poses no threat. Yet.
Rose & Adam have no turned on the monitor & see this torture taking place & Rose is horrified & dashes down to stop it. Meanwhile, the Doctor is trying to convince Van Statten of the dangers imposed by the Dalek. He tells him of the creature within the body armor, of how it has been genetically engineered to feel nothing except hate. Van Statten's eyes light up at the thought of something he can exploit for his own ends & asks by whom this has happened. "By a genius. By a man who was king of his own little world, Van Statten, you'd like him!" The Doctor can see the similarities between this arrogant American & Davros. Both were relentless in pursuit of their own goals, both dangerous beyond words because of their blinkered approach, and both blissfully unaware until it was too late of the threat posed by the Daleks. The Doctor points out that the Dalek is now a threat because it knows he is there, that it now has a reason to break free & a potential means of escape. He explains about the time war, that the Dalek must have escaped the final battle. "You survived too," points out Goddard. "Not through choice!" replies the Doctor. Still refusing to believe the Dalek to be any kind of threat, Van Statten picks up on another point. The Doctor is an alien & the last of his kind. This is not a good thing to point out to a ruthless collector of all things alien & he subsequently finds himself stripped to the waist, chained, probed & tortured. The Doctor realizes just how selfish this crazed American is as he explains that he has been collecting alien artefacts for years, discovering their secrets & using the information to further his empire. He even claims to have a cure for the Common Cold, but won't release it. This guy is SO going to get it later! Reasoning with him seems to be getting him nowhere & the Doctor begins to panic, becoming more & more irrational as he just knows (as do we all) that the Dalek will not be chained & bound for long. Little does he know that it will find the means to its regeneration through Rose, who, upon gaining access to The Cage, asks the Dalek if it is in pain &, in typical human manner (expecting all life forms to follow our patterns of behaviour) asks it its name. Now, Daleks don't have names, but they do feel pain apparently & the Dalek admits this, rather sadly & asks Rose if she fears it. She shakes her head, not realizing that this is probably the last thing the creature in front of her needed to hear. The eyestalk drops again as this latest insult, however unintentional, strikes the universes most feared monster. "I..am..dying" proclaims the Dalek, sounding worn out & defeated, but in reality luring Rose into pitying it, fooling its enemies in the same ways as the Daleks have in many earlier stories, namely Power & Evil. Feeling sorry for this pathetic creature, Rose places a hand on the Dalek's dome, accompanied by a hundred thousand voices around the world screaming "Don't do it!!!!!" Too late.
The Dalek breaks free. Regenerates. It takes Rose's DNA &, by virtue of her being a time-traveller, uses it to restore certain of its functions. Simmons rushes in & the Dalek moves towards him, extending its sucker arm. He looks at it derisively, "What are you gonna do?" he asks sarcastically, "Sucker me to death?" At which point the Dalek does precisely that! Rob Shearman has said that he wanted to take the Daleks' most ridiculous facets & turn them on their head. The first example we get of this is the oft-maligned sucker, which originally just kind of sat there, redundant. Now it can mould itself onto a persons face and suck the life out of them, it can clamp onto a control panel & manipulate the most delicate instruments within. It can also punch forward with tremendous force & is no longer to be taken lightly!
The Cage is sealed & the alarms sound. Van Statten is interrupted in his interrogation of the Doctor & the reason is only too obvious. There are so many nice little touches in Dalek that make you think "That was good". Possibly the best one here is a close-up shot of the Doctor, bright blue light behind him, his face drenched in sweat & lit quite beautifully. His eyes steely & fixed on his interrogator. He scarcely moves a muscle & just says in a low, quiet & very calm voice, dripping with intent & authority, "Release me if you want to live!" The camera lingers on this image for a split second & instantly we cut to the outcome of the Doctor's demands, he is dressed, back in control & he rushes through the door into the control room. The guard insists that the Dalek is trapped in The Cage, that the lock has a billion combinations, but the Doctor dismisses this completely. The Dalek has an augmented brain & computer assistance; it can work out a thousand billion computations in a second. As he says this Van Statten turns & stares at him, the dawning realization of the menace they all face beginning to grow in his mind. True to the Doctor's word, within a few seconds the Dalek is free, the guards blast away at it with their guns, totally redundantly as the Dalek ignores them & everything else. We see it for the first time clearly & the thing is a mess. It looks old & dirty; its panels are torn & cut. It looks like it has been in a war. It doesn't look like the gleaming, indestructible terror we have grown up with. Yet.
The Dalek glides over to the monitor, scrutinized by the Doctor, Van Statten & Goddard & punches its sucker arm through it. In doing so, it taps directly into the national power grid & diverts its power into its own regenerative circuits. Lightning crackles around the metal monster & it changes before our eyes. The sheen returns to its bodywork, the panels seal themselves up again, the dented balls on its lower body return to their natural immaculate state. And its gun is repaired. Throughout this procedure the Dalek screams, so its return to glory is not without sacrifice. Now it is a threat once more. It also downloads the Internet..all of it. You'd think that would confuse the poor thing to death there & then, but clearly the Dalek can filter out all the extraneous data & it must have the greatest hard drive we can ever imagine! I'll also wager that any ability it had to spell has just been wiped out!
It then does what any of us would do in its position. It gives the wall a good kicking as it vents the frustrations it must have felt constantly for the last 50 years, at the same time testing out its now healthy weaponry. The corridor shots for Dalek were shot in the lower levels of the Millennium stadium in Cardiff & they work very well. The scene where the Dalek is attacked by the guards is another mouth-waterer. Accompanied by some of the finest incidental music the show has ever heard & directed to perfection by Joe Ahearne, the Dalek first guns down the guard Commander, utilizing the same sound effect we know & love & the same blue-grey beam, but adding a neat skeletal effect to the negative/positive image of its victim. We then see the stream of bullets heading for the Dalek in slow motion simply dissolve & vanish before they get near its body. Interspersed with Dalek viewpoint shots, end of corridor shots & overhead shots, the Dalek calmly stands in the centre of the corridor blasting away, rotating its midriff this way & that & wiping out the squadron of guards with ridiculous ease. A watching Van Statten still wants the creature unharmed & tells the remaining guards that he doesn't want "a scratch on it", a truly ironic comment since the Dalek now looks brand new & all its previous scratches, dents & tears have vanished! The problem is, by the time he has finished barking out his orders, there is no-one alive to follow them. Rose, Adam & De Maggio are escaping through the corridors with the Dalek in hot pursuit. They reach a stairwell & all foolishly assume that they can escape that way. They obvious never saw Remembrance of the Daleks (& nor did a vast amount of those who wrote previews since they also assumed the Daleks were always stymied by anything worse than a flat floor). Of course, we all know that had today's technology existed then, the Daleks would have been flying all over the place, but it didn't & we never questioned their ability to cope with rough terrain off screen. With a brisk "Elevate", the Dalek rises slowly off the ground & sets off after them, not even pausing whilst it dispenses of De Maggio, as Rose & Adam run up the stairs. The Dalek may move slowly at this point, but remember, it is relentless & doesn't tire. Plus it can clearly zip along quite happily on flat ground. The Cgi Dalek used at times throughout the episode is completely indistinguishable from the real one, always easier to do with less organic creation & making for seamless action sequences.
Van Statten still doesn't get it. He believes the Dalek will be open to negotiation. The Doctor asks him what the nearest town is. Salt Lake City. And it's population...1 million. "All dead!" Eccleston's matter-of-fact delivery of this line merely enhances its impact. Van Statten begins to panic & demands to know why. "Because it honestly believes they should die. Human beings are different & anything different is wrong. It's the ultimate in racial cleansing" The Doctor is getting worked up again, showing far less in this story of his grinning & exuberance & more of his darker side. When he plays these intense, moody scenes, Eccleston is simply untouchable; he dominates the screen, even the scenes with the Dalek in. Unless David Tennant is also very good in this department then Eccleston's loss will be felt all the more next year.
The Dalek is still coming. The Doctor tells the surviving guards how to deal with the Dalek, their only chance. Of course, these guys always know how to do it better than those with empirical knowledge, which means that we know they are about to be massacred. The way it happens however is superb, showing us the Dalek's superior intelligence & it's nifty flying ability in one go. Pausing merely to stare at Rose & turn on the monitors again so the Doctor can witness its actions, it calmly hovers in mid air, shoots out the fire alarm triggering the sprinkler system & then simply using the puddles of water the guards are standing in to electrocute the entire platoon in one fell swoop. The pictures of a water-soaked Dalek are quite beautiful, as well as allowing the Doctor to get in one of the few humorous lines in the episode when he tells the Dalek, "You'll gonna get rusty!" The Dalek reveals that it has been searching through the Internet & using radio telescopes & satellites to look for others of its race & has found nothing. Deprived of any superiors to give it orders it will follow its instincts & destroy & conquer. Eccleston puts his heart & soul into this exchange with the Dalek, performing half the scene with a little blob of spit on his lip as he rants at the Dalek "Rid the universe of your filth! Why don't you just DIE!!!!!!"
Why don't you just die? This coming from the Doctor. It shouldn't do, but it works. The little hints and unfolding arc of the season about the Time War have shown us how alone the Doctor is now, how hurt & resentful. Maybe this is all the Daleks ever were. Alone, certainly, but through choice. Hurt, possibly, they spent most of their stories lashing out at others. Resentful..certainly. In-built programming from Davros ensured that they would always resent anything that wasn't Dalek-created. The Dalek recognizes these elements & once again comes out with an astonishing statement, "You would make a good Dalek." The Doctor merely stares at this, horrified by the second comparison by this lone Dalek, which, despite its killing spree, appears to be reacting more naturally than the Timelord. The Doctor feels compelled to seal the Dalek in, knowing that it can be trapped in the vault. The problem is that Rose (& Adam) is still escaping. The needs of the many, however, must be addressed & with fingers crossed that his companion is quick enough on her feet, the Doctor begins to lower the bulkhead doors. Adam is just fast enough to scramble through the bulkhead, but Rose doesn't make it. The Doctor is stunned to discover that she is now trapped with the Dalek & his despair when he hears the Dalek scream "Exterminate" & its gun blaze is palpable.
Rose, however, isn't dead. The Dalek wants to kill her, but hasn't. It is now connected to Rose, feels her fear. It is an alien emotion to it & it reacts again by doing the equivalent of punching the wall. It blasts either side of Rose, but cannot shoot her. It feels that her DNA has contaminated it. It is confused & knows only that it needs to escape. Turning the monitors back on it holds Rose hostage & demands the vault be unsealed, to the Doctor's immense delight (at Rose being alive, that is!) "What use are emotions if you will not save the woman you love?" asks the Dalek in what I feel is the only unsatisfactory bit of the episode. We all know that this new Doctor is supposed to feel something different for Rose than any of his other companions. We know that the Dalek has sampled her DNA, but surely, SURELY, it would not understand the concept of love. That, above all other emotions, would be alien to it. This new-style Dalek has been imbued with abilities far beyond any others we have seen. The entire story is superbly crafted, directed, scored, acted & produced. It contains numerous moments of sheer brilliance & jaw-dropping scenes. Yet this one line leaves a sour taste in the mouth. It is a shame.
The Doctor, naturally, cannot commit Rose to her fate & unseals the vault. Adam tells them that there are uncatalogued weapons which may stop the Dalek & he & the Doctor go to check this out. Adam reveals that he kept a supply of supposed weapons in case Van Statten turned on him & he needed to fight his way out, much to the Doctor's surprise. It is almost as though he views Adam as another Mickey, he doesn't quite trust him & he is suspicious of his intentions. He is also sarcastic to him at every available opportunity. This should be an interesting relationship to watch develop next week. The Doctor then finds a suitable weapon, which he, again quite
uncharacteristically, seems to relish as he hoists it up with a brisk "Lock & load!" We are told that this episode is a turning point in the season for the Doctor. Let's just hope that he doesn't deteriorate into a gun-toting unfeeling vigilante, for if he does then it will be the end of the Doctor Who we have known for 42 years.
Rose & the Dalek head for the control room in the lift. The Dalek still confused & uncertain as to why it could not kill Rose, "What..am.I? WHAT..AM..I????" it screeches. Rose looks nervous & unsure. On arrival, the Dalek seems quite happy to exterminate Van Statten, yet again, it doesn't, possibly because Rose stops it, maybe because of its contamination, either way, Van Statten survives just when we all figured he'd had his chips. "What do you want?" demands Rose of the alien. "Freedom" replies the Dalek, sadly. Rose therefore takes the Dalek to the top level, where it blasts a hole in the ceiling, letting the sunlight in. Rose seems quite pleased that this lethal killing machine has made good its escape, simply because it now appears to be questioning its reasons for being. The Dalek asks her how the sunlight feels, and then answers its own question by stripping of & having a brief sunbathe. This again is new territory. Not only can the Dalek unhinge its front section (ummmmm, why would it ever need to do that anyway??), but it exposes the mutant within to public scrutiny for the first proper appearance of a Dalek.or should that be of a Kaled mutant? Blue/grey in appearance & looking not unlike an octopus, with a single sad-looking eye in the middle of its body, dripping with goo & gesturing pathetically with its tentacles, this is the real Dalek, not the machine which houses it. Thankfully, the mutant resembles closely enough all previous snippets we have seen of it as to avoid any contradictions with previously held beliefs as to its appearance & the animatronics of the creature are, once again, handled with aplomb.
The Doctor arrives, big gun at the ready & demands that Rose steps aside so he can blast it into infinity, but she refuses "It's not the one pointing the gun at me" she says simply, drawing the third comparison between the Doctor's actions & that of the Dalek. She steps aside to show the Doctor the mutant getting a tan. It floors him completely, as if he is no longer looking at a ruthless killer which has just slaughtered hundreds of people. This Dalek is simply pathetic. It is the overriding message of the episode. Once it has infused Rose's DNA, it changes, begins to feel other than what its programming tells it. The Dalek Mk III Travel Machine which houses the mutant is an unstoppable evil tank, but this poor confused creature within is merely that. For the first time in 42 years, the audience sympathises with the Dalek. I bet there were even some tears last weekend. The Daleks, this one at least, have changed. "What about you Doctor?" asks Rose, "What the hell are you changing into?" Eccleston's body language changes completely. His shoulders droop, his posture relaxes. His eyes betray an infinite sadness & confusion, echoing again the sentiments of the Dalek. "I couldn't..I wasn't.." he stumbles, his gaze flitting between Rose & the mutant. "Oh, Rose" you get the feeling he is going to cry again, "They're all dead!" he speaks of the Timelords. "Why do we survive?" questions the mutant, & the Doctor has no answer. "I am the last of the Daleks," continues the mutant. "You're not even that" realizes the Doctor, knowing that this creature, programmed, genetically altered & conditioned its entire existence to kill & to further the Dalek race now has no purpose in life, there are no Daleks to further, & the thing cannot even kill anymore. It is mutating into something new. "I'm sorry," he tells it, not for what it is turning into, but that any variance from the standard design for a Dalek makes it the very thing it despises. The Dalek tells them it can feel darkness. To us, what would appear to be light is anathema to the Daleks. The creature cannot handle what it is becoming & orders Rose to command it to destroy itself. It is a soldier & cannot merely take its own life out of pity for itself. Rose, through their connection, has the capacity in its mind to give it the only order it now wishes to obey. To die. Rose, reluctantly, does just that & the Dalek asks her if she is frightened. This time she is, & although it is the very thing the Dalek needs to hear, it is not for the reason it would want. Betraying its newfound emotional side, the Dalek admits that it too is frightened. Then it puts its kit back on, elevates itself into the air & releases the balls (in time for the lottery as well!) from around its base, which form a sphere around the Dalek & vaporise it (as far as we know..watch this space!). The Doctor & Rose watch this all in silence, the camera lingers a moment to catch the sentiment of the scene & then we move on. Goddard takes control of the base & orders Van Statten to be taken away, have his mind wiped & dumped on the street of somewhere beginning with S, eliciting a wry smile from the watching masses as he FINALLY gets what was coming to him.
The Doctor & Rose arrive back at the TARDIS ("A little piece of home" remarks the Doctor wistfully stroking his battered old time ship, "Better than nothing!") & she asks him if this is really the end of the Time War. He explains that he is now the only one left, "I win.how about that?!" there is no joy in his voice. He knows he is the last of the Timelords, because he cannot feel any residue of their presence in his mind, suggesting that throughout the whole of his life he was never, ever, truly alone. Now he is, except for Rose. Possibly because she was the first person he had any emotional contact with since the War finished, this may explain why his emotions towards her are slightly different to normal. Maybe he is on the rebound in a strange sort of way. Either way, he needs her companionship now & she knows how important she is to him. Unfortunately for him, Adam is now along for the ride, but this is something he can tolerate, for now. Even if he is "A bit pretty". The TARDIS dematerialises & we are left wondering if this really is the last we will see of the Daleks. I would say take everything you ever had or ever will own, sell it, treble that amount & bet against this being the Daleks' last hurrah. Not that I'm sure mind you!
» Review by Miles Northcott, Copyright 2005.
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The Doctor: “Don’t you see? It’s all gone. Everything you were, everything you stood for”.
I have
thoroughly enjoyed the series so far, dramatic, pacy,
funny, and even realistic in a down to earth way, without
losing the sinister and alien elements of Doctor Who.
I just
watched Dalek and I was so wrong about the
new lad in The Tardis being an Aspie. He basically
is full of himself and very NORMAL. Despite being a
genius he is not an Aspie. He makes eye contact
and wastes no time chatting Rose up. He also is
boastful of how brilliant he is, even though he gets
things wrong. The Doctor is quick to give him
a dressing down "So what you going to do throw
your A Levels at THEM?" Or words to that
effect - Brilliant acting.
)
