Planet of the Daleks Episode Four

The one where a Dalek chases the Doctor up a ventilation shaft...

The Daleks may not be able to construct their own hot air balloon, but they can follow our floating Thal pals up the ventilation shaft on one of their anti-gravitational discs! How cool is that? The disc itself is literally a black disc, and nothing like the hoverbouts which have populated Doctor Who spin-off fiction since they first appeared in the Cadet cigarette sweets stories of 1964. In fact, it's a real shame the hoverbouts (sometimes called transolar discs) never appeared in the classic TV series properly, only ever in comics, novels and audio stories.

In a nice nod to the scene in The Ambush where the Doctor and friends bung a heavy object down the lift shaft to stop the approaching Dalek, the Doctor and the Thals chuck a load of rocks down the ventilation shaft and send the anti-gravitational Dalek crashing back down to the bottom. All very satisfying!

While all that's happening, Jo follows the Daleks out of the city to where the Thals have hidden their bombs, but the scene is a little bit silly because every time the Daleks need to do anything practical or fiddly (like uncover the bombs, or change their timer settings), director David Maloney has to cut away to Jo watching from behind a bush! Finally, the Daleks leave the bombs in-situ to blow up, so Jo naturally tries to change the timers again to prevent the explosions. However, a sudden rockfall puts paid to that, and she's clonked on the head by a huge boulder, which really should have killed her! It's a little embarrassing to watch Katy Manning "do an Adric" as well, anticipating the rock falling on her head before it does. And when she comes round, there's not a single drop of blood!

Nine minutes in to the episode the Doctor is finally reunited with Jo for the first time since she left the TARDIS in episode 1, but I have to say that judging by the jolly way he spent his gravity-defying journey up the ventilation shaft, he's not missed her much. He jokes with Rebec about how exhilarating he's finding it all, and how he might well take up hot air ballooning. I'm sorry Doctor, but your best friend is DEAD (or so you think). Have some respect for the girl you got killed! But of course, Jo isn't dead and they are reunited, Jo showing a little more emotion than the somewhat bemused Doctor.

We then spend some time exploring the relationship between Taron and Rebec, and it seems the two are lovers. Rebec wanted to be a part of Commander Mira's expedition with Taron, but was prevented by Taron, so instead she took the second flight to Spiridon as part of the Thal warning party. Taron isn't happy however, claiming that her presence will now cloud his judgement when he makes decisions. Sadly, after showing promise that Rebec has a bit of chutzpah, Terry Nation scuppers it all by having her made out to be the "foolish female" who just didn't think things through properly. Taron tells her off for jeopardising the expedition with her very presence. "I didn't understand," Rebec concedes, as Taron says that her being there could mean the Daleks win. What an utter bastard he is!

The Thals are generally quite a dysfunctional bunch, as we find when they rest on the Plain of Stones and Vaber's temper rises against his leader again. Vaber insists that Taron deliberates too much and never acts, and when he suggests Rebec's presence as "hanging around our necks", Taron flips and the two start brawling. These are not the pacifist Thals of The Daleks, although it's interesting that Nation has them come to blows over a woman once again, which was also the case in The Expedition when Ian goaded Alydon. And when Taron vows that he won't hesitate to kill Vaber if he disobeys his orders, it doesn't sit right with what we know of the Thal philosophy.

Latep seems to have made a beeline for Jo, and I roared with laughter at the scene where he offers to help her retrieve the bombs she's hidden. "They're here," she says, and they're literally inches away from where they stand! This always reminds me of one of my favourite scenes in the sitcom Only Fools and Horses, when Rodney meets Cassandra and offers to walk her to her car. They walk four steps and she smiles: "Here we are!"

There's another missed opportunity on Nation's part when the Doctor suggests to Jo that she offer Rebec "a female shoulder to cry on", but then we don't get to sit in on that conversation at all. It would have been nice for Nation to give the only two women in the story a scene together. Although it wouldn't have passed the Bechdel Test, it would have been a real departure for Nation as a writer. Instead we follow the Doctor to moody Taron, and Jon Pertwee gets another chance to moralise at someone. "The load getting a little heavy?" Oh, piss off Doctor!

The Daleks have made headway with their bacteriological culture, which will wipe out all non-immunised living matter within one Spiridon day. The bacteria looks like scrambled egg and spinach. Presumably the Daleks are going to use this bacteria to destroy all life on the planets they choose to conquer, but I'm still not sure whether they plan to do this invisibly, or whether they've completely forgotten all about those experiments. The Doctor suggests that the events of Frontier in Space were "only a part" of their plans for intergalactic domination.

By the episode's end, Vaber has made off with the bombs to presumably try and blow up the Dalek refrigeration chamber himself, and those left on the Plain of Stones notice that they are being watched by myriad animal eyes from the darkness, like a gang of Boks just outside the circle. Vaber is taken prisoner by the Spiridons, and the final shot is a zoom in on a purple throw, which says: "Take him to the Daleks!"

First broadcast: April 28th, 1973

Steve's Scoreboard
The Good: The race to get to the top of the shaft before the balloon breaks and the Dalek catches up is tense and well-executed.
The Bad: Terry Nation continues to write poorly for women. Taron's castigation of Rebec wreaks of misogyny, and the fact we're deprived of a nice scene between Jo and Rebec is really disappointing.
Overall score for episode: ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

"Now listen to me" tally: 25
Neck-rub tally: 13

NEXT TIME: Episode Five...

My reviews of this story's other episodes: Episode One; Episode Two; Episode Three; Episode Five; Episode Six

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.com/2014/05/planet-of-daleks.html

Planet of the Daleks is available on BBC DVD as part of the Dalek War box set. Find it on Amazon - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-Frontier-Planet-Daleks/dp/B002KSA3T8