The Daleks
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| 002 - The Daleks / The Mutants | |
| Doctor | William Hartnell (First Doctor) |
|---|---|
| Writer | Terry Nation |
| Director | Christopher Barry (episodes 1,2,4,5) Richard Martin (episodes 3,6,7) |
| Script Editor | David Whitaker |
| Producer | Verity Lambert Mervyn Pinfield (associate producer) |
| Executive producer(s) | None |
| Production code | B |
| Series | Season 1 |
| Length | 7 episodes, 25 mins each |
| Transmission date | 21 December 1963–1 February 1964 |
| Preceded by | An Unearthly Child |
| Followed by | The Edge of Destruction |
| IMDb profile | |
- This article is about the serial. For the race, see Dalek.
The Daleks (also known as The Mutants, among other titles, see below) is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast weekly from 21 December 1963 to 1 February 1964. The story also marks the first appearance of the popular Daleks.
Contents |
[edit] Plot
When the TARDIS arrives in a petrified jungle, the Doctor and his friends are unaware the planet is highly radioactive. The Doctor insists they explore a futuristic city they spot beyond the forest but Ian Chesterton and Barbara Wright are unconvinced. to force his companions to do so he sabotages his own TARDIS by emptying the mercury fluid links. He now insists they must all search the distant city.
The next morning when they emerge from the TARDIS they find a box outside, holding vials filled with an amber liquid. Susan Foreman places the box in the ship for safekeeping, after which the four travellers head off to the mysterious city. It is entirely built of metal and there are no stairs, only metal ramps; while the doorways are fashioned as squat rounded arches. Barbara manages to open a door, revealing a corridor beyond, but a shutter soon falls cutting her off from her colleagues. Within moments a strange creature emerges from a nearby lift, threatening her with a metal arm.
Ian, Susan and the Doctor enter a room full of machines, including a Geiger counter, which confirms they’ve been exposed to radiation. The trio realise the gravity of the situation, prompting the Doctor to admit his sabotage of the fluid link. This causes more mistrust between them and Ian takes the fluid link hostage to ensure the Doctor helps him look for Barbara. The trio continue to explore the city and are soon captured by beings known as Daleks, who imprison them together with Barbara. It soon becomes apparent they are all suffering from radiation sickness, with Barbara succumbing very quickly.
The Doctor is interrogated by the Daleks, who explain something of the history of their predicament. They are survivors of a neutronic war with the Thals, which has caused mutations to both races, and the Daleks are now confined to their travel machines limited to the boundaries of their metallic city. They are reliant on a variation of static electricity to provide them with the ability to move. The Doctor persuades the Daleks that the travellers will die from radiation sickness if no drugs are found, so Susan is sent to retrieve them from the TARDIS. She makes her way out of the city and back into the petrified forest. Having located the anti-radiation drugs in the TARDIS she emerges from the craft to find an alien being confronting her.
The stranger is a striking, handsome, blonde man named Alydon. His appearance proves his race, the Thals, have not suffered the same disfiguring mutations as the Daleks. He explains that he brought the drugs to Susan and now gives her more, hoping she will be able to save her friends. The Thals live in the forest and did indeed have a war with the Daleks, but they believed the robotic creatures were all now dead. He explains that the Thals have travelled many miles across the planet (named Skaro) in search of food as their race is near starvation. The Thals now hope to broker a treaty for food with the Daleks. Susan heads off to the Dalek city while Alydon returns to the Thal encampment and tells them about his encounter, hoping Susan can broker a peace and trade agreement.
Susan reaches her friends and passes round the drugs, then contacts the Daleks and explains the Thals are now looking for peace and food. The Daleks imply acceptance, asking the Thals in return to help them cultivate the land, but in reality they are plotting revenge and extermination of their old enemies. The message of peace is conveyed to the Thals, who are invited to collect food from the entrance hall to the Dalek city the following day.
Having recovered with chemical help, the Doctor’s party succeed in overpowering one of the Daleks and decide to use the robotic shell as a means of escape. The reptilian monstrosity within is dumped while Ian squeezes into the Dalek casing. In this guise he escorts his three friends through the city, hoping they can make a break for freedom.
The ruse works thanks to some quick thinking on the part of Ian, who even convinces another Dalek that he is one of them and is taking the three human prisoners for further questioning. However, when the same Dalek makes enquiries it discovers that it has been duped and sounds the alarm. After a tight squeak getting out of the casing, Ian and his allies find themselves at a window where they observe the Thals arrive to collect the food and make peace with the Daleks. As the Thals take the food the Daleks open fire, exterminating several Thals including their leader Temmosus. The surviving Thals including Alydon regroup and find the four travellers. They all travel together to the Thal encampment where a young Thal named Dyoni provides a history of the planet Skaro from a Thal perspective. It seems that the Daleks were once known as Dals, humanoids similar to Thals who mutated into their current form after the lengthy neutronic war. The Thals have reacted to their history by adopting pacifism as a creed. However, it soon becomes apparent that the TARDIS crew need fighting allies – Ian has left the empty but vital fluid link in the Dalek city and they must retrieve it somehow.
Ian eventually spurs Alydon on to display aggression when he threatens Dyoni, prompting the new Thal leader to hit him. This must now be channelled against the Daleks and the Thals agree to help the TARDIS crew. One group will accompany Ian and Barbara as they cross the swamp, then go around the lake to the mountains, where they can enter the city unseen through a back entrance. The other group, led by the Doctor and Susan, will try to sabotage the Daleks’ surveillance equipment. In the Dalek city their enemies start to regroup and test the medication left by the travellers which they now deduce is deadly to them. As a response they decide to increase the levels of radiation on Skaro and thus make it impossible to the Thals to survive.
The attack party heading for the Lake of Mutations makes good progress on their lengthy journey. Four Thals called Elyon, Kristas, Ganatus and Antodus, the latter two of whom are brothers, have accompanied Barbara and Ian. Vast pipes are used to take water from the lake into the Dalek city. The lake also contains many mutated offshoots from the war and Ian soon spots a multi-tentacled creature in the water. The assembled party are shocked to hear one of their number, Elyon, scream as one of the monsters drags him below the murky surface.
It is clear Elyon is dead but the party has to head on up the mountain. It remains a treacherous journey, with narrow fissures and no clear paths for their journey. At the front of the city the Doctor’s party have succeeded in disabling the Dalek surveillance cameras using large mirrors to reflect sunlight into them. This persuades the Daleks to reorientate their probes on to the Thal encampment rather than the other possible entrances. The Doctor and Susan become bolder and move to sabotage some static electricity control boxes, but their activity has alerted the Daleks, who soon surround them menacingly. They are taken to the control centre of the city and are told of the Dalek plan to irradiate the entire planet.
Ian's party has meanwhile found a tunnel that should lead to the Dalek city. Antodus is less secure than his colleagues and starts calling for them to turn back. The situation is made more perilous by rockfalls which stops them retreating even if they wanted to. The only way is onward – and a vast chasm is their next hurdle. One by one the party has to jump across, supported by a rope between them. The last to jump is Antodus, who loses his footing and falls into the abyss, his weight dragging Ian toward the edge.
Antodus sacrifices his life to save the others, and cuts the rope, letting himself fall. The others press on and within a short while have found an entrance point to the city. At the front of the city Alydon has also led another band of Thals in an assault, hoping to rescue the Doctor and Susan. By luck the two parties converge on the Dalek control centre at the same time. Together they destroy the Dalek apparatus planning the radiation release and also the power source for the Daleks in the city. The creatures become immobile and soon die. The Thals are repulsed by all the death, but are grateful their struggle is finally over.
They all return together to the Thal camp – this time with the fluid link – and the Doctor and his party make their farewells and return to the TARDIS. No sooner than they are in flight there is an explosion on the console and the four travellers fall to the floor.
[edit] Cast
- Dr. Who — William Hartnell
- Ian Chesterton — William Russell
- Barbara Wright — Jacqueline Hill
- Susan Foreman — Carole Ann Ford
- Dalek voices — Peter Hawkins, David Graham
- Dalek Operators — Robert Jewell, Kevin Manser, Michael Summerton, Gerald Taylor, Peter Murphy
- Temnosus — Alan Wheatley
- Alydon — John Lee
- Dyoni — Virginia Wetherell
- Ganatus — Philip Bond
- Antodus — Marcus Hammond
- Elyon — Gerald Curtis
- Kristas — Jonathon Crane
- Thals — Chris Browning, Katie Cashfield, Vez Delahunt, Kevin Glenny, Ruth Harrison, Lesley Hill, Steve Pokol, Jeanette Rossini, Eric Smith
[edit] In print
This was the first Doctor Who serial to be adapted as a novel. Written by David Whitaker, it was first published in November 1964 by Frederick Muller as Doctor Who in an Exciting Adventure with the Daleks, which was shortened to Doctor Who and the Daleks when Target Books republished it in May 1973. Although it was considered to be No. 16 in the Target Books Doctor Who Library, this was due to the numbering initially being based on the stories' alphabetical order. In fact, it was the very first novelisation published under the Target imprint (the books would continue for the next 20 years). Whittaker's book differs from most later novelisations in that it is written in the first person and from the point of view of a companion (Ian Chesterton in this case). It also ignores the events of the preceding serial An Unearthly Child, except for a modified retelling of the first episode (to explain how Ian and Barbara joined the Doctor). For some reason, Susan Foreman is renamed Susan English for the novelisation, which has led to some reference books erroneously listing the character by this name. Indeed, in the PC game Destiny of the Doctors, the player has to ask the First Doctor the surname of Susan for one of the tasks. Both English and Foreman are available options (although only the latter is considered correct in the game).
The novelisation was also translated into Dutch, Turkish, Japanese, Portuguese, French and German.
[edit] Daleks
This is the first story when the Daleks make an appearance. Writer Terry Nation once claimed that he came up with the name after seeing a set of encyclopedias with one volume spanning the section of the alphabet from Dal - Lek. However, he later admitted that this was simply a good story for the sake of the press, and that in fact he had just made up the name. This is similar to a legend concerning how L. Frank Baum chose the name "Oz" for his book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
Although many parts of the Dalek mythos were established here, several key elements were changed over the years. The most notable change regarded the nature of the war with the Thals and the transformation into the Daleks. In this story, the Daleks mutated as a direct result of the war, and their previous species was called the Dals. In the later Genesis of the Daleks, their mutation was a direct result of the machinations of Davros, their previous species was the Kaleds, and the mutation marked the end of the war with the Thals. The contradictions between these origins have provided an endless source of debate among fans.
This story was also the only instance in which the Daleks' dependence on static electricity to move was a factor. In their next appearance, The Dalek Invasion of Earth, they had found a way around this restriction, and though occasionally referenced in future serials (The Power of the Daleks) it has not been an issue in any story since.
[edit] Production
- The seven episodes of the serial had individual titles: "The Dead Planet", "The Survivors", "The Escape", "The Ambush", "The Expedition", "The Ordeal" and "The Rescue".
- According to text commentary on the 2005 DVD release, the first episode, "The Dead Planet", was recorded twice. The first version was affected by a technical fault that captured backstage voices. The remount was done two weeks before it was broadcast, and Susan's outfit was changed in the second version. The only surviving footage of the first version is the recap at the start of the second episode, "The Survivors" showing Barbara menaced by a Dalek; the corresponding scene at the end of "The Dead Planet" was recreated when the episode was remounted.
- The second episode, "The Survivors", was taped on November 22, 1963. Minutes before taping started, the cast and crew learned of the assassination of John F. Kennedy but it was decided to continue with the shooting. The next day, the first episode of Doctor Who was broadcast.
- The designer originally assigned to this serial was Ridley Scott, later a famed film director. However, a problem with Scott's schedule meant that he was replaced by Raymond Cusick, who was thus given the task of realising the Dalek creatures.
[edit] Alternative titles
During production the overall story went through a number of working titles such as The Survivors and Beyond the Sun, before settling down as The Mutants. This title was used in most BBC paperwork using titles for over a decade.
However in 1972 a later Doctor Who story called The Mutants was produced (with the same director). Some feel that referring to two stories by the same title is confusing. Others have argued that such occurrences of repeated names are by no means uncommon and that disambiguation is not hard.
Two titles emerged as alternatives. The Dead Planet emerged after the 1973 Radio Times 10th anniversary Doctor Who special referred to all the early stories by the title of their first episodes. The Dead Planet was used in many licensed guides and magazines up until 1980, when it was displaced by The Daleks, a title deriving from the story's book and film adaptations and with no basis in contemporary usage (indeed "The Daleks" is the onscreen title of the second episode of the second Dalek story). This title has largely stuck, and was used for the script book published by Titan Books in 1989 as well as the VHS and DVD releases in 1989, 2001 and 2006 and the 1992 reprinting of the novelisation. However some still use The Mutants, often disambiguating it by the use of the production code (B), as opposed to (NNN) for the 1972 story.
One compromise has been to not refer to the story by a title but to instead write "the first Dalek story" or "Serial B". See also Doctor Who story title controversy.
[edit] DVD and video release
Arguably the most famous of the 1960s Doctor Who serials, The Daleks was one of many sets of Doctor Who episodes slated for destruction by the BBC in the 1970s. However, in 1978, Ian Levine came across them at the BBC just hours before all remaining copies of the story were to be destroyed and managed to rescue them. This act preserved the historic serial, allowing it later to be released on video and DVD. It was released twice on VHS, first as a double video in 1989 (as CBS/Fox video 8253) and subsequently a remastered version in 2000. It was remastered again for inclusion in Doctor Who: The Beginning DVD boxed set released in 2006, together with An Unearthly Child and The Edge of Destruction.
[edit] External links
- The Daleks at bbc.co.uk
- The Daleks at Doctor Who: A Brief History Of Time (Travel)
- The Daleks at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
- The Daleks at Outpost Gallifrey
[edit] Reviews
- The Daleks reviews at Outpost Gallifrey
- The Daleks reviews at The Doctor Who Ratings Guide
[edit] Target novelisation
- Doctor Who in an exciting adventure with the Daleks reviews at Outpost Gallifrey
- Doctor Who in an exciting adventure with the Daleks reviews at The Doctor Who Ratings Guide
