‘DESTINATION: SKARO’
Please feel free to comment on my review.
Davros (?!) and the Genesis of the Daleks (?!!) with the Fourteenth Doctor (?!!!)
Oh dear! Russell T. Davies isn’t off to a good start with his neo-‘Doctor Who’ era. He’s already upsetting some fans with his retcon of one of ‘Doctor Who’s most popular villains in both classic and new TV show eras. I wonder if having RTD back as showrunner for the TV series was a good idea or not. 😦
Okay, I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s put this into context, shall we? This happens to be a ‘Doctor Who’ mini-episode, which was shown on Children in Need night in November 2023. RTD seems very keen in continuing the tradition of doing a special ‘Doctor Who’ TV item for Children in Need night. 🙂
This is also the first televised appearance of David Tennant as the Fourteenth Doctor since he debuted at the end of ‘The Power of the Doctor’. In-between ‘The Power of the Doctor’ and this mini-episode entitled ‘Destination: Skaro’, there’s a 14-part comic story called ‘Liberation of the Daleks’. 🙂
In fact, I believe the links between ‘The Power of the Doctor’ and ‘Destination: Skaro’ are present in ‘Liberation of the Daleks’, especially when it opens with the ending of ‘Power’ and it closes with the opening of ‘Destination’. This was fascinating to discover in doing my research for this mini-episode.
This is also before we get to have the official 60th anniversary specials of ‘Doctor Who’ on TV. It was nice to see David Tennant as the Doctor again in this mini-episode. ‘Destination: Skaro’ would have been a very decent appetiser for the 60th anniversary specials if other things didn’t get in the way. 😐
In ‘Destination: Skaro’, David Tennant’s Doctor finds himself on the planet Skaro where he witnesses the ‘genesis of the Daleks’ again (more on this later). He inadvertently damages the original claw arm of the Mark III travel machine and he retrieves a plunger from the TARDIS in order to replace it.
Apparently, this Children in Need mini-episode was recorded a year after the three official 60th anniversary specials were made in 2022 and it was recorded on David Tennant’s birthday in April 2023. I think David also did some pick-ups for the 60th anniversary specials at exactly the same time.
It’s nice that the cast and crew sang “Happy Birthday” to David from watching the ‘Doctor Who Unleashed’ behind-the-scenes featurette accompanying the mini-episode. I wonder if the filming of the mini-episode on David’s birthday was pre-planned, especially since he’s a huge ‘Doctor Who’ fan. 😀
On the surface, the mini-episode seems decent, especially when there’s comedy business between David Tennant’s Doctor and Mawaan Rizwan as Mr. Castavillian (Okay, seriously? What was Russell thinking when he came up with that name? 😀 ) The episode might be considered ‘mostly harmless’.
But then, we have the return of Davros in the mini-episode. I have to tell you; I didn’t realise who this was when I first saw him in the episode. It did gradually dawn upon me that this is Julian Bleach as Davros, but without the familiar Davros make-up. He’s also walking instead of being in his chair. 😐
To be fair, Julian Bleach continues to be good as Davros, even without the make-up on. You can see how expressive his face is when he’s performing the character again after such a long while. This would be satisfying to watch if it wasn’t for the continuity issues concerning Davros that can’t be ignored. 😦
So, from looking at Davros in the mini-episode, this is presumably before he had his accident and before he ends up in his life-support unit, which is the bottom half of a Dalek, in ‘Genesis of the Daleks’. Honestly, that would have been okay to accept if it wasn’t for some glaring problems for me.
Years ago in 2006, Big Finish made their spin-off audio series about Davros’ origins on Skaro called ‘I, Davros’, which led to ‘Genesis of the Daleks’. Now, it’s been a while since I’ve heard ‘I, Davros’ as a series, but I can recall how certain things happened in the spin-off audio series compared to ‘Destination: Skaro’.
For one thing, Davros had his accident in ‘Corruption’. He then went on to build the first Dalek with Nyder’s help in the final episode of the spin-off series called ‘Guilt’. At that point, Davros was already disfigured and wheelbound. The first Dalek featured in ‘Guilt’ said its first words at the story’s end. 😐
The point I’m trying to make is that ‘Destination: Skaro’ contradicts established events for Davros in terms of his history and timeline, as Davros has already created the Mark III machine with the Dalek creature inside it before he had his accident and became disfigured and wheelbound. It’s so confusing.
I’m also surprised that RTD didn’t connect ‘Destination: Skaro’ to the ‘I, Davros’ audio series, as that would have been a glorious opportunity to connect both TV series and Big Finish audios for the TV show’s 60th anniversary. Has RTD not heard the ‘I, Davros’ audio series in order to be aware of this?
Mind you, this might be the point of the mini-episode, since David Tennant’s Doctor establishes that ‘the timelines and canon are rupturing’. Meaning that ‘Destination: Skaro’ takes place in an alternative reality and it’s setting up the tone of what’s to come in the 60th anniversary TV specials.
Now, this would have been okay for me to cope with from watching the mini-episode on its own. Usually, I don’t like it when certain established events in Big Finish audios and sometimes in TV are placed in alternative continuities, but if that’s how it was going to be, I would have been fine with it.
But then, RTD ruined things when he made statements in the ‘Doctor Who Unleashed’ behind-the-scenes featurette for the mini-episode that has upset a lot of fans. Apparently, RTD didn’t want to depict Davros as he looked in the past for today to avoid associating a disfigured wheelchair user with ‘evil’.
This is especially for Children in Need, where those with physical disabilities and mobility issues are among those who are being helped by the charity. Now, I can see where RTD is coming from on this, but quite frankly, I never thought of Davros in that way in being a disabled person in a wheelchair. 😐
I’ve read plenty of other opinions by ‘Doctor Who’ fans who feel the same way. If RTD feels this way, why did he have Davros in ‘The Stolen Earth’/’Journey’s End’ – one of the best ‘Doctor Who’ stories in Series 4 of the new TV series? A lot of the things he says about Davros nowadays seem to be hypocritical.
This is especially when he said in the ‘Doctor Who Confidential’ episode for ‘The Stolen Earth’ that he didn’t want to change Davros then. He wanted to keep him the same as he was in the classic TV series. Granted, opinions change over the time, but why would he change his mind about Davros? 😐
And it’s not like Davros is the only wheelbound villain featured in RTD’s original ‘Doctor Who’ era. There was John Lumic who was wheelbound in ‘Rise of the Cybermen’/’The Age of Steel’. For a RTD-penned episode example, Max Capricorn was depicted as wheelbound in ‘Voyage of the Damned’. 😐
I don’t understand the logic to this change in Davros as a character. If RTD wanted to portray Davros as no longer a disabled person, he shouldn’t have done that by depicting him in the past when the ‘genesis of the Daleks’ was happening. It doesn’t sound that progressive enough concerning Davros.
Ways around this could include having Davros appear as he is after ‘The Magician’s Apprentice’/’The Witch’s Familiar’, but having him with cybernetic legs and a rejuvenated body. Heck, the Daleks worked with the Cybermen in ‘The Power of the Doctor’! The Cybermen could provide those legs! 😀
Another option is to not have Davros appear at all, but only hear his voice. Yes, we wouldn’t see him in the flesh, but it could help to avoid the ‘disability with evil’ issue RTD seems to have about Davros nowadays, and it could be just Mr. Castavillian and the Fourteenth Doctor appearing together here.
We don’t even need to have the Dalek guest star in the mini-episode. Or at least, we can have the Mark III travel machine, but we don’t need to have the Dalek talking, especially since it says only one line of dialogue in the mini-episode. Nicholas Briggs didn’t need to come in to voice the Dalek in this story.
By having the Dalek not say anything, it could connect to the ‘I, Davros’ audio series rather well, especially when we see Davros as he was before he became mutilated and wheelbound. There might be more issues concerning the Mark I and Mark II machines, but surely, they could’ve been resolved.
I appreciate the good intentions behind the change to Davros by RTD in the mini-episode, but logically, it doesn’t make sense, especially when you’re trying to connect the dots together. It also upsets those who likely prefer the original Davros compared to the new Davros introduced by RTD. 😦
Incidentally, I believe Nick Briggs voiced Nyder, who contacted Davros via intercom in the story. He sounded remarkably like Peter Miles as Nyder in that moment. 🙂 The Dalek operator also happens to be Barnaby Edwards. Where would we be without dear Barnaby Edwards as the Dalek operator? 😀
I’ve said more than I expected to say regarding a Children in Need mini-episode, but it’s astonishing Russell T. Davies came up with this story and expected people to agree with his latest views about Davros and not wanting to associate him with a ‘disability with evil’ trope that wasn’t familiar to me.
I never saw Davros in that way and it almost sounds disrespectful, not just to the ‘Doctor Who’ community but also to Terry Nation who created the character in ‘Genesis of the Daleks’. I find it a struggle to enjoy this mini-episode, especially when taking into account so many continuity issues. 😦
I’m sure RTD meant well, but it goes at odds with what he said about Davros in the past and how the character was set up as the creator of the Daleks. It’s something not needed, especially when celebrating 60 years of ‘Doctor Who’. It’s dampened my enjoyment of the classic and new TV eras. 😦
If you enjoyed ‘Destination: Skaro’ very much on Children in Need night, I’m happy for you. It’s nice to see David Tennant again, and at this point, I’m looking forward to seeing him in the 60th anniversary TV specials. But this isn’t a great way to kick off the ‘Doctor Who’ 60th anniversary celebrations by RTD.
‘Destination: Skaro’ rating – 4/10
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Bradley's Basement 
Even for a brilliant Doctor Who showrunner like Davies and even for the obviously best intentions, some decisions can bring about more controversy than appeal. Star Trek and Star Wars have been suffering similarly in the hopes of sufficiently refreshing themselves. In this case, I for one just see this minisode as simply a prequel before the tragedy that maimed and crippled Davros. That could make enough sense and for the sake of our natural imagination, it may be just as it was seeing how normal Davros looked as a child in Series 9. So long as the freedom to imagine is honored by those who understand how that freedom works best in our favorite SF shows, then some things may pay off to some extent. Thank you, Tim, for your review.
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Hi scifimike,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on ‘Destination: Skaro’. It’s difficult to judge how this mini-episode will fare well through the passage of time. Maybe in five years, it’ll be looked on more favourably compared to how some viewers reacted to it on its initial transmission back in November 2023. It’s going to be a challenge for me to make sense of how ‘Destination: Skaro’ doesn’t tie-in to the ‘I, Davros’ spin-off series by Big Finish and why RTD didn’t see the opportunity to combine both TV series and Big Finish audio universes together for the 60th anniversary. Then again, the Daleks’ history on Skaro is already confusing, as established in the records found by the First Doctor in the first ‘Daleks’ story on TV when he showed them to Ian and Barbara, involving Dals and Thals and how that doesn’t match to what’s in ‘Genesis’ with the Fourth Doctor, involving Kaleds and Thals. I believe there’s a totally different ‘Genesis of the Daleks’ in the TV Century 21 comics. I’ve not read the comics yet, but it’s fascinating and baffling how there can be varying continuities to establish what occurred in the ‘genesis of the Daleks’ from comic to TV to audio and to TV again.
Many thanks for your comments.
Tim 🙂
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I think that to be fair as possible, this was a Children In Need minisode which is usually meant to be lighthearted, as it was with Time Crash and Space & Time. So Davies’ points on that can make enough sense, even though we’re certainly entitled enough to question how canon such a special minisode could appropriately be. Continuity may always be among the most controversial and inevitable issues with the Whoniverse, yet never without the good spirits to appreciate the lighthearted aspects.
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Hi scifimike,
Yes, I think continuity and canon are always going to be debatable in whatever film series and TV show we’re going to be emotionally invested in like ‘Doctor Who’, ‘Star Trek’ and ‘Star Wars’. Again, I appreciate the good intentions behind this CIN mini-episode by RTD, and hopefully as time goes on, the lighthearted aspects of the story will grow on me. I think we can all speculate on how ‘Destination: Skaro’ fits with the main continuity of ‘Doctor Who’ and it’s fair to assume it takes place in an alternative universe, as established by the Fourteenth Doctor.
Many thanks for your comments.
Tim 🙂
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The origin of the Daleks is more contentious than first appears. We think it’s monolithic. “Genesis of the Daleks” defined their creator and the nature of their creation. However, before that Terry Nation had contributed to two other possible origin stories. “Genesis of Evil” from the 1965 TV21 comic and “We are the Daleks!” from a 1973 Radio Times special.
My interpretation is that the TV21 Dalek comic is a fairly accurate depiction of early Dalek conquests. Barring the first story, which is a revisionist retelling created by the Dalek Emperor to remove Davros’s role from their creation. The Kaleds and the Thals are purged not just physically, but historically as well.
These humanoid Daleks, as they’re called in the comics, could have been sourced from the Dals. ‘I, Davros’ mentions that the Dals and the Tharrons were wiped out in a Kaled genocide programme of the past. The Kaleds and the Thals being the last surviving races of, at least, four on the planet.
I’m happy to let “Destination: Skaro” sit in an alternate timeline. It’s fun, but a bit too goofy when put alongside its fellows. I will credit it for doing what “I, Davros” did when they had the opportunity to tell of Davros’s past. They didn’t make him noble. They showed that the chair and the accident didn’t make Davros into a monster. He already was.
A boy who’d lock his teacher in a radiation chamber to see the effects. A man who smiled as the woman he loved was hanged. Someone who shot dead the closest friend he had at the time because “[he] didn’t need people like [him]”. Who was excited at the mutations in his dying mother’s body. There was a reason why the Fourth Doctor, uncharacteristically, hoped he was dead.
“Destination: Skaro” is a giddy bit of fun, but the whole story — as it’s already been told — is perhaps too nasty for a Children in Need special. As the Sixth Doctor said of Davros, “He’ll destroy you, Mister Baynes. First, he’ll come for your eyes. Then, he’ll be back for the sockets. And he’ll laugh as he does it.”
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Hi Wolfie,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on ‘Destination: Skaro’ and how it fits in with other versions of the ‘genesis of the Daleks’ story, including the TV21 comic story and the Radio Times special as well as the TV series. I’ve yet to check out the TV21 comic stories featuring the Daleks and it’ll be fascinating to see how their history is depicted compared to how it’s done in the TV series, both classic and new. It’s also an intriguing revelation as to how some Dalek records are corrupted in terms of accuracy by the Daleks themselves, including their Emperor, as you’ve mentioned in terms of an attempt to wipe out the Daleks’ ancestral history involving the Kaleds and Thals. Again, it’s been a while since I’ve heard ‘I, Davros’ as an audio series, so thank you for reminding me of how the Dals and Tharrons’ mention in Skaro’s history is made in that series.
Yes, it’s fair to assume ‘Destination: Skaro’ takes place in an alternative reality and I appreciate the mini-episode for establishing that Davros is already a monster before he became crippled and disfigured as we would know him become in the TV series. I think the humour aspects of the mini-episode get in the way of things and if RTD ever explored Davros again in future, it’ll be interesting to see how his history is interpreted in the TV series compared to how the Big Finish audios did things in 2006. The ‘I, Davros’ audio series is arguably gruesome in how it depicts Davros and his interactions with others on Skaro. Yet it’s how I would see him with all the things you mentioned on how cruel he was in how he treated his lover, his best friend and his mother. Maybe an adult spin-off TV series featuring Davros to match ‘I, Davros’ is something I don’t think the BBC would consider nowadays, especially when considering the young audience interested in Davros, but it would be fascinating to see.
Many thanks for your comments.
Best wishes,
Tim 🙂
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