Doctor Who: The Evil of the Daleks

FINAL BOSS BATTLE

The final end... (for now)

Season Four, Story 9 (Production Code LL)

Starring Patrick Troughton as the Doctor

with Frazer Hines (Jamie) and introducing Deborah Watling (Victoria)

• Written by David Whitaker
• Directed by Derek Martinus
• Produced by Innes Lloyd
• Story Editor: Gerry Davis (eps 1-3), Peter Bryant (eps 4-7)

Broadcast Dates, Viewership, Appreciation

• Episode 1 – 20 May 1967 (8.1m, 51%) **MISSING**
• Episode 2 – 27 May 1967 (7.5m, 51%)
• Episode 3 – 3 Jun 1967 (6.1m, 52%) **MISSING**
• Episode 4 – 10 Jun 1967 (5.3m, 51%) **MISSING**
• Episode 5 – 17 Jun 1967 (5.1m, 53%) **MISSING**
• Episode 6 – 24 Jun 1967 (6.8m, 49%) **MISSING**
• Episode 7 – 1 Jul 1967 (6.1m, 56%) **MISSING**

The story was repeated and incorporated into the end of Season Five (7 June – 19 July 1968), as the Doctor replays the entire adventure for incoming companion Zoe. The start of the episode one repeat has a short voiceover between the Doctor and Zoe where he explains what's going on. Following a two-week break, Season Six began.

Although Episode 7 is missing, there is a surviving sequence of film trims and unused special effects that give a good sense of what the climactic battle looked like.

How to Watch

• The full-color animated version is available on demand on the BBC's Doctor Who Classic channel on YouTube.
• The 2021 DVD/Blu-ray release includes animation of all seven episodes in both color and b/w, plus the Loose Cannon recons and Episode 2.
• The Loose Cannon recons of the missing episodes, paired with the audio of the 1992 audiobook with narration by Tom Baker, is available here. (This contains the original broadcast audio including an excerpt from the Beatles' "Paperback Writer," which has been replaced on subsequent official BBC releases)
• Episode 2 was included in the 2004 Lost In Time DVD release, as well as on the 1992 VHS "Daleks – The Early Years"
• John Peel wrote the novelization, twice as long as standard Target books, in 1993

Synopsis

The Doctor and Jamie pursue the stolen TARDIS out of Gatwick Airport, eventually tracking it down to a mysterious antique shop owned by Edward Waterfield. He is revealed to be in the employ of the Daleks. Doctor and Jamie are gassed unconscious, and wake up in 1866 at a mansion owned by Waterfield's friend, the wealthy scientist Theodore Maxtible. Their experiments with time travel inadvertently summoned the Daleks, who have taken over the house and are holding Waterfield's daughter Victoria hostage to ensure his cooperation. The Daleks force the Doctor to subject Jamie to a series of perilous experiments and tests to identify and distill the Human Factor, the innate qualities that have allowed humanity to consistently defeat them.

Jamie endures the various tests, but his faith in the Doctor is shaken by his apparent collaboration with the Daleks. The Doctor injects the Human Factor into three test Daleks who become childlike, docile, and playful before being summoned back to Skaro. The remaining Daleks return to Skaro with Victoria and Maxtible and destroy the mansion, but not before the Doctor, Waterfield and Jamie follow. On Skaro, they meet the fearsome Emperor Dalek who reveals their true intention – analysis of the Human Factor has allowed to them to identify the Dalek Factor, which they plan to force the Doctor to spread to the human race, with the help of the TARDIS which has also been brought to Skaro.

Maxtible is lured through an archway where he is infused with the Dalek Factor and becomes stiff and robotic; mentally he's become a Dalek. He lures the Doctor through, and he also appears to be converted. The three test Daleks are starting to create disorder by asking heretical questions like "why?" so the Doctor persuades the Emperor to send all Daleks through the arch to be reconverted. But in truth, the Doctor was pretending to be Dalek-ized, swapped formulas, so hundreds of Daleks are given the Human Factor, inciting a massive civil war that engulfs the Dalek city and destroys the Emperor. The Daleks appear to have destroyed themselves, although Maxtible and Waterfield both perish. Victoria, now orphaned, leaves in the TARDIS with the Doctor and Jamie.

Analysis, Opinions, Etc.

There are two primary types of beloved Doctor Who stories.

One is the well-plotted cracker of a story that builds in tension over several episodes, which has proved optimal for viewing decades later in a single sitting. It's plotted like a movie. Maybe at the time of broadcast it wasn't as well-received; when viewed episodically a week at a time it moves along a bit slowly, maybe is more reliant on dialogue, and saves the action and excitement for the climactic episode. The problem is, Doctor Who wasn't designed to be viewed decades later in a single sitting. Especially in the b/w era, there was no concept of the stories having any value after their one broadcast.

The other is the type of story that is structured to deliver moment-to-moment thrills, memorable scenes, iconic images, has a cracker of a cliffhanger, and is structured to hold your attention for 25 minutes even as the viewer attempts to work out just what the hell is going on. Typically these were optimal for people watching the show at the time of original broadcast. Fans of these stories recall the imagery that stayed with them for decades, hiding behind the couch, nightmare fuel, etc. But when viewed in retrospect, or in one sitting, it can be frustrating as the evil menace seems to have a godawfully complex or confusing plot that makes zero sense. It's clear that the writers of these stories went for the memorable moments first, then assembled a plot after the fact. After all, we would only see these stories once, right? What would we remember, the iconic moments, or the plot?

It is interesting that David Whitaker wrote both "Power of the Daleks" and "Evil of the Daleks" because they're exemplars of both of these story types, and they're both effective in their own distinctive and different ways. I've talked at length about how "Power" slowly builds up tension over five episodes to have Episode Six deliver a huge knockout when the Daleks finally start massacring everyone.

And now let's take a look at the plot of "The Evil of the Daleks:"

So there was this antique shop...

"We want to infect humanity with the Dalek Factor, so we will kidnap our greatest enemy and force him to identify and distill its complete opposite, the Human Factor. Incidentally we have a conduit to an English mansion in 1866 thanks to some rudimentary human experiments with time travel. And, we know that the Doctor is in 1966 London. We hold one of the scientists' daughter's hostage to ensure their cooperation. Now, the best part is how we kidnap the Doctor. We take one of the scientists ahead in time to 1966 and ... get this... open an antique store! And once we succeed, we have all this medieval weaponry for the testing. Oh, and wait'll you hear about the mute Turkish strongman... etc etc."

But when we're watching this, at least for the first time, we don't particularly notice. We're caught up in the mystery of who stole the TARDIS. Then we're puzzled about who Mr Waterfield is, with his antiques of such suspiciously good quality. And then DALEKS! And then voom, the Doctor and Jamie are yeeted back 100 years to an enormous country house with a lot of mysterious goings on, shady characters, and a beautiful young lady in distress. Then there's the incongruity of the Daleks with the gothic architecture, and Jamie being put through all these potentially fatal tasks, combatting and eventually befriending the Turkish strongman Kemel and working together to destroy a couple Daleks, the tension as Jamie challenges the Doctor over his collaboration with the Daleks, and the iconic cliffhanger moment of the Doctor and the humanized Daleks in a conga line. Then we're on Skaro for the first time since Season One, we meet the freakin' Dalek Emperor, we discover the double-crossing about the Human Factor, we see the Doctor apparently get Dalek-ized, and then the epic destruction of the Emperor, the Dalek city, and the Daleks, presumably forever.

It's only when you watch it again that we start to notice that the plot is utter bollocks, that episode one is a pointless runaround, that neither the robber Toby, nor the robo-controlled Arthur Terrall, nor his sweetheart Ruth Maxtible have any bearing on the plot at all, that Jamie's tests are silly medieval pikes, that it spends three episodes farting about in a gothic mansion to FINALLY get to the good bits near the end of episode five.

Inasmuch as the plot is taken up by Jamie's tests, simultaneously Jamie's loyalty to the Doctor is also put to the test. Where true, he's never met the Daleks before, he somehow seems to have an innate sense of how iconically horrifying they are (did he read the 1966 Annual?). His outrage builds over the course of the test as he comes to realize that he (and by extension, Victoria and Kemel) is being manipulated and used by the Doctor, who appears to be a collaborator with the Daleks, until the end of episode five where his frustration boils over and is ready to ditch him. "Just who's side are you on, anyway," he demands. Definite echoes of the scene at the end of "The Massacre" where Steven, albeit momentarily, leaves.

Even as Jamie watches the three childlike Daleks playing trains with the Doctor, has to help the Doctor and Waterfield hurriedly reassemble the transmat to avoid being blown up, and watches the Doctor push the Dalek pretending to be one of his test cases over the cliff, he's still not 100%. Maxtible walks through the archway and gets converted. Shortly after, the Doctor follows and appears to also be converted. Then a few scenes later he shows up and urges them to come through, promising it's OK, but even then Jamie isn't entirely convinced. Eventually he has to choose, and finally chooses to go through. Once he's through and hasn't been converted, he then seems to finally trust the Doctor again.

It's not entirely dissimilar to the end of "Curse of Fenric" where Doc #7 has to break Ace's faith in him so he can defeat Fenric; the Doctor knows what he's doing but has to keep his companion in the dark in order to do it, and that secret-keeping and apparent betrayal is an unfortunate necessity to win the day.

Sometimes the dialogue contains an almost poetic quality. Episode five contains my absolute all-time favorite quote in which the Doctor defines themself.

Terrall: Doctor, no doubt you're a keen student of human nature, but some things are better left alone.
Doctor: No, Mister Terrall, I am not a student of human nature. I am a professor of a far wider academy, of which human nature is merely a part.

Sublime. And then in the next episode, Waterfield reminds us that this show is aimed at small children.

Emperor: The Human Factor showed us what the Dalek Factor was. [...] Without knowing, you have shown the Daleks what their own strength is.
Waterfield: While you were doing one thing, they were really making you do another.

Sigh. Thank you, Mr Waterfield, for reminding me that I'm a grown-ass man obsessing over a kids' show.

For every moment that makes me cheer, "YES, THIS IS WHAT THE SHOW IS ALL ABOUT!" there's a moment that makes me cringe with embarrassment. Don't get me started on Marius Goring and his over-the-top performance as Maxtible, how he and Troughton ham it up as Daleks, and his "killkillkillkillkill" as he hurls Kemel to his demise. But I guess as a Doctor Who fan, that truly is the essence of the show, how brilliance and cringe co-exist. Even "Caves of Androzani" has the Magma Beast.

Oh, and just pointing out that Maxtible is basically an extremely rich guy with scientific interests who hires truly clever people to do the hard labor for him, takes the credit, and is angling to increase his wealth by bargaining with evil. Sound familiar?

DEI Report

We do have to talk about Kemel. The track record for 60's and 70's Doctor Who in terms of racial representation, though not out of step with the period in which it was made, is still rather cringey. This is the first of two consecutive stories in which the one BIPOC character is a physically imposing, muscular male, largely if not entirely mute, and a servant to a devious white character. But if Kemel is cringe, what's coming up next is worse.

I suppose we also have to talk about Victoria. After a series of female companions where it appears the producers at least tried to make them contemporary and relatively plucky and self-reliant before they defaulted to being helpless screamers, it appears they abandoned all pretense of making female companions with agency and created Victoria, who spent a year being almost entirely a damsel in distress up to the point where her screaming is eventually weaponized. When she eventually leaves, it's basically because she's been completely miserable for that past year and has found a nice quiet family to take her in. It is telling, and not necessarily in a good way, that she was one of the most popular female companions on the show.

Tidbits and Gossip

Dalek creator Terry Nation had been trying to spin the Daleks into their own BBC series. They didn't bite, and once Nation started to sell the concept to American television, the BBC decided it was time to retire them from Doctor Who. Sure enough, the BBC resisted the temptation to bring them back for five years, by which time Terry Nation had abandoned trying to flog the Daleks elsewhere.

The original concept for the story was for the Doctor to encounter a caveman named Og, from whom he would derive the Human Factor, while his companions were held hostage by the Daleks.

The maid, Molly Dawson, was also considered as a potential companion before deciding on Victoria. The role of Victoria was originally accepted by Denise Buckley, but shortly after changed her mind – presumably she didn't want to become a regular cast member, and Deborah Watling was cast in her place. Jo Rowbottom, cast as Molly, had also auditioned for Victoria.

I appreciate that the scene in the Tricolour coffee bar uses the Beatles' "Paperback Writer" which came out two months before the July 1966 setting of episode one. (Due to rights issues, the song is replaced on the animated DVD/Blu-Ray releases.)

This was the last story of Season Four (although "Tomb of the Cybermen" was recorded directly afterwards in this same production block) and the last time the show was produced on the insanely tight turnaround of taping one week before broadcast. Next season's episodes would be, on the average, taped a slightly less stressful three weeks ahead.

Season Four, by pretty much all standards, was a success; effectively navigating through the turmoil of replacing the lead actor – thereby accidentally laying the groundwork for the show to survive to the present day – and through a hectic stretch of having no margin for error. Shows were hastily re-written to accommodate a new castmember. One iconic recurring enemy was written out of the show and another introduced. Ratings weathered the introduction of Patrick Troughton, holding steady around 7-8 million viewers.

Haven't I Seen You Somewhere In The Future?

• John Bailey (Waterfield) also appeared as the Commander in "The Sensorites," and Sezom in "Horns of Nimon."
• Sonny Caldinez (Kemel) regularly appeared as an Ice Warrior in "The Ice Warriors," "Seeds of Death," "The Curse of Peladon," and "The Monster of Peladon."

Does the BIPOC Character Survive? No. (Kemel dies in episode 7)

Sausage Factor: 83.3% 18 credited actors (including Victoria, Dalek performers and voice actors), 15 males

Rating: Three out of Four Matchbooks Torn Out Left to Right
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John Geoffrion is a semi-retired semi-professional thespian, a professional data guy, and a Dad. He usually falls asleep to the Classic Doctor Who channel on Pluto.tv

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