Genesis of the Daleks Part One

The one where the Doctor is tasked with trying to alter the course of Dalek history...

From the opening moments of this episode, you can tell you're in for something quite gritty. A gas-masked face emerges full screen amid the swirling fog, but just as we start to establish the assumption that we're somewhere among the trenches of the Great War, the masked men are mercilessly gunned down - in slow motion! The horrors of war are rammed home as these unidentified soldiers are cut down in cold blood before we've even got to know them. The slow motion effect accentuates the horror, giving it as nightmarish quality.

And then out of the fog emerges another shape, this time the familiar outline of the Doctor. He's met by a mysterious man who identifies himself as a Time Lord, one of the Doctor's own race, dressed in some rather ostentatious black robes with a bat-winged collar not unlike the ceremonial collars we see make their debut in The Deadly Assassin (it's also uncannily like the black cape worn by the Master in the Death Zone in The Five Doctors).

The Time Lords have intercepted the Doctor's transmat between Earth and Nerva in order to send him on a mission to basically mess up the history of the planet Skaro. The Time Lords foresee a time when the Daleks will become the dominant species in the universe, so to prevent this happening, they want the Doctor - as their undercover agent - to alter the course of their development so this does not come about. And the Doctor seems pretty OK with this, despite that old chestnut of not being able to rewrite history ("Not one line!"). And instead of giving the Doctor his TARDIS, which would have been a much better plan, the Time Lord hands him a cheap looking Time Ring to put on his wrist. A Time Ring which looks very easy to lose...!

Reunited with Sarah and Harry, all the Doctor tells them by way of explanation is that they are on Skaro. That's it. It's something which probably means absolutely nothing to either of them (Sarah certainly doesn't appear to recognise the planet), but it's surprising that neither of them question what's going on and why they are there and not back on Nerva. It's one of those cases where, because the viewer knows why they are there, it doesn't need to be explained to the actual characters, which is a bit poor. Sarah and Harry just happily accept the change, don't question it, and get on with being bombed.

The "creeping barrage" of explosions is startlingly close to the actors, and suitably impressive. Director David Maloney manages to make Betchworth Quarry look alien and desolate, the swirling fog adding a lot of atmosphere, and the barren landscape is dressed well with barbed wire and debris by designer David Spode. It's a very convincing war zone, not least when the Doctor accidentally treads on a mine. It's a nice switch that it's the Doctor who treads on the mine, and not a "silly" companion, and Harry is tremendously brave in trying to free his friend. If the bomb were to go off, Harry would get the blast face first!

Maloney generates a creeping atmosphere of danger and dread in this episode, and the proliferation of explosives, gas attacks, fisticuffs and rapid machine gunfire makes this very violent and potently real. The sight of Sarah, abandoned outside the bunker after the semi-conscious Doctor and Harry are taken within, clambering over corpses strewn around her like a carpet of death is sobering. The cosy UNIT years are long, long gone...

The Doctor and Harry are questioned by General Ravon, played with relish by Guy Siner, who goes all out to portray this man as a fanatic of his cause. "I enjoy interrogation," he sneers, to which the Doctor replies: "Yes, you look the type", only to be clubbed down by the butt of a rifle. Ravon is a Kaled (ooh, what a wonderfully contrived anagram!) and dresses like a Nazi officer, all in black with jackboots and Hitler salutes. Ravon is waging a war with the Thals (back for a third time), but provisions are thin on the ground, so prisoners such as the Doctor and Harry have to be hanged rather than shot, to conserve ammunition.

The Doctor manages to overpower Ravon by rapping his knuckles with a cane, which doesn't say much for the General's resolve. Our heroes insist on being led back to the surface to search for Sarah, but on the way (along some gloomy corridors lit moodily by Duncan Brown) they bump into Security Commander Nyder, played by the fantastic Peter Miles. This is the third and final Doctor Who role for Miles, after impressing as the frustrated Dr Lawrence in Doctor Who and the Silurians, and failing to impress as Professor Whitaker in Invasion of the Dinosaurs. But Nyder is undoubtedly his defining part, and he looks every inch the dispassionate villain, nastiness almost radiating from him. His presence in a scene is almost hypnotic.

He's also given some cracking lines by writer Terry Nation, such as when Ravon wonders what the Doctor and Harry are if they're not Thals or Mutos. "We'll find out what's different about them... by autopsy." Miles leaves just the right pause there to turn what is a good line into a great line. Miles is simply stunning in the role, perfectly cast as a stone cold bad guy. He dominates his scene with Tom Baker (no easy feat) through his stillness, his emotionless stare (note the Himmler-esque spectacles) and staccato delivery (reminiscent of those Dalek fellas). It's just the way he stalks the room, taking everything about the Doctor in, looking almost bemused as well as intrigued by this stranger. And it's in the way he delivers the most mundane of lines, such as when he takes the Doctor and Harry off to be interrogated and snarls: "Bring the prisonerrrs!" Wonderful.

Meanwhile, on the misty surface of Skaro, Sarah wanders alone in a stereotypically tense Terry Nation set-up, followed by creatures in rags. And when Sarah reaches a ruined building, she becomes the first to see Doctor Who's newest classic enemy - Kaled Chief Scientist Davros! The glimpse we get of him, through the darkness, is mysterious and intriguing. What is he? He seems to be a hideously disfigured man in a half-Dalek wheelchair, but with an emaciated face of brindled skin and sunken purblind eyes. Davros is like something out of a Francis Bacon painting, or the imagination of Clive Barker. And then before we have time to process this new menace, there's a Dalek! It demonstrates its effective weaponry, which seems to please Davros: "Perfect. The weaponry is perfect. Now we can begin!"

Cue titles. Truly, this is a masterpiece of tense drama and relentless terror. And I can't wait for part two!

First broadcast: March 8th, 1975

Steve's Scoreboard
The Good: David Maloney establishes a creeping atmosphere of danger throughout the episode. Nobody seems safe.
The Bad: Why don't Harry or Sarah ask a bit more about where they are and why they're there?
Overall score for episode: ★★★★★★★★★★

"Would you like a jelly baby?" tally: 05

NEXT TIME: Part Two...

My reviews of this story's other episodes: Part Two; Part Three; Part Four; Part Five; Part 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/2014/06/genesis-of-daleks.html

Genesis of the Daleks is available on BBC DVD. Find it on Amazon - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-Genesis-Daleks-DVD/dp/B000EGCD5A