The Randomizer: Dalek

[purplecat]

In retrospect, I don't think I really appreciated or understood what season 1 of NuWho was trying to do. I recall thinking that the stories all seemed very simple, but on rewatching there is a lot more going on - its just not the sort of thing Doctor Who has attempted much either before or, to be brutally honest, since.

You actually don't get a lot simpler than the plot of Dalek which is, mostly, a chase sequence and not a chase that involves a great many events. However the story isn't really about the chase, or even about making Daleks scary again (which I vaguely recall being a part of the publicity at the time). The story is very much about highlighting the Doctor's emotional state, the dark place he has reached, and Rose's capacity to redeem him.

The Doctor's initial reaction to the Dalek, particularly once he realises that it can not escape is shocking, and I'm surprised that I have no memory of this at the time. The Doctor gloats, and is deliberately cruel to a defeated enemy something I don't think* we've ever seen before. Its an excellent scene, tightly directed, which very clearly sets out the Doctor's state of mind. The parallels between the Doctor and the Dalek, including the way Rose redeems both of them, then continue to be carefully drawn, with the acting and direction remaining focused on the characters. It is all, really, very good indeed.

The secondary story, of the Dalek escaping its confinement is also very well done. I think it has become tempting to say that a lone Dalek is naturally more scary than an army of Daleks and that Who has got trapped into some kind of "and yet more Daleks" arms race. But I suspect it is more accurate to observe that you can tell a story which is essentially a chamber piece (for all the scores of expendable soldiers and scientists) with a single Dalek while any story featuring an army of the things is necessarily an epic of some kind. Chamber pieces let you tell tightly focused stories which, when done well, are often more memorable and gripping than sprawling epics. I don't honestly see why Doctor Who couldn't do another lone Dalek story, so long as the forces ranged against it were underpowered enough, its just that it hasn't, so far, chosen to do so.

*In 50 years of the show I'm sure it's happened some time, but never, I suspect, quite so deliberately.


To be honest, I don't have a great deal to say about Dalek. It is very good indeed but others have noted that before me. I'm surprised that The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances beat it to the Hugo, though maybe I'll revise that opinion when I rewatch the latter. The only real revelation is the feeling that I very much under-appreciated this season of Doctor Who the first time around.

Comments

More than just the capacity to redeem

[ed_rex]

I keep coming across, and enjoying, your randomized Who reviews, to the point that I've decided to add you to my Dreamwidth reading list; it probably doesn't need saying, but you're under no obligation to return the favour.

Anyway, Dalek really was a quietly brilliant episode from the first series of the revived Doctor Who. Something that you touched on, but that I found central, was its part in Rose's growth arc, from lost girl, to acolyte, to hero in her own right.

You said she "redeems" the Doctor, but I think it's noteworthy that she did so by challenging him, when she had every reason to shut up and let him do as he would. It occurred to me as I was typing, that Rose's compassion is one of the few pop-culture examples I know where it (compassion) is depicted as a real strength. And not in the semi-mystical way that say, Deanna Troi's empathic abilities were in Star Trek: The Next Generation, but simply as a complex character trait, that was a moral plus, even if it sometimes backfired.

Re: More than just the capacity to redeem

[purplecat]

That's a very good point about Rose's compassion. It's her compassion that makes her touch the Dalek and bring it to life, but the story validates the fact that she did so and doesn't suggest she should regret the action even given the consequences. It's odd, in a way, that Gwen fills this role so much less successfully (in my opinion) in Torchwood since a lot of the publicity for that show suggested she was supposed to be a humanising influence on the team.

I've read several of your reviews too. I don't always agree, or at least, I often agree with your points but find I've enjoyed a story you dislike anyway. Friending back.

Re: More than just the capacity to redeem

[ed_rex]

I've read several of your reviews too.

I saw, after I'd done the friending thing, that you've linked to at least one of my rants reviews in the past. I suppose I ought to have remembered, but I'll claim extreme business (which is mostly the truth).

It's odd, in a way, that Gwen fills this role so much less successfully (in my opinion) in Torchwood since a lot of the publicity for that show suggested she was supposed to be a humanising influence on the team.

I don't think I've thought of Gwen that way before, but it makes sense now you say it. I can certainly see that she was meant to be the viewer's "in" to Torchwood, like a Who companion. And I suppose it also makes sense to me that her characterization was less successful because Torchwood itself was so much less successful a program (Children of Earth excepted), in the sense that it never seemed to quite know what it was supposed to be from one episode to the next.

Anyway, thanks for the return; I'm looking forward to see your posts — Who-related and otherwise — on a regular basis.

[reggietate.livejournal.com]

I loved Dalek. I certainly never expected any episode of Who to make me cry for one, but this did. It was an absolute gem.

[purplecat]

I do think I thought it was good at the time, but I think I was just grumpy in some what that NuWho was not what I had expected. I thought it was truly excellent this time around and it also made me think that NuWho has moved back towards something much more like old Who which is, perhaps, a shame. Much as it may make us old skool fans feel more comfortable.

[jane-somebody.livejournal.com]

"I think I was just grumpy in some what that NuWho was not what I had expected."

What were you expecting NuWho to be and how did it differ from that expectation?

[purplecat]

That's an interesting question and I'm not sure I have a very clear answer.

I was certainly expecting plots to involve more investigating things, discovering things, with A plots and B plots and the supporting characters' various agendas interfering with each other as well as the Doctor's own actions putting spanners of various sorts in the works. Old Who often used multiple factions as part of its plot structure where NuWho tended to pare the supporting cast down to the bare minimum often with the effect of simplifying the external situation in which the Doctor found himself. As a result NuWho tended to serve up fairly simple stories of the form Doctor Arrives->threat is revealed->threat is defeated with comparatively little else going on at that level beyond a certain amount of running around.

Instead, the complexity in these episodes is coming from what is happening inside the characters heads while the arrive->threat revealed->thread defeated steps are going on and I think I was missing a lot of that since I wasn't expecting it.