In an effort to find something quick that can be written as part of Daily Doctor Who, we are continuing with Say Something Nice, where I look back at each of the Doctor Who stories and pull out one or two cool things about it.
(Daily Doctor Who #313)
Read the previous entry here. Today, we continue with the ninth and final story of the show’s fourth season…
The Evil of the Daleks
The story stars Patrick Troughton as the Doctor and Frazer Hines as Jamie McCrimmon, and introduces Deborah Watling as new companion Victoria Waterfield in episode 2.
The serial is written by David Whitaker and directed by Derek Martinus.
All but episodes 2 of this serial are missing from the BBC archives, but animated re-creations of all seven episodes are available to watch.
Say Something Nice…
(Named for Missy–aka the Master–and her catchphrase from her first full appearance in Dark Water).
Though the animated version of The Evil of the Daleks is now available, I haven’t seen it yet. But looking over what I have seen and can read about it, it comes across as a grand epic of a serial. It has a gripping plot, interesting characters, and a great sense of scope–with the adventure going from Gatwick airport to 19th century London to Skaro. It brings up some interesting questions about the core essence of both humans and Daleks. If it had been the end of the Daleks on Doctor Who (as was originally the intention), it could have been a pretty fitting conclusion.
But because we’re equal-opportunity fans here, we’re not going to only be sycophantically complimentary.
You craven-hearted spineless poltroon!
(Another cry from the Master, but not exactly a catch-phrase, this time from The Deadly Assassin)
There’s actually not a lot of negatives to say about the serial (maybe this will change when I have a chance to watch the animated version). But the story point about Jamie first fighting and then befriending a mute, foreign strongman who has a crush on Victoria is a bit…cliched at best. Also, it seems like the characters Terrall, Mollie and Ruth all stop being useful and just abruptly written out of the story at the end of the fifth episode–which is not the biggest sin a story could commit but does make it feel like the writer just found himself in a corner that he had to figure out a quick way out of.
Catch you next time!
Blue Towel Productions 