The Dalek Invasion of Earth

World's End [Episode 1]

I always try to hide as much information as possible about each story before Hannah watches it, a strategy which has had very a mixed success rate so far. However, this time (as with the previous Dalek story) it's essential that the cliffhanger at the end of the first episode remains a surprise, so I've been particularly careful here. (The fact that the Daleks would have been plastered all over the current issue of the Radio Times at the time of transmission and spoiled the surprise for everyone watching in 1964 is neither here nor there.)

Hannah: You've succeeded this time; I have no idea what this is about, other than that it's going to be a sci-fi one.
Me: How do you know?
Hannah: I'm just assuming they're going to follow the same alternating pattern as last season.
Me: But we've just had a sci-fi one.
Hannah: Did we? It was on Earth!
Me: Well it wasn't a historical, was it? It was a sci-fi story set in the present day. And before that we were in the French Revolution.
Hannah: Oh, so now it should be... yeah, okay.

To be honest I'm not sure why I even bothered playing with her expectations like that, because the TARDIS immediately lands in what looks like a very run-down version of contemporary London. Fortunately Hannah doesn't take issue with this; she has far more important things on her mind.

Hannah: Why are the windows of the TARDIS open? They don't open!

It's not long before a bridge collapses on the TARDIS, putting an end to any thought of a quick departure.

Hannah: It's only some wood.
Me: And iron.
Hannah: Eh. The modern Doctor would remote-control it and fly it out.

By now it's obvious that London is deserted and that it's the far future, way beyond Ian and Barbara's time. I decide to push my luck.

Me: I like the historical ones.
Hannah: Is this a futuristic historical?
Me: What does that mean?
Hannah: It means that it's based on Earth but it's... it's future history. (laughing)
Me: Or as we call it, the future.
Hannah: Yes. But to the Doctor, it's history.

Whilst exploring an abandoned warehouse, the Doctor and Ian discover a 2164 calendar and a dead man with a large metal helmet. Hannah now has that knowing smirk she gets when she thinks she's ahead of the game, but for once I'm genuinely not sure what she's getting at. Then I suddenly realise what she's thinking.

Me: Do you have a suspicion?
Hannah: (laughing) Well, it's a weird metal contraption on somebody's head. But I know that's not what they look like in their first appearance, so it's not them.
Me: You can say "Cybermen" if you want.
Hannah: Yeah, but I know it's not. I know the original ones have got cloth faces.
Me: Maybe they haven't yet. It could happen later in this story.

She giggles at the incredibly fake-looking flying saucer, quite understandably.

Me: Problem?
Hannah: I like it! It's cute! It's a sink plug with a ruff.
Me: It's also something that would be shamed by a bad 1950s film.
Hannah: It's not too bad. So this is another science one, then?
Me: We're in the 22nd century! It's clearly not a historical.
Hannah: Yeah, but it's Earth.
Me: Sci-fi ones can be set on Earth.
Hannah: Are they not doing the same pattern?
Me: More or less, but it's not as consistent as last season. It's a bit more flexible this time.
Hannah: So the answer's no. It doesn't alternate.
Me: No, but close enough.

Barbara and Susan take refuge with a group of freedom fighters, led by the wheelchair-bound Dortmun.

Hannah: He reminds me of Russell Crowe. I don't know why.

If you want some idea of how much this revelation took me by surprise, take a look at the picture that accompanies his entry on Doctor Who Wiki. Go on, I'll wait.

While I'm reeling from this, it's time for Hannah to get a shock of her own. As the Doctor and Ian are surrounded by Robomen, a familiar shape slowly emerges from the Thames.

Hannah: Thomas.
Me: Yes, dear?
Hannah: That appears to be a Dalek.
Me: Oh yes, so it is.
Hannah: A submarine Dalek. They'll get their electronics all wet.
Me: They've mastered inter-planetary invasion. I shouldn't think waterproofing is that much of a issue for them.
Hannah: Also, they clearly don't work like dodgems anymore. They must have developed some other kind of power system.
Me: Maybe that'll be explained in the next episode.
Hannah: I'm very surprised that they've brought the Daleks back so soon. They've barely done anything in time and space, and then...
Me: This is the tenth story.
Hannah: Yes! Just the tenth story.
Me: They were a huge hit, especially in terms of merchandising, so the production team obviously aren't going to waste any time bringing them back. And it's already been a year since they last appeared, so they're not appearing any more frequently than they did in the David Tennant era.

The Daleks [Episode 2]

Hannah: I like futuristic dystopia-type things. They're my favourite stories to read, ever.
Me: This is essentially The War of the Worlds but with Daleks instead of Martians.
Hannah: I wish it wasn't Daleks.
Me: It could be any alien race doing this. Why does it matter that it happens to be Daleks?
Hannah: I'm just not ready for them again! It's a big exciting event and it feels like there's more pressure for me to like it, instead of wondering what kind of alien race that we'll never see again is going to turn up this time.
Me: What makes you think you're never going to see the Voord or the Sensorites again?

The Doctor surmises that these Daleks come from an earlier point in their history than the ones we saw last time.

Hannah: So Skaro was a million years in the future? They've only just... that doesn't make any sense.
Me: The Daleks were killed off at the end of their first story, so obviously these ones need to come from an earlier point in their timeline.
Hannah: But on Skaro they'd only recently mutated into that particular form and were planning to spread out across the planet.
Me: I think from what we find out later about the Dalek timeline, a million years is way off. It's more likely a couple of hundred.
Hannah: So they were still trying to colonise their own planet, but some special units had already gone off and colonised other planets? Last time they were stuck in their city and couldn't do anything.
Me: Yeah, Dalek chronology is tricky at the best of times.
Hannah: But can't they time travel too? Or is that later?
Me: That's later. The whole timeline is really awkward, especially when Davros eventually turns up and contradicts everything from the original story.

The underlying Nazi subtext is much more explicit than last time; not only are the Daleks talking about mass extermination and giving each other fascist salutes with their sink plungers, but apparently they've already wiped out all the non-white races on Earth by spreading a plague. Hannah, bless her, wonders if there might be a more innocent explanation.

Hannah: Perhaps it's because most of those people just happened to be living in the developing countries with the least effective medical care. Maybe they're not developing countries anymore in the 22nd century, but in 1964 those are the countries that might get wiped out by the plague more quickly because their healthcare isn't as good.
Me: I'm sure that's what they were driving at.
Hannah: Not "the only people who can possibly be our Dalek slaves must be white people." Also I'm sure the races are more mixed 200 years in the future, and national borders probably aren't the same anyway.

She's a little more cynical about Dortmun's bomb, though.

Hannah: Probably doesn't work.
Me: You're very pessimistic.
Hannah: I'm a realist. He hasn't tested it, has he? And you can't win the war in the first half of the story, or why would they make more story? It's all hinging on that bomb working one time. It's not going to work, is it?

The Daleks, meanwhile, are testing the Doctor and Ian to see if they're intelligent enough to become Robomen.

Hannah: I thought they just took everybody and robotised them. Or are they looking for a Robo-Controller? Like a Cyber-Controller?
Me: My girlfriend is making Cyberman jokes. Life is good.
Hannah: Cybermen don't exist yet.

Day of Reckoning [Episode 3]

It's taken until this episode for Hannah to notice a quirk of early Dalek weaponry; rather than shooting out a visible beam when the gun is fired, a small flange emerges from the gunstick in a rapid in-and-out motion.

Hannah: What's that doing? It's supposed to shoot lasers, and it's shooting starfish puke.
Me: Don't you remember that from the first story?
Hannah: No! That thing that goes in and out of it...
Me: Yes, that happens, and then the victim is surrounded in light and the screen goes negative.
Hannah: I know the screen goes negative, but I thought they had little laser blasts.
Me: Not until the mid-seventies.
Hannah: I must have added the blasts in my mind. I don't remember that thing coming out the end of it, like a little pokey tongue.

She loves seeing Ian in his hiding place, mostly because it looks like he's in a giant cat travel box, but she finds it odd that the resistance movement has chosen the Civic Transport Museum as a rendezvous point. Not least because Dortmun's wheelchair doesn't seem up to making the journey.

Hannah: Why the Civic Transport Museum?
Me: Why not?
Hannah: Is this story sponsored by the London Buses? And why is there no disabled access on the Thames Embankment? That's very bad.
Me: Maybe it got destroyed, like Battersea Power Station.
Hannah: Just the ramp? Just the ramp up the steps, which the Daleks would need? Or maybe the freedom fighters blew it up to stop the Daleks getting around.
Me: That's probably it.

Their journey is intercut with striking images of the Daleks strutting around various deserted London landmarks.

Hannah: Weird that there's no sound in the outdoor scenes.
Me: You know what's even weirder? Daleks on Westminster Bridge.
Hannah: They filmed on the actual bridge, didn't they? That's actual outdoors. You can tell because there's actually some sense of distance.
Me: Yes. They had to film it early on a summer morning because it was the only way they could get an abandoned London landmark in daylight before it started getting busy.

Other landmarks include the Houses of Parliament, Whitehall, Trafalgar Square and the Albert Memorial.

Me: This is one of the stories with the most iconic imagery. First the Dalek rising from the Thames, and now all these shots of them in London.
Hannah: Is that outside Buckingham Palace? I'm trying to remember where the Albert Memorial is. Does the script give any details of where they actually go?
Me: I haven't read the script, but I know something else that might tell us...

The special features on the classic Doctor Who DVDs are amazingly comprehensive. As well as the various documentaries, commentaries on every story and archive footage from contemporary TV shows, each episode also comes with production subtitles that provide the viewer with as much behind-the-scenes information as anyone could possibly want.

The production subtitles give us a handy guide to the locations in this sequence, and we discover that this is indeed Kensington Gardens and Buckingham Palace. We also learn that buses can be seen running in the background, that the production team's first task at 6AM was to evict the vagrants from Trafalgar Square who had slept there overnight, and that the Dalek operators were forced to answer the call of nature by relieving themselves into a Trafalgar Square grating. Best of all, though, is the revelation that the Daleks frightened a group of drunken party-goers who were returning home via the square.

Hannah: It's distracting me from the story, but in a good way. This is exactly the kind of thing I like to read! The information about how they actually do things. I like the behind-the-scenes stuff so much. Oh yeah, look, there's people walking in the background. I suppose they could have been Robomen.

In fact the subtitles are far too interesting, and eventually I have to turn them off so that we can turn our attention back to the story.

Hannah: Yes, it's much more believably told than some other stories. I like it.
Me: How?
Hannah: The actors are better.
Me: I like the sense of scale. It's not just confined to a few locations, they're going all over the country. You get the sense that the Daleks have taken over the whole world, not just the home counties.
Hannah: Is it all the running around? There's running down corridors and alleyways and entire boulevards. Tennant can do one.
Me: I thought you liked Tennant.
Hannah: I do, but I always think of him as the most "running through corridors" one. He's always running away from things and crying about it.

The End of Tomorrow [Episode 4]

The highlight of this episode comes when Barbara drives a truck into a patrol of Daleks.

Hannah: It wasn't as dramatic as it should have been because they didn't want to destroy all the models.
Me: Fair enough, they only seem to have about four of them.
Hannah: They just took it apart slightly for the shot. All the little ring bits just fell off.

It turns out that alligators are living in the sewers between London and Bedfordshire, thriving down there after they escaped from the local zoos.

Hannah: Bollocks. Reptiles would not thrive down there, they need external heat because they're cold-blooded. They'd have to be able to bask in the sun, or they'd die. They need to have somewhere they can get out and stay warm, London's not warm enough for most species.

When one of the alligators threatens Susan, Hannah's reaction is probably not what the production team were aiming for.

Hannah: Awwww! It's a baby one! It's only a baby, it's been filmed to look big. Babies usually have stripes.

The Waking Ally [Episode 5]

Me: This is our 50th episode, by the way.
Hannah: (yawning) Is it. Congratulations.
Me: Well, it's a modest achievement, isn't it?
Hannah: No. I don't think of it as that.
Me: Nor do I really, but it's still pretty good progress. And by the end of season two, we'll be around 10% of the way through it.
Hannah: That's the kind of thing I'm more interested in.

Ian encounters the Slyther, and it's much less endearing than a baby alligator.

Hannah: It's really slow. That's the slowest monster I've ever seen.
Me: That's probably why they call it the Slyther.
Hannah: (laughing) It's so pathetic!
Me: It does seem a bit odd for the commanding Dalek to have a pet.
Hannah: Yes, they're not supposed to have sentiment. Also, if the Slyther can be killed by a rock, why hasn't anybody killed it yet?
Me: Everyone's stuck toiling in the mines.
Hannah: Exactly. They've got rocks. The Slyther was absolute rubbish, it didn't do anything. It was a bit slow and all it did was chase them until it got killed with a piece of stone, which anyone could have done at any point.

Susan is cooking a fish with David, one of the freedom fighters, but they end up getting a bit frisky.

Hannah: Fishy rough and tumble? Eww.
Me: Nah, just floundering around.

Hannah begins to say something that sounds suspiciously like "having a fin-dle" but is mercifully cut short with an "ooooh!" when Susan and David begin kissing.

Meanwhile, the Daleks' plan is revealed...

Hannah: They want to hollow out the planet's core? And use it as a big spaceship or something?
Me: Yep, for some reason they want to turn Earth into a spaceship and fly it around. Very slowly, I imagine.
Hannah: Why Earth? There are other planets...
Me: Apparently it's the only one with a magnetic core.
Hannah: Well that's bollocks, considering there are other planets with magnetic cores in this solar system.

They've already dug down to the core and are planning to hollow it out by dropping a penetration explosive down the mine shaft. Guess where Ian happens to be hiding?

Hannah: Who has the bad luck of accidentally hiding inside a bomb?

Flashpoint [Episode 6]

With nothing to lose, Ian does his best to sabotage the explosive.

Hannah: He doesn't know what any of the wires do, he's just pulling random bits out and short-circuiting them. He can't read Dalek.
Me: Didn't you see the Daleks' diagram? They write everything in English anyway!

The Daleks are inexplicably prancing round in circles as they discuss their plans.

Hannah: Ah, they're just dancing around! You could re-dub it with some kind of dance music.

This idea sounds too promising to resist. I turn down the volume, then search for a recording of "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy" and play it over the scene. It syncs up amazingly well and works better than I could have ever hoped, with the dance movements changing perfectly in time with the music.

Hannah: Beautiful.

The TARDIS crew are finally reunited and stop the Daleks, but the bomb has already been activated and is wedged a short distance down the mine shaft. Fortunately everyone is able to clear the area before detonation.

Hannah: If that bomb is big enough to liquidise the earth's core, and it's gone off so close to the surface... they should all just die. How can they have gotten away far enough in ten minutes? They should all be dead. Everyone who was down there should just be dead. It makes no sense.

The mass landscape destruction shown in the stock footage doesn't help, either.

Hannah: (laughing) It's going to send up a mushroom cloud! They should be dead! Are they not going to have a volcanic winter or something?

Before our heroes re-board the TARDIS, there's an exchange between the Doctor and Susan. He takes her shoe away to repair and appears to have a small epiphany before he goes back to the ship, telling her that she needs taking in hand.

Hannah: Weird.

She doesn't realise where this is leading yet.

Hannah: He doesn't want her to grow up.

The Doctor, knowing Susan would never leave him but also realising that she wants to stay with David, locks his granddaughter out of the TARDIS as soon as Ian and Barbara are aboard and delivers a heartfelt goodbye speech. It's an incredibly moving scene, and Hannah doesn't say another word until the credits start rolling.

Hannah: Wow. Lots of important things happening. First time a companion leaves... and it's his own granddaughter. Didn't really give her a choice.
Me: No. And he took her shoe with him.
Hannah: Yeah! And he didn't let her say goodbye to Barbara and Ian, or let them say goodbye to her.
Me: Good though, wasn't it?
Hannah: Didn't let her unpack her stuff, taking her clothes and belongings... and he says one day he'll come back, in the hope that he might eventually learn how to fly the TARDIS.
Me: I think it would have spoiled the scene a bit if he'd let her come in and raid the wardrobe.
Hannah: I know. It was a good speech. It reminds me of the more modern stuff where it's all emotional and serious. For some reason it felt more serious than watching people die.
Me: Did you think she'd be the first to go?
Hannah: No. Not when it's blood. I didn't really think she'd leave, I thought they'd take David with them for a bit. I knew she'd obviously go at some point, but I thought they'd move on and get some other travelling companions first, and finally find a way to get Ian and Barbara home. It's not going to be the same.
Me: Are you going to miss her?
Hannah: Yeah. I hate her and now I like her. She's annoying and weak and silly, but at the same time they need her. She's part of the dynamic.

The Score

Hannah: An amazing story, mostly well performed and done. There's lots of bits and pieces you'd expect in a post-apocalyptic kind of society, like the two old women in the hut, the slave groups, and the man who has a contact that can get you in and out of places for a fee. I liked the way it's been filmed; it's very beautiful and there's lots of proper outdoors, running up and down through London.
Me: There's definitely a sense of scope here that we don't see very often.
Hannah: There's a few things that annoy me that stop it being a 10, like the fights that are supposedly being choreographed, but the ending was very nice. It was a bit of a surprise. I'm sad; it's so touching because it feels like he's never actually going to see her again, because he doesn't know how to fly the ship. He doesn't know if he can ever come back.

9/10