Day 25 — January 25th 2021
Day of Reckoning and The End of Tomorrow
Day of Reckoning (The Dalek Invasion of Earth — Episode Three)
I think my favourite thing about this story is just how paranoid the Daleks are. We had the one yesterday desperately trying to reassure itself that the Daleks are, indeed, the ‘Masters of Earth’, and today we have the increasingly crazed orders of the Black Dalek;
Find every survivor. Destroy every one. Destroy them! Destroy every one of them! Destroy!
For some reason it just amuses me to have the Daleks in control of the planet and yet also a little bit worried about how strong their grip really is. I like to imagine they have a weekly meeting where they compare notes on the rebels in different parts of the country.
Which brings me to my next point; this story has some genuine scale to it, and I think it’s more expansive than any we’ve had before in the series (even moreso than The Keys of Marinus which created an entire varied world), but I don’t get the sense that the Daleks have taken over the Earth. It feels like they’ve taken over London and a little bit of Bedford. I guess it’s not practical to cut to lots of other countries — it’s a waste of space in the studio — but that’s what we’d get from modern Doctor Who. They pull that trick in Army of Ghosts and it helps give a slightly more global feel.
That’s just me moaning for the sake of it, thought, because I’ve really enjoyed today’s episode, and actually it does a really good job of building up the world of the Dalek invasion in London. There’s a brilliant bit here, which I’m not sure I’ve ever noticed before, where we hold the image on Susan and David while a death plays out unseen in the background;
Dalek: Stop! Stop! Stop!
Man: Why?
Dalek: Stop!
Man: Why? You killed my mother and my brothers!
Dalek: Stop!
Man: Get away from me! No!
The vignette ends with the sound of the man being exterminated and the Dalek moving away. It was probably done off-screen for practical reasons, not having to find a bit of set to use and all that, but it works really well. Despite everything I said above about loving the paranoid Daleks, there’s something powerful about the fact that this Dalek simply repeats the command ‘stop’. There’s no bargaining, no chat. I love that.
I also love the moment later in the episode where Baker says goodbye to David and Susan. They share they resources, he paints us a picture of his intention to escape London on his own and head to the coast. They say their farewells… and then he runs straight into the path of two Daleks and is killed. It’s really brutal, and you don’t often get to see the Daleks being as callous as this. It works so much in the episode’s favour, and makes the Daleks here feel like more of a threat than they were in their last story — or than they will be in many of their future ones.
On that same set, I really like the way the Dalek is framed in the archway. It’s a very beautiful serial (with all the rubble and decay!), and it proper suits the Daleks. I’ve never been as much of a fan of the movie version (although it was the very first piece of Doctor Who I ever saw, a solid 25 years ago I reckon), because I think the black and white really adds to the tone of it all. I’ve enjoyed the look of the serial so much that I’ve ordered a handful of Eaglemoss figurines of the Daleks and have visions of making little dioramas to play with.
There’s one death which doesn’t work for me, and that’s Dortman. It should be a really powerful moment, as he goes into the street on his own to face down a group of Daleks and test the latest version of his bomb. The decision is clearly influenced by events earlier in the episode where one of the rebels argues with him, pointing out that it’s all very well to send others into the firing line while he stays safe in the hideout.
Where it falls flat, though, is the bomb landing several feet away from the Daleks and going off a bit limply. I suppose it should add to the sense of the Daleks’ total domination (they really are the masters of Earth!), but it just looks a bit like they ran out of time to do another take with a better throw.
A proper solid episode, and one I’ve enjoyed even more than I expected. 8/10
The End of Tomorrow (The Dalek Invasion of Earth — Episode Four)
I always used to think that the big problem with The Dalek Invasion of Earth was that there’s no build up to Susan being stranded on Earth with David. But that’s nonsense! There’s lots of little moments between them peppered throughout both of today’s episodes. In Day of Reckoning Susan even invites David to come with her on the TARDIS;
Susan: ‘If only we could go to the ship and get away from here.’
David: ‘Well, I couldn’t go anyway.’
Susan: ‘Perhaps you could! I could ask Grandfather. I’m sure he’d let you come. We could go to a place that had never even heard of Daleks.’
Oddly, he then comments that he can’t just swan off to Venus with her, which felt odd because I’m not sure she’d told him that their ship can travel in time and space. Maybe it happened off-screen, but I’d have liked to see a scene like the one she shared with Ping-Cho, talking about seeing the stars and finding a home.
In this episode, David turns the tables on Susan, and we get the first suggestions that she may have found somewhere to settle down;
David: ‘One day this will be all over. It’ll mean a new start.’
Susan: ‘A new start? Rebuilding a planet from the very beginning. It’s a wonderful idea.’
David: ‘You could always help.’
Susan: ‘…Yes.’
There’s been a stronger thread of Susan wanting to settle down across the series than I’d ever realised before. She talks wistfully in Marco Polo of the day their travels come to an end, and a similar theme comes up in The Sensorites and The Reign of Terror, too. I’m giving these moments more weight than was intended looking at them in hindsight, but it means my worry that her departure is abrupt was unfounded.
She gets to spend today having an adventure with David in the sewers (what a romantic second date!), and I think it probably helps her storyline that William Hartnell had an injury so had to be written out of this episode last minute. It gives her and David a chance to breathe, although having checked it appears that Doctor Who didn’t get to do much more in the episode as originally written anyway!
Elsewhere, there’s still lots to enjoy in this episode. I complained that we’d not had much sense of the invasion as a global thing, but what we do get is some brilliantly drawn background to the invasion of London. I love the talk of there being people out there who’d still kill you if it made their lives easier, and the introduction of Ashton as a black marketeer who’s making a profit of his own off the back of the invasion is great.
I’m genuinely surprised we’ve not had more stories set during the Dalek Invasion. Ones without Doctor Who or his companions, just set in the world following the occupation. I reckon you could do a solid audio box set about a band of rebels fighting the Daleks, very much in the vein of Survivors. Come on, Big Finish, hit me up. I’ve already got four episodes planned out in my head.
Genuinely.
There’s more great location work today, and as much as I felt Dortman’s death was wasted, there’s something quite striking about seeing his body still laying in the street when Barbara and Jenny make their escape from the Transport Museum. When we reach the Dalek mining operation in Bedfordshire we get a great shot of slaves pulling a cart along a railroad track and it’s incredible. There’s loads of extras. It looks more like an expensive film than Doctor Who on the telly. Oh, and I love the Robomen standing atop the cart. That’s a brilliant image!
I’ve not found time to mention it anywhere yet, so I’ll do it here. I love Barbara absolutely and unconditionally, but her hair has gotten ridiculous by this point.
7/10
