Doctor Who/Recap/S1/E02 The Daleks: Difference between revisions

The Daleks are entirely dependent on static electricity drawn through the metal floors of the city, and when the power is turned off and the Daleks fall lifeless, one is heard to intone "This is the end of the Daleks...".

 

 

 

NB This story is also referred to as "The Mutants".

 

== Tropes ==

* [[All There in the Manual]]: [http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/classic/episodeguide/dalekhistory1.shtml According to the BBC Classic Doctor Who website], the Daleks encountered in this story are early prototypes of Darvos' experiments, left behind when most of the Daleks went into space after the end of the Thal-Kaled War. This explains both why the Daleks have a mighty space empire later while the Daleks in this episode are confined to the city {{spoiler|and are all wiped out}}, and why later Daleks don't have the same weaknesses of needing high levels of radiation to survive and constant static electrcity to power their shells.

* [[Beauty Equals Goodness]]: The Thals, all of whom are blonde and nearly physically perfect. Not that they don't have flaws, a few of which prove fatal. But they're nearly all good characters, while the hideous Daleks are all evil.

* [[Breakout Character]]: And thus Dalekmania had begun.

* [[Characterization Marches On]]: Next to ''nothing'' about the Daleks in this serial carries over into future ones.

** Here the Daleks are technocratic scientists, barely holding onto a hysterical sanity, locked up in suits of armour that barely preserve their lives on a hostile world.

* [[Double Entendre]]: [[Lampshade Hanging|This has a lampshade placed on top of it]].

'''Another Thal''': Now there's a double meaning for you. }}

* [[Dressing as the Enemy]]: Ian at one point climbs into an immobilized Dalek.

** [[Fridge Horror|Fridge]] [[Squick]]: It must be ''really'' gross in there.

* [[For Want of a Nail]]: The Doctor intentionally sabotaged the fluid links of the TARDIS in order to strand them there, after his companions denied him the chance to satiate his curiousity about the Dalek City, claiming that they would now have to go there in order to find replacements (unaware that he actually HAD seriously damaged the TARDIS and the need for repairs was genuine). If he hadn't been impulsive, he may never have encountered the Daleks, starting the [[Timey-Wimey Ball]] rolling that lead to the Daleks manipulating their own timeline and beginning a campaign of terror, the Timelords attempting to intervene, "Genesis of the Daleks", and ultimately, the Time War itself.

* [[Hilarious in Hindsight]]: The Daleks don't know what the TARDIS is, and when the Doctor mentions it, assume he's delirious. For future Daleks, the word TARDIS, especially one shaped like a blue box, is [[High Octane Nightmare Fuel]].

* [[Mutants]]: Everyone on Skaro is a mutant, from the Daleks to the Thals, to the surviving animal life.

* [[Let's Split Up, Gang!]]:

Barbara goes down one corridor, Ian another and the Doctor and Susan take the third. Less than five minutes later the angriest pepperpots in the entire history of time and space make their television debut. }}

* [[No Except Yes]]:

'''Dalek:''' No. Extermination. }}

* [[Nothing Is Scarier]]: When they crack open a Dalek, Ian appears visibly horrified at what he sees inside, and tells the two girls to wait in the hallway so they don't see. The audience also never sees what's inside either, except for a single claw later struggling from underneath a cloak. Of course, the audience does eventually see the creature inside a Dalek in later episodes. Although, given that this is a different offshoot, whats inside ''these'' particular Daleks might appear totally different...

 

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