‘RESURRECTION OF THE DALEKS’
Please feel free to comment on my review.
Daleks and Davros with the Fifth Doctor, Tegan and Turlough
This was the third ‘Doctor Who’ TV story I’d seen from the Peter Davison era!
‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ is a remarkable and enjoyable experience. I’m so glad that Peter Davison managed to get his battle with the Daleks as the Fifth Doctor before he departed from the TV series. Every Doctor must have a battle with the Daleks on TV and Peter’s Doctor has an explosive one in this.
It was after doing my winter A Level exams in January 2007 that I received both ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ and ‘The Tomb of the Cybermen’ on DVD from my parents to enjoy. It was an exciting experience. I’d just seen ‘Earthshock’ and ‘The Five Doctors’ with Peter Davison’s Doctor beforehand.
I’ve had the original DVD cover of ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ signed by Peter Davison at the ‘Stars of Time Film and Comic Con @ The Tropicana’ in Weston-super-Mare, August 2016. I’ve also had it signed by Janet Fielding at the ‘Science of the Time Lords 2019’ event at the National Space Centre, Leicester, January 2019; Mark Strickson at the ‘Time Warp’ event in Weston-super-Mare, July 2014 and by Terry Molloy and Brian Miller at the ‘celebrate 50 – The Peter Davison Years’ event in Chiswick; London, April 2013.
When I saw ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ on DVD back in 2007, I had it as a four-part version of the story. It was later on that I discovered ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ was transmitted as a 2 x 45 minute episode story on TV back in February 1984. Why it was first released as a four-part story on DVD, I do not know.
This Dalek story is by Eric Saward, who was ‘Doctor Who’s script editor at the time. It’s a story that Eric wasn’t entirely happy with. He felt he didn’t do the Daleks justice. It’s true there are too many ideas in the tale to keep track of. But it certainly is a remarkable story and it doesn’t bore throughout.
In the story, the TARDIS gets caught in a time corridor following the events of ‘Frontios’. The Doctor, Tegan and Turlough find themselves dragged to Earth as the TARDIS lands in London on the Shad Thames in 1984. They soon find this warehouse where the source of the time corridor gets contained.
Meanwhile, in the far future, a space station gets under attack by Dalek forces. They’ve come to rescue their creator Davros from his cryogenic sleep. They want Davros to save the Daleks from a deadly virus that was created by their enemies, the Movellans, from ‘Destiny of the Daleks’. Will Davros save them?
In this story, Davros is now played by Terry Molloy. This was the first time I saw Terry as Davros and I found his performance very mesmerizing indeed. He captured the essence of the original Davros as played by Michael Wisher from ‘Genesis of the Daleks’. Terry has played Davros in more stories lately.
He’s played Davros in both the TV series and the Big Finish audios. I like it when Terry Molloy rants and raves as Davros and I love that scene where the Doctor confronts Davros when on the verge of killing him. Davros taunts the Doctor in the moment, especially when the Doctor’s reluctant to kill him.
That shot of Davros being released from his frozen tomb in ‘Part One’ was a thrilling moment to watch. Terry Molloy of course doesn’t just rant and rave like the original Davros did. He also has his quiet moments, especially when he is outlining his plans on improving the Daleks to become the supreme beings.
I enjoyed seeing the Daleks in this adventure. However it would be fair to say that they are slightly underused when Davros casts his shadow. The Dalek voices are done by Brian Miller (who previously guest starred in ‘Snakedance’ and was Elisabeth Sladen (Sarah Jane Smith)’s husband) and Royce Mills.
The Daleks are quite manic in this adventure (as they usually are). 😀 I loved that moment when a Dalek’s eyestalk gets blown up and it goes into a panic. The Daleks exterminate a lot. Some deaths are over-the-top like Colonel Archer’s doing a strange disco dance as he dies. I can’t take that seriously. 😀
This story contains quite a number of violent scenes throughout. This includes policemen shooting people in a street and space station crew members killed by gas which disfigures their faces. I found that pretty gruesome to watch. I’m sure there were many complaints from viewers who watched this.
This story features special guest star Rodney Bewes as Stein. Rodney Bewes is well-known for starring in ‘The Likely Lads’. Stein’s a ragged character who’s scared and has a stammer. I like that Stien is the heart of this story. It was a shock when Stein turned against the Doctor, revealing he’s a Dalek agent.
There’s also Maurice Colbourne as Commander Lytton. Lytton is a mercenary who works for the Daleks and leads his own army of human Dalek troopers. Lytton is a real tough guy, who’s easily frustrated when he’s working with the Daleks and rescuing Davros. But he manages to keep his cool throughout.
The other guest stars in ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ include Rula Lenska as Styles, the space station’s chief medical officer and Jim Findley as Mercer. There’s also Leslie Grantham, who would go on to play ‘Dirty Den’ in the BBC soap opera series ‘EastEnders’, as Kiston, as well as Del Henney as Colonel Archer.
The regular cast of ‘Doctor Who’ are great to watch here too. Peter Davison delivers a brilliant performance as the Doctor and does remarkably well facing the Daleks on TV. I liked his scenes when he tries to break Stein’s Dalek conditioning and when he faces Davros for the first time as he is about to kill him.
Janet Fielding is remarkable as Tegan in this story too. She gets to have her own adventure as well as use her own initiative. I liked it when Tegan and Chloe Ashcroft as Professor Laird realise that Colonel Archer and his men aren’t what they seem to be as they deceive them to bluff their way out to escape.
Mark Strickson as Turlough seems a little short changed in this adventure though. At first, he’s lurking about the corridors avoiding Daleks on board their ship. He eventually meets up with Mercer; Styles and the other space station crew as he witnesses them setting off the self-destruct to blow up the station.
One of my favourite moments from the story is when the Doctor’s past lives and companions are shown up on the Daleks’ screen when he’s plugged into their duplication machine. Nyssa’s face featured in that montage of companions. For me, being a Nyssa/Sarah Sutton, this was a joy to watch on screen. 😀
‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ is of course where we say goodbye to Tegan. She left once before in ‘Time-Flight’. Now she definitely leaves here. I found Tegan’s departure moving and sad, since she’s had enough of all the death and destruction and she considers travelling with the Doctor not ‘fun’ anymore.
Saying that however, I didn’t really like how Tegan’s departure was handled since it seems rushed and there was no build up to her leaving. They obviously put Janet’s farewell into the Dalek story at the last minute, without considering the development required to make Tegan’s departure so worthwhile.
Mind you, I still find Tegan’s departure moving and found it very touching when she ran back to have one last chance to be with the Doctor again before the TARDIS leaves. Tegan will meet the Doctor again though. Janet Fielding later played her in the audio story, ‘The Gathering’. “Brave heart, Tegan!”
‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ was originally released on DVD in 2002 as a four-part story on 1 disc. The DVD special features are as follows. There’s ‘On Location’ – a making-of featurette in London’s Shad Thames and there’s a ‘Breakfast Time’ interview with Janet Fielding and producer John Nathan-Turner. There are deleted scenes from the story, a trailer for ‘Part One’ of the story; a 5.1 sound mix; a music-only option by Malcolm Clarke, a photo gallery of the story and an info-text commentary option to enjoy. There’s also an enjoyable DVD audio commentary with Peter Davison, Janet Fielding and director Matthew Robinson. There are some ‘Easter Eggs’ to look out for on the DVD and a ‘TARDIS-Cam’ CGI sequence.
This story was later re-released into a brand-new 2-disc Special Edition DVD for the ‘Revisitations 2’ DVD box set that also included ‘The Seeds of Death’ with Patrick Troughton, Frazer Hines and Wendy Padbury as well as ‘Carnival of Monsters’ with Jon Pertwee and Katy Manning. On both discs of the ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ Special Edition DVD, there are two versions of the story. On Disc 1, there’s the two-part version that was initially shown on TV in 1984 and on Disc 2, there’s the four-part version. There are DVD audio commentaries on both discs of the Special Edition DVD. On Disc 1, there’s a commentary with Terry Molloy, writer/script editor Eric Saward and visual effects designer Peter Wragg, moderated by Nicholas Pegg. On Disc 2, there’s the commentary with Peter Davison, Janet Fielding and director Matthew Robinson from the original DVD release of ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’. There are new documentaries on the Special Edition DVD for ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’. These include ‘Casting Far and Wide’ with Toby Hadoke and ‘Come In Number Five’ which focuses on the Fifth Doctor era of ‘Doctor Who’ overall and is presented by David Tennant. Sadly, there’s not much Sarah Sutton or Nyssa featured much in that documentary, which I found pretty disappointing. There’s the ‘Tomorrow’s Times – The Fifth Doctor’ presented by Frazer Hines, ‘The Last Dalek’ – a behind-the-scenes look on ‘The Evil of the Daleks’, and there’s a ‘Walrus’ short sketch with a Dalek which was quite amusing.
‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ is an enjoyable Dalek TV adventure from the Peter Davison era. It’s quite violent and gruesome in places, but it is certainly a thrill to watch. It’s one of the best of Peter Davison’s era since it’s an action-packed adventure and features a moving departure for Janet Fielding as Tegan.
‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ rating – 8/10
‘DOCTOR WHO – RESURRECTION OF THE DALEKS’
Please feel free to comment on my review.
The Fifth Doctor Dalek Story with Davros and New Series Dalek Voices
35 years since the story was first transmitted on TV? WOW!!!
I’ve enjoyed reading/listening to the novelization/audiobook of ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ by Eric Saward. I was hoping for a novelization on both this story as well as ‘Revelation of the Daleks’ since they hadn’t been novelized in the 1980s following TV transmission. Now they can be enjoyed as books.
At this point, ‘Doctor Who’ novelizations are becoming a thing again with the juicy novelizations of Douglas Adams stories such as ‘Shada’, ‘City of Death’, ‘The Pirate Planet’ and the unused TV story ‘Doctor Who and the Krikkitmen’. There are also Target novelizations of new series TV episodes getting made
I did wonder if Eric Saward’s two Dalek TV stories would ever see the light of day as novelizations and whether Eric would agree to novelizing them. Thankfully he did say ‘yes’ to novelizing them and I was happy about it. I was looking forward to how Eric would tackle those two Dalek stories he did as books.
It was a surprise mind when I found the hardback books of ‘Resurrection’ and ‘Revelation’ not as huge, bumpier and juicer as the Douglas Adams books that had been out. But Eric was novelizing his stories as they would’ve been done for the Target novelization range which did make sense thinking about it.
I like ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ as a ‘Doctor Who’ story. It does have flaws in terms of storytelling, but I recall it being a thrilling action-packed adventure with Peter Davison’s Doctor when I first saw it on DVD. Eric Saward however wasn’t too happy with the finished result when it came out on TV in 1984.
Therefore, Eric clearly saw the novelization as an opportunity to improve on what he felt were weaker aspects of the story as shown on TV. This I can appreciate. From reading/hearing the novelization and recalling what I saw of the tale on DVD, there were some weaker aspects that needed clarification on.
This isn’t the first time Eric’s done a ‘Doctor Who’ novelization before. Oh no! The first novelization he did was on ‘The Visitation’. He also novelized ‘The Twin Dilemma’, ‘Attack of the Cybermen’ and ‘Slipback’. He probably didn’t have time to do the novelizations of his two Daleks tales when he was script editor.
The novelization is divided into 11 chapters with a coda at the end. I purchased the hardback at Waterstones in Cardiff. I also purchased the audiobook as a download from Audible. The story is read by Terry Molloy, who played Davros in the TV story. It was right for him to be reading the adventure. 🙂
There are also Dalek voices provided by Nicholas Briggs himself. I had a thrill from hearing Nick Briggs doing the Dalek voices in the audiobook. And meaning no disrespect to the actors who voiced the Daleks in the TV story, but I feel that Nick Briggs’ Dalek voices for ‘Resurrection’ are very superior here.
Nick takes advantage of Eric Saward’s writing in the novelization by homing in one the emotions of various Dalek characters such as the Supreme Dalek as well as the Alpha Dalek, Beta Dalek, Gamma Dalek, Delta Dalek and Epsilon Dalek. He also makes the Daleks sound very much like new series Daleks.
I know that’s an odd thing to say considering Nick Briggs does Dalek voices for the new series anyway. But from watching the TV story countless times, I recall how they sounded with being monotone and simply barking orders. The Daleks in the audio sound calculating and manipulative including Supreme.
And with the greatest respect to Eric Saward, he’s better writing for Daleks than he is for Cybermen. With Daleks, they’re allowed to have more emotion-like dialogue, especially when they’re ranting and such. The same can be said for Davros, who can vary from being quiet at times to ranting pretty loudly.
Going back to Terry Molloy, he’s very good as a reader of the story and providing voices for other characters as well as Davros. Yeah, his voices for the Fifth Doctor, Tegan, Turlough, Stein and the rest don’t match to the actors who played them, but they are very decent voices when I was hearing them.
What I’ve noticed from reading/hearing the novelization/audiobook is that Eric Saward amends a lot of dialogue between characters. When hearing them on TV, some of the characters sounded clumsy when talking. This was properly due to the scripts getting written in a rush before transmission on TV.
With the novelization however, Eric’s able to tighten the dialogue between characters in order to make them sharper and believable. Eric also gets a chance to explore more of the characters, especially with the supporting ones. It allows us to emphasise with the characters compared to watching them on TV.
I liked it when the novelization allowed us to get to know Mr. Jones, the old man with the cigarette that gets killed by the fake policemen early on in the story. There’s the man looking for treasure named PJ who gets killed by the fake policemen when Tegan calls out to him. Great character touches.
There are setbacks to the novelization however. For one thing, Kiston’s recruitment into Davros’ service is briefly glanced over in one paragraph, which was disappointing for me. There’s also Colonel Archer being killed by the fake policemen getting reduced to a paragraph. It was pretty dramatic on TV.
I noticed when reading/hearing the novelization that Eric made a lot of references to the Terileptils from ‘The Visitation’. I suppose Eric’s making up for the lack of the Terileptils’ development in ‘The Visitation’ novelization. I’m okay with that, but I wish it was done for ‘The Visitation’ than in ‘Resurrection’.
The prison space station gets a name in the novelization, as it’s called the Vipod Mor. Wait! There was a spaceship also called the Vipod Mor in the audio adventure ‘Slipback’. Could these two be the same thing? Perhaps the Vipod Mor would soon get renamed as Terminus to cause the ‘big bang’ explosion. 😀
To be fair, Eric Saward did say in an interview that he forgot he already used the name for a spaceship in ‘Slipback’. And to be fair, ‘Slipback’s a pretty forgettable adventure anyway. But it makes me curious on whether ‘Resurrection’, ‘Slipback’, ‘Terminus’ and ‘Castrovalva’ are all connected to each other. 😀
The book also features a cat named Sir Runcible on the Vipod Mor. I thought it was the cat the Doctor and the army men found in the warehouse with the Morvellan virus cylinders. But it turns out to be a different cat and one that can talk. No, seriously! The cat talks to the Doctor at one point in this story.
This happens when Sir Runcible is escaping with the Fifth Doctor through the time corridor down to the warehouse. I was gobsmacked as much as the Doctor was. I don’t know how that cat can talk and I don’t know if we’ll ever see that cat again. I want answers about that cat please, Mr. Eric Saward! 😀
Lytton gets more development in this story as well as a first name which happens to be ‘Gustav’ instead of ‘Gustave’ in the novelization. Apparently, Lytton knows who the Doctor is before this adventure and vice versa. It does explain how the Doctor knew Lytton well in ‘Attack of the Cybermen’.
There’s also more development on the interaction between Mercer and Styles when meeting each other aboard the Vipod Mor for the first time. There’s also a sense of ‘sexual attraction’ on Mercer’s part towards Styles in the novelization, I believe, which I don’t believe was hinted at in the TV version.
Interestingly, the novelization has the Doctor, Tegan and Turlough finding out it’s the Daleks involved with the time corridor in the TARDIS before they arrive at Shad Thames in 1984. This was interesting compared to the TV story where the Doctor became surprised to see a Dalek appear in the warehouse.
Another interesting aspect about the novelization is that it has Tegan not knowing who the Daleks are, as if it was the first time she encountered them in this adventure. Clearly Eric Saward didn’t hear the Big Finish audio story ‘The Elite’ where Tegan saw a Dalek for the first time. A big continuity error there for me!
The novelization handles Osborn’s death differently compared to the TV story. In the TV version, the crewmember that got infected with a deadly disease, now named Senior Ensign ‘Baz’ Seaton in the novelization, was shot down in cold blood by Osborn before she got shot by the troopers led by Lytton.
In the novelization, Seaton was responsible for sabotaging Airlock 3 so that the Dalek could invade because they paid him well. Seaton gets killed in the process before Osborn does by Lytton’s troopers. This works better in the novelization compared to the TV story, which I found uncomfortable to watch.
Stein gets to see more of the TARDIS interior compared to what was shown in TV story. I couldn’t help but be reminded of Chris Parsons’ exploration of the TARDIS in the ‘Shada’ novelization by Gareth Roberts. It was nice for Stein to experience more of the TARDIS interior compared to the TV story here.
An astonishing aspect of the TARDIS interior is that there’s an unseen robot chef named Ooba-Doa who provides the meals. Whilst it does explain how people in the TARDIS got food and drink in ‘The Five Doctors’, how come we never saw Ooba-Doa the robot chef before in the TV series. It’s so insane!
I personally would’ve used Hargreaves, the robot Jeeves from the Big Finish audio story ‘Aquitaine’ to provide the TARDIS teams’ meals instead of Ooba-Doa. Gosh, I should’ve used Ooba-Doa in one of my stories. It would’ve saved Billy Walker cooking spaghetti bolognese for Nyssa in my story ‘Junglos 4198’. 😀
I enjoyed reading/hearing the scenes where the Doctor was almost about to kill Davros at point blank range in the novelization/audiobook. I’d just written an alternative version of the Fifth Doctor about to kill Davros in a ‘Genesis of the Daleks’ setting called ‘Psychic Image’. Amazing that’s come full circle.
I like how Stein’s journey is handled in the novelization, especially when he grows from a stuttering wreck to turning out to be a Dalek agent to becoming redeemed in stopping the Daleks’ plans before blowing himself and the Vipor Mor up with the Daleks on board. It’s done well on TV, but it’s great in book.
Tegan’s exit from ‘Doctor Who’ is handled well in the book just slightly. More hints at her departure are handled earlier in the tale, especially when she’s shocked over the Doctor nearly about to commit murder on Davros as well as seeing all the horror and violence being caused by the Daleks in the story.
The announcement of Tegan leaving the Doctor and the TARDIS is not so sudden in the book as it was in the TV story. There isn’t the “I’m not coming with you” line uttered by Tegan, as she questions all that’s happened with the Daleks, Lytton and everything before she departs in an emotional state by the end.
Tegan’s decision to leave the Doctor is also reflected in the coda at the end of the book. She questions minutes after she’s left on whether she made the right choice to leave the Doctor after all the adventures they’ve had. I do appreciate Eric going out of his way to include that in the book’s coda.
The book also ends differently with the Doctor and Turlough intending to pursue Lytton rather than warning Earth authorities about the Dalek duplicates. There’s also Tegan being pursued again by Lytton’s policemen in the coda where she jumps off a bridge onto a boat to escape with ‘super strength’.
I’m not sure what the mystery of Tegan’s ‘super strength’ is at the end of the book, considering the fake policemen’s surprise at it before informing Lytton about it. Whether Tegan’s real or a duplicate is a matter of debate. It’s a question left open to interpretation and it’s never answered in ‘The Gathering’.
In all seriousness, the ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ novelization/audiobook is very good. There are issues regarding certain scenes reduced to one paragraph and such, but I feel Eric Saward has done a superb job novelizing this story in a way that he would’ve done it for the Target range of novelizations.
I enjoyed reading the book whilst listening to the audiobook in the background. Terry Molloy’s reading of the story is excellent and the Dalek voices provided by Nicholas Briggs are sublime. As I write this review, I’m looking forward to finding out how Eric Saward novelized ‘Revelation of the Daleks’! I can’t wait!
‘Doctor Who – Resurrection of the Daleks’ rating – 8/10
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Bradley's Basement 
Awesome review Tim, well written & perfectly summarized, i remember seeing this upon original transmission like it was yesterday because of it being longer via 2×50 episodes because of the Olympics, this one came under fire from Mary Whitehouse & her band of do – gooders about how many on screen deaths there were & how burning faces traumatised young children, well i was 9 yrs old & while i was scared watching this it wasn’t to the point i was hysterical or affected by it as i found scary was why i loved Doctor Who.
Again Tegans exit rushed, should’ve hinted at how the deaths affect her over the four episodes so that when she announced she leaving it doesn’t feel rushed or jarred like it does here, felt like they forgot Janet leaving & added this scene at the eleventh hour.
However still one of my top 5 Fifth Doctor stories, Peter Davison is excellent throughout this season despite Warrior’s Of The Deep he gave excellent performances.
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Hi Simon.
Glad you enjoyed my review on ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’.
Thanks for sharing your memories of watching this story on its original transmission back in 1984. To be honest, I can appreciate why Mary Whitehouse was concerned. After all, this story does feature upsetting scenes that would’ve been traumatising for very small children. While I understand Mary Whitehouse’s complaints were too much back in the day, I do appreciate where she’s coming from.
I chatted to Janet Fielding about her exit in ‘Resurrection’ at the ‘Science of the Time Lords’ event recently. She initially wasn’t keen about her exit, but looking back she’s pleased she had an emotional exit. I’m glad she was given an emotional exit and that she didn’t die. But yeah at the same time, it was rushed and felt last minute. It didn’t feel like Nyssa’s exit in ‘Terminus’ which was well-handled as well as Turlough’s in the following story, ‘Planet of Fire’. It’ll be interesting how Eric Saward changes things in his novelization for ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ as well as ‘Revelation of the Daleks’ this year. Hopefully Tegan’s exit will be well-handled in the book.
Yeah ‘Warriors of the Deep’ is the weakest story of Peter Davison’s third season of ‘Doctor Who’. I don’t consider Season 21 to be as good as Season 19, but I still enjoyed Peter Davison’s Doctor in it as well as Janet Fielding and Mark Strickson. I’ll have to do my ‘Top 10 Favourite Fifth Doctor TV stories’ someday on my blog.
Many thanks for your comments, Simon.
Tim. 🙂
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Fantastic audiobook review, i been undecided until now whether to get this audiobook, however your review sealed the deal.
One of my favourite Fifth Doctor story’s, i remember this well seeing it on tv.
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Hi Simon.
Glad you enjoyed my review on the novelization/audiobook of ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’. Very pleased my review’s persuaded you to purchase the audiobook. I enjoyed reading/hearing the story in novelization/audiobook form very much.
I’m half-way in reading/listening to the ‘Revelation of the Daleks’ novelization/audiobook. Hopefully sometime this week I’ll have finished the novelization/audiobook to review on my blog.
Many thanks.
Tim. 🙂
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Great review Tim.
I watched this story on Britbox along with ‘Planet of Fire’ and ‘The Caves of Androzani’ and I enjoyed all three (for the last one, I also have the audiobook). I am hoping to get the novelisation of the story as well.
I understand where your coming from with Tegan’s departure being rushed. But I still found it to be rather moving. I am hoping to get around to listening to ‘The Gathering’ (as well as ‘The Reaping’) to hear what happens when Tegan meets the Doctor when she is much older. I found out from your review about her brain tumour which is quite sad. But what makes it even sadder is, Janet Fielding actually contracted cancer in 2012, six years after ‘The Gathering’ was recorded. She was cured of course which is a relief.
WF92
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HI WF92
Glad you enjoyed my review on ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’. I’m also glad you enjoyed ‘Resurrection’, ‘Planet of Fire’ and ‘The Caves of Androzani’ recently on Britbox. Hope you enjoy the novelization of ‘Resurrection’ when you get to read it.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts about Tegan’s departure. It was abrupt and rushed, but at least it was an emotional send-off. Hope you’ll get to enjoy ‘The Reaping’ and ‘The Gathering’ when you hear them. I’d listen to ‘The Reaping’ first before hearing ‘The Gathering’. It is sad that Janet Fielding contracted cancer in 2012. Thankfully she recovered. I was able to see Janet at ‘Project Motor Mouth 2’ in 2013 and some more conventions after that.
Many thanks for your comments.
Tim. 🙂
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Great review Tim.
‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ wasn’t that great in my opinion. I enjoyed it, but that was mostly part 1 whereas part 2 was a bit of a drop for me. I wasn’t sure about what was going some of the time. One of the confusing parts was when the Daleks revealed the duplicates of Tegan and Turlough when the Doctor was trapped to the bed which meant I wasn’t sure which of them was real or not. Mercer was rather irritating with the way that he kept pointing guns at people.
The Daleks and Davros were good in this adventure but it was also confusing when some of the Daleks wanted to exterminate him. Maybe it will come clearer when I start writing my review. As for Tegan’s departure, I actually liked it. Maybe it could have been hinted at better, but she did have a rather torrid time in the story, especially getting concussion. I’ve no doubt you won’t agree with me on what I’m about to say, but I found it similar to Nyssa’s departure given that she also said “I’m not coming with you” in ‘Terminus’. I can at least agree with you that it was emotional.
‘Planet of Fire is next’. My copy of Season 22 on Blu-Ray has been dispatched, but I won’t start watching it until I’ve finished and reviewed Season 21.
P.s. what if Tegan met Mr. Brittas from ‘The Brittas Empire’?
Take care, WF92.
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Hi WF92,
Thanks for sharing your latest thoughts on ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’. Hopefully I’ll get a chance to update my thoughts on the story when it comes to revisiting Season 21 on Blu-ray sometime. Both Nyssa and Tegan’s farewells are emotional, but I prefer Nyssa’s over Tegan’s if that makes any sense. I suppose it was hinted at that Tegan would be leaving the TARDIS, but it was abrupt and sudden and I would’ve handled Tegan’s departure differently, especially after all she and the Doctor had been through.
Hope you enjoy ‘Planet of Fire’ next. Looking forward to receiving my copy of Season 22 of ‘Doctor Who’ on Blu-ray with Colin Baker tomorrow. If Tegan met Mr. Brittas, she’d throttle him. 😀
Many thanks for your comments.
Tim 🙂
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The author, Eric Saward, reflected that the story had a lot going on, but it ended up all being a bit of a muddle. “Resurrection” is a great action-thriller. It has spectacle aplenty and a dynamic directorial style that the show hasn’t really seen since maybe “Earthshock” (maybe “Enlightenment”?). It struggles, though, with connecting the logic of all those disparate threads together.
It’s a story of assassinations and double-crosses. The main two plots are the Daleks finding a cure for the Movellan virus (via Davros)… or the duplicates intended to launch an assassination of the High Council of the Time Lords (a pet project of the Supreme Dalek). The story flip-flops between one and the other. They’re missing the connective tissue in between.
I think… If you added that the duplicates were planning to wipe out the High Council with a modified version of the virus (and blame it on the Movellans) and only Davros possessed the means to do so… It would lend a stronger link to the Doctor’s attempt to kill Davros. After all, it isn’t the first time he’s tried — the Fourth Doctor made the attempt way back in “Destiny of the Daleks” with a space-age time bomb.
There’s a lot to explore in the fact that the Doctor believed, even for a moment, that to save his People, he was prepared to kill Davros (and, by extension, potentially wipe out the Daleks). It almost prefigures some of their later decisions, circa the Time War. I almost wonder if it would’ve been even more effective for Tegan’s departure if she had been in the room with him.
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Hi Wolfie,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’. I’m glad Eric Saward was able to novelise ‘Resurrection’ recently, as I think what he considered a mess in the TV version does seem clarified and more ironed out in the novelization. I’m pleased I did a sort-of follow-up to the notion of the Doctor attempting to kill Davoros in ‘Resurrection’ for my story ‘Psychic Image’ in the ‘Genesis of Terror’ anthology by the Divergent Wordsmiths.
Here are links to ‘Psyhic Image’ and the ‘Divergent Wordsmiths’ website for people to enjoy.
* ‘Psychic Image’ – https://bradleybasement.wordpress.com/sci-fi/doctor-who/the-fifth-doctor-by-tim-bradley/psychic-image/
* ‘Divergent Wordsmiths’ – https://divergent-wordsmiths.weebly.com/
Once again, many thanks for your comments, Wolfie.
Tim 🙂
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The action thriller aspects for Dr. Who can be a curse in certain ways. Indeed with all the big action stuff during Jodie’s era which hindered character development and especially for most of the guest casts. I prefer Dr. Who’s more subtle approach to SF which made me a fan in the 70s and a Wilderness Years fan later on.
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Hi scifimike,
The action thriller aspects of a ‘Doctor Who’ story can be great, although there often needs to be a balance struck between action and character drama, much how there often needs to be a balance struck between comedy and drama. I’ve enjoyed watching ‘Doctor Who’ in all the eras its had, but it’s easy to make comments/criticisms about certain stories and seasons depending on how you percieve them, despite enjoying them.
Many thanks,
Tim 🙂
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“You are soft, like all Time Lords. You prefer to stand and watch. Action requires courage. Something you lack.”
Is this true of the Fifth Doctor?
“Resurrection of the Daleks” comes as something of a watershed. After “The Five Doctors”, ‘Doctor Who’ passes its twentieth anniversary and begins another decade of storytelling. At nearly sixty years, this feels like pittance, but back in 1984, the programme is about to do something which it hasn’t attempted in quite some years. With Peter Davison definitively settled into the role — and at his most proactive across his three-year tenure in his last — it’s going to start looking at the Doctor’s role in the violence we witness around him.
Now, next year’s Season 22 will receive a great deal of scrutiny regarding the series’s approach to violence, but violence of that nature has always been with us. From the first Dalek story, we saw a massacre of unarmed farmers in a wave of racial cleansing. In the next story, a companion throttles the Doctor almost to death under the influence of the TARDIS. In the one after that, Tegana stabs himself to death in the court of the Khan rather than be humbled. And the one after ends with a ritual sacrifice. Death has always been with the Doctor. Saward’s tenure on the programme, aided in no small part due to the departure of Tom Baker’s indomitable interpretation of the character, will open an entirely new window for exploring the Doctor’s vulnerability and culpability.
This is the story where the Doctor picks up arms and becomes an assassin. This is the story that a companion sees someone gunned down, screaming, as she tries to escape. This is the story where a guest character turn around to discover her colleague’s has been blistered and burnt away. Season 22’s tone starts, quite definitively, with this story. A Fifth Doctor story. The fan favourite of 1984.
“Resurrection of the Daleks” spends a great deal of its time developing the characterisation of Davros. It’s the most comprehensive examination of him since his first debut in “Genesis of the Daleks” and it’s there that we find an interesting contrast in the Doctor’s characterisation. We are treated here and back on Skaro to two similar scenes where the balance of power between the two characters is out of kilter. In the heat of the moment, on Skaro, the Fourth Doctor was prepared to kill Davros by cutting off his life support system. The Doctor’s threat drives Davros to nearly commit genocide. However, it’s done in a moment of horror and anger. In warm blood. An attempt at a face-to-face, cold-blooded execution is left to the Fifth Doctor. An incarnation dressed for a garden party.
“A pleasant, open face” was how Terrance Dicks described the Fifth Doctor. His rebirth came from an Arcadian woodland where the greatest danger was a mathematical cat’s cradle. By this point, he’s experienced the slaughter on Seabase 4 among humanity’s own. The in-fighting among the humans and the nihilism of the Silurians. The assassination attempt feels like a reaction to his words: “There should have been another way.” The detail that catches my eye when he puts the gun in front of Davros’s face is that his hands are trembling. This isn’t bravado. It isn’t gallant derring do. This is about a man about to shoot someone in the face to stop them from hurting any more people — and the Doctor can’t do it.
Davros calls him a coward. From his perspective, as a Kaled, someone raised during the Thousand Year War, the Doctor hasn’t the conviction of a soldier. And for that — so many other people will die. Davros will go on to kill hundreds at TAI, pulp Tranquil Repose of its corpses, butcher his way through the Lethe colony… And that’s not even counting what occurs during “Resurrection of the Daleks.” Tegan’s revulsion to the death and carnage around them, and she doesn’t blame him, but can’t find herself going on.
“It seems I must mend my ways,” the Doctor says at the end. But what does that actually mean? “Planet of Fire” will show him at his most detached and resenting. The Time Lord who stands and watches. Even as a man burns to death in front of his eyes. “The Caves of Androzani” will push him to his death as he tries to save one life from events he himself feels responsible for.
Perhaps, that’s the word? Responsibility.
“Do I have the right…?”
“…Am I in the right?”
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Hi Wolfie,
Thanks for sharing more thoughts on ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’. I like how you comment on that this story set up the precendent for what would come in terms of stories for Season 22 with Colin Baker’s Doctor, especially in how it tackles violence and the topics concerning violence. I also like your callbacks to how violence has always been in the TV show from the early William Hartnell days right up to where we are now in the 1980s.
I agree, the ‘mending my ways’ line said by Peter Davison’s Doctor seems to be at odds with how it’s sort-of followed up in ‘Planet of Fire’ with him watching the Master being burned to ‘death’. It’s quite a contrast when story arcs weren’t a focus in the 1980s tenures of ‘Doctor Who’ compared to new series standards where the story arcs are the focus of each season nowadays.
Your “Am I in the right?” is very poignant, especially in connection to the Fifth Doctor’s indecision to kill Davros, which I’m glad I was able to touch on in the ‘Genesis of Terror’ story ‘Psychic Image’.
Many thanks,
Tim 🙂
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Hi Tim,
Thanks. I’ve been turning over the line in my head: “It seems I must mend my ways.” It’s a bit vague… A viewer could take it to mean that the Doctor will attempt to be more proactive in saving lives, but this is something that we’ve already seen from “Frontios”. His almost manic efforts to preserve life on the doomed colony.
Viewing “Planet of Fire”, however, another interesting possibility presents itself. Especially given his treatment of Turlough. I wonder if the line refers to the Fifth Doctor’s propensity to trust. His lack of caution around Stien allowed him to be captured by the Daleks. Bad enough, in and of itself, but that capture put Tegan’s life at risk. Head wound. Deserted warehouse. Foreign country. On her own. Among people who would shoot her dead.
Ironically, it’s only through Turlough’s intervention that Tegan isn’t ultimately killed aboard the Dalek ship. The way in which she leaves — running away from the Doctor — fuels this idea that he abandoned her. He doesn’t know she came back. So, he blames the Daleks, blames Turlough, blames the Master — but, really, blames himself. And his trust is at an all-time low when he gets to Sarn.
Best,
Wolfie
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In retrospect, I have sometimes found, as I’m sure many fans do, that when the Doctor nears his time of the next regeneration, certainly in the 10th Doctor’s case with The Waters Of Mars, his sense of security over his own moral faculties may lessen. This might indicate that it’s time for a new Doctor to take over. Tegan’s traumatic farewell can be an ultimate sign that things were changing faster than the young and vulnerable 5th Doctor could handle, and especially when he couldn’t go through with killing Davros. S21 was the beginning of the end for the 5th Doctor, certainly after how Warriors Of The Deep ended, and so dramatically enough the stories would get considerably harsh.
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Hi scifimike,
It’s interesting to compare the Season 21 stories to the Season 19 and 20 stories, since S19 and S20 had plenty of fun elements to enjoy, whilst the Season 21 stories were less fun or ‘stopped being fun’ as Tegan would put it. It’s probably why I lean to enjoy S19 and S20 more than enjoying S21, as I can find the Fifth Doctor more or less happy in those seasons than in his last season.
Thanks,
Tim 🙂
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Hi Wolfie,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I found it interesting that you remarked on how the Doctor blames himself and everyone around him for abandoning Tegan, prompting him to say that he ‘must mend his ways’ and how it affects his behaviour in ‘Planet of Fire’ due to problems with trusting people, particularly with Turlough and to a certain extent Kamelion. Not sure if that’s reflected well in the Big Finish audios featuring the Fifth Doctor and Turlough, considering ‘Resurrection’ seems to have recently happened for Five in ‘Planet of Fire’. Then again, I’ve not checked out every adventure featuring Five and Turlough between that gap of ‘Resurrection’ and ‘Planet of Fire’.
Best wishes,
Tim 🙂
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Hi Tim,
That’s a good point. The Doctor’s new character development is present, albeit diluted by the passage of time between London and Lanzarote. His character development is more pronounced in other ways. He’s more subdued, certainly. Cynical, absolutely. In the larger gap, he has more time to settle. Like salt to the bottom of a glass of water.
Something I remember is that he keeps others at arm’s length where he can, but he also likes Turlough’s unpredictability. According to “Singularity”, the fact the Doctor doesn’t know what he’s thinking makes him an interesting travelling companion.
We haven’t yet had an adventure that links up directly to the opening of “Planet of Fire”. At least, not to my knowledge. The Doctor’s depressed obsession with the Daleks and Turlough’s question about Tegan (“Do you miss [her]?”) point to something else having happened in that gap to open up those old wounds.
Best,
Wolfie
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Hi Wolfie,
I’m pleased you like how I’ve raised a good point. It’s interesting that ‘Phantasmagoria’, ‘Loups-Garoux’, ‘Singularity’, ‘The Memory Bank and Other Stories’ and ‘Lords of the Storm’ haven’t provided a proper link into ‘Planet of Fire’ from the Fifth Doctor and Turlough’s travels without Tegan. I’m sure it’s something for Big Finish to follow up on in a future box set featuring Five and Turlough. We can speculate that another Dalek adventure happened for Five and Turlough to make the Doctor feel ‘obsessed and depressed’ at the beginning of ‘Planet of Fire’.
Many thanks,
Tim 🙂
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Yeah, I like that reading a lot, scifimike70. There’s an echo in each of the Doctors’ demises on television that have to do with a fundamental element of their characterisations (or the direction of the show). In the first eight incarnations alone:
— The First Doctor dies as a result of maintaining an important historical event. Mondas’s destruction in 1986 must be upheld to preserve the lives of everyone on the planet Earth. In doing so, however, the Doctor is one of the victims of the Cybermen’s energy drain. His final act is to remain true to his convictions and let go of that final tether to this incarnation. (“You can’t rewrite history, not one line. […] I know. Believe me, I know.”)
— The Second Doctor dies as a result of realising that he cannot battle against the evils of the Universe alone. Some problems are so large that they require the assistance of others. Many others. His time in the War Games will prefigure his more permanent association with UNIT as much as intervention from the Time Lords. (“There are some corners of the universe which have bred the most terrible things, things which act against everything that we believe in. They must be fought.”)
— The Third Doctor dies to prove that he can face his own demons alone. In confronting the Great One, he’s struck with a lethal dose of radiation that ravages his body. However, he comes away from Metabelis III with a new sense of indomitability. From here, we can see why his singular wanderlust returned in earnest. (“Courage isn’t a matter of not being frightened, you know. It’s being afraid and doing what you have to do anyway.”)
— The Fourth Doctor dies, curiously enough, as a result of his own self-obsession. His brooding over the TARDIS’s increased age, the departure of Romana, the reappearance of the Master… It all culminates in his realisation that he’s an egotist. Logopolis was the Master’s target, all along, and he was too distracted to notice. Every event to the Pharos Project leads up from there. (“Sometimes my brilliance astonishes even me.”)
— The Fifth Doctor dies as a result of his previous failure with Adric. Something he tries to remedy to the exclusion of all else. Including what he derides as a “pathetic little local war” between the Androzani planets. Interestingly, he would have made it from the caves of Androzani if not for a fumble at the finish line. There was enough antivenom for him and Peri, both, before he dropped it. (“There should have been another way.”)
— [The Sixth Doctor is tricky for how tumultuous his televised tenure is. Blindsided by an unexpected act of violence? That sounds like his time on television in a nutshell.]
— The Seventh Doctor dies as a result of someone else’s machinations. It’s not clear in the TV Movie why he’s been sent to Skaro, but his return to Gallifrey is waylaid by the Master’s interference. His death on the operating table is much down to happenstance than his incarnation’s noted deliberate planning. (“I think I might have miscalculated.”)
— The Eighth Doctor dies as a result of despair at a life not worth living. Rather ironic given his initial appearance and how tightly he clung to that new existence. He’s convinced to destroy himself so that someone more ruthless can take his place. That can be seen either as the ultimate assumption of responsibility or a total abdication of it. (“Please, you have to get me out of here before they kill me again.”)
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Hi Wolfie,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the circumstances of each of the classic Doctors’ deaths from 1 to 8 and how it led them to their regenerations. I like how each of the Doctor’s regenerations is handled differently depending on who’s writing them, whether it’d be by heroic circumstance or incident or whether it’s through predetermined fate. I think the Sixth Doctor’s regeneration into Seven works better in ‘The Sixth Doctor: The Last Adventure’, though it has been a while since I’ve heard that epic audio story. I’m sure the Eighth Doctor has had plenty of regeneration stories, especially as there are now two in ‘The Night of the Doctor’ where he became the War Doctor and in ‘Doctor Who and the Time War’ where he became the Ninth Doctor. 😆 Eight becoming the Shalka Doctor or the Curse of Fatal Death Doctor in other universes seems likely, though it’s never been confirmed as far as I know.
Thanks,
Tim 🙂
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Janet’s development for Tegan was sadly not as good for S21, and particularly due to not having Nyssa with her anymore. I am so glad that she survived her cancer, especially so that she could be in The Power Of The Doctor. Thank you, Tim, for your very review.
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Hi scifimike,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on ‘Resurrection of the Daleks’ and how Tegan was developed in Season 21. It’s a shame how her character turned out in previous seasons compared to this season, but I’ve enjoyed her character development in the Big Finish audios and it was nice to see her return in ‘The Power of the Doctor’ recently.
Many thanks for your comments. Glad you enjoyed my review.
Tim 🙂
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