The Ambush (The Daleks Episode 4)

The one where the Daleks make their first killing...

We sadly don't see any more of what was found inside that Dalek machine last week, and so the horrors our imagination has been dreaming up must stay in our minds. It's this kind of psychological torture that children must have been affected by, and loved! It's one way in which the weekly cliffhanger serial format works so well, planting ideas and images into the brain and letting the imagination run riot for a whole seven days.

Ian gets to ride around inside a Dalek, and many viewers were probably quite envious. Proceedings are tense as the quartet try to affect their escape by stealth, attempting to bluff a sentry Dalek guarding the lift. We learn that there is such a thing as a Dalek Council (I wonder how often they empty the bins?), and that Daleks have a rather flashy line in control panels and buttons. Following on from her strong show in The Escape, Susan is the one who takes the initiative to prevent them being rumbled by feigning an hysterical fit. It comes to her so easily too...

These early scenes in which they try to get past the jobsworth sentry Dalek are tense, but it has to be said that Tristram Cary over-eggs the music somewhat, as the score rises to an almost deafening cacophony which doesn't quite match the level of danger our heroes are in (yet!). Soon, the sentry Dalek realises his goof and raises the alarm, and two more Daleks glide in to help him from just off camera! It's so obvious that they were there all along!

The Daleks begin cutting their way through the door, and they look fabulous and much more threatening and surreal on film. The Doctor, Susan and Barbara opt to leave Ian trapped in his Dalek casing, to all intents and purposes leaving him to his death. Barbara is reluctant to leave Ian, but it is Susan who flicks the hysterical switch again in her protestations.

Once safe, the trio send the lift back down to collect Ian, who they hope has now escaped the casing. "It's so slow, it'll never reach him in time," she frets. She should try waiting for a lift at the Travelodge in Cardiff city centre, then she'd know what slow meant! Once Ian narrowly makes it back, straight away there's an embrace for Barbara!

The first 10 minutes of The Ambush have more action in them than the preceding three episodes, and the shenanigans with the lift - Daleks chasing humans, humans hurling rocks at Daleks - have the vertical jeopardy so beloved of Russell T Davies (think the lift shaft in New Earth, racing upstairs in Tooth and Claw, or the window cleaners' cradle in Partners in Crime). It's all very Flash Gordon.

As the Thals arrive at the city, we're treated to another ideological discussion between leader Temmosus and deputy Alydon. Temmosus is banking on the Daleks being honest, and is actually risking the entire Thal race in his optimism. "Perhaps [the Daleks'] offer was coldly worded but friendship grows with time," he says. "These Daleks must have believed they were the only survivors on this planet." But Alydon shows wise caution: "And now they're relieved to find they aren't? Or are they shocked and horrified, perhaps insanely jealous?" Not jealous. Just insane.

The Daleks' ambush of the Thals is well-staged and tense. It's clear that Christopher Barry is back in charge, showing flair compared to the workmanlike Richard Martin (who directs episodes 3, 6 and 7).

As the Thals approach the entrance hall, the Daleks back into the shadows (actually, they seem to do that twice!) to impassively regard their victims from the gloom. An impressive array of fruit and vegetables have been left for the Thals to collect, and am I right in thinking the Daleks have also left the Thals some toilet rolls?

The massacre is impressively staged. Temmosus gives his speech for peace, watched from the darkness by Daleks eager to exterminate, their gunsticks twitching like excited children. And then the killing starts, and Barry makes it look like there are Daleks everywhere, flooding the hall and corridors, herding the Thals away. Temmosus becomes the first person to be killed by a Dalek on screen, meaning Alan Wheatley - who was a pretty well-known actor at the time through his role as the Sheriff of Nottingham in the 1950s ITC series The Adventures of Robin Hood - never gets to meet the TARDIS crew. There's also some impressive extermination effects here, when the Dalek gunfire misses Ian but appears to melt the wall. That must have been a very tricky effect to perfect back in 1964!

Back in the forest the Doctor tops up on local knowledge using the Thals' history records (I wonder if those videotapes we glimpse are copies of now long-junked BBC shows?) while Alydon and Ian discuss what to make of the Daleks. Ian sums them up perfectly when he says they have a "dislike for the unlike". They are racists and fascists by any other name, but still the Thals won't fight them. Instead, they'll run away. This frustrates Ian and Barbara, who asks: "Can pacifism become a human instinct?" Writer Terry Nation gives Ian the perfect rejoinder: "Pacifism, is that it? Pacifism only works when everybody feels the same."

The Doctor brings over some of the Thal history plaques, and we see that the Thals' ancestors were warriors, not unlike Norman soldiers. Sadly we don't get to see what the Dals looked like, although Ian's face suggests they weren't pleasant. But surely, pre-neutron war, both the Thals and the Dals were perfectly humanoid? We have no reason to believe the Dals were unlike the Thals, do we? Whatever, the use of the word Dal here directly contradicts what we later learn about the Kaled race. Surely Dal seems much more realistic, seeing as the word Kaled has less etymological resonance with Thal?

The way the story is structured suggests this is the end of the adventure. It's the end of part 4 (the last serial was in four parts) and everyone is essentially safe as the Daleks cannot leave their city. Ian wonders if they should try and convince the Thals to stick up for themselves and gain the Daleks' respect, but the Doctor's back to his old self-centred tricks: "Our fate doesn't rest with the Thals. Let's leave well alone. We have ourselves to worry about."

Those words will take on a new meaning next week, when the TARDIS crew realises they cannot leave, as the Daleks have the fluid link. "It's down there somewhere... in the city!"

First broadcast: January 11th, 1964

Steve's Scoreboard
The Good: The ambush itself is very well staged, and the Daleks really come across as a formidable force.
The Bad: There's not much wrong with this episode, to be fair. It's action-packed (by 1964 standards) and has plenty of peril and excitement.
Overall score for episode: ★★★★★★★★★☆

NEXT TIME: The Expedition...

My reviews of this story's other episodes: The Dead Planet (episode 1); The Survivors (episode 2); The Escape (episode 3); The Expedition (episode 5); The Ordeal (episode 6); The Rescue (episode 7)

Find out birth/death dates, career information, and facts and trivia about this story's cast and crew at the Doctor Who Cast & Crew site: http://doctorwhocastandcrew.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/the-daleks-aka-dead-planet-mutants.html

The Daleks is available as part of the Doctor Who - The Beginning box set. Find it on Amazon - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-Beginning-Unearthly-Destruction/dp/B000C6EMTC