Doctor Who 08X02 "Into The Dalek" Grading/Discussion)(SPOILERS!)

Well. I liked it a LOT more than I liked "Deep Breath".

I liked it very much. I love what Capaldi is doing with his body -- just the way he stands there enforces and reinvents the Doctor. I also love his dialogue.

The episode felt a bit superficial in everyone's initial acceptance that "Death to the Daleks!" had to be a sign of general morality, and with the "bumb this panel to reactivate a suppressed memory" stuff. Both of which could have stayed the same for the plot, if it had been presented a little bit better.

But I really like the fact that they didn't end up with any easy answers. However, if the Doctor doesn't at least try to "save the future" in some proactive way with this new perspective, as he promised, I will feel cheated.

I absolutely adore the new realtionship with Clara. That's so new and deep and multi-layered, it's pure joy to watch.

And I really liked that in speaking about war and soldiers, this episode wasn't afraid to mention our wars and our soldiers. If they manage to say somethng about that in the long run with Clara's companion, even if and especially if it's just questions like this time around, that would be great.

Not a bad episode, but not great either. Agree with Packard that, in only two episodes, the Doctor's relationship with Clara is already better than it was with Matt Smith.

And WTF is up with Missy and heaven? There's obviously a setup there. Better be a good payoff.

I think Missy is a combination of the old meme that Mary Poppins is a time lord, and a female Master regeneration.

Seen it now.
Much better.

I'm just glad there's no sane way for her to be River Song. I mean, I guess there could be a repressed regeneration between "little girl in New York" and "Amy's buddy", but A: they did that already with the War Doctor and B: why would a sociopath feel the need to repress anything?

The episode itself I'm okay on. It's no instant classic, but I wouldn't call it bad or a pointless use of the Daleks.

The Doctor's self-examination is kind of interesting. It would make for an unusual series-long arc, because usually those have a concrete, definite answer out there waiting to be uncovered, whether it's finding the parts of the Key of Time or figuring out why that gash keeps popping up everywhere. This is more open-ended. But then Missy is probably a series-long arc at the least, and she herself is presumably the concrete answer.

Yea. Better but not entirely thrilled. Capaldi still isn't 'The Doctor' for me. And I find the Daleks boring - how often have they been destroyed just to come back a few episodes later.

Solid F! Capaldi is completely miscast as the Doctor, and Steven Moffat doesn't seem to know what he wants to do with the character anymore. The Daleks are boring as usual, and the story as a whole was godawful. I would rather see Doctor Who go on hiatus for another ten years and start over fresh with new show runners than to continue to watch it be destroyed with Capaldi.

How many people died while they were dicking around with the "Wait, we can make him good!" shit?

Exactly. Thought at first that was an homage, but then it turned out to be a neon sign. The basic plot is a direct lift from TNG’s “I Borg.” Rusty will return to the Daleks as a virus the same way Hugh did with the Borg.

Disproportionate number of Daleks being held off by far too few humans far longer than was plausible. Why didn’t the Dalek ship just vaporize Aristotle once they located it? Answer: Because then you wouldn’t have all those cool battle scenes.

Those are the negatives. Lots of positives, but I'm still mulling. More later.

How many lives would have been saved if it had worked? Worth at least a try. They'd all have been dead without him turning at the end anyway.

That's not how Daleks operate. They're all about killing individual beings face to eyestalk as often as possible, not wiping out large groups from a distance.

Well, okay. I guess that's a legacy of the original show's skimpy budgets. And maybe it’s just me, but I simply can’t take the Pepper Pots with Plungers seriously. They're clownish, and I'm glad I'll never meet one because I'd be too busy laughing to do anything. (That episode a few seasons back when they showed up in designer colors, like iPods? Pulleeze!)

Also, this recurring “they’re pure evil” theme is disturbingly religious for an ostensibly religion-neutral show. Really it's just silly, especially now that we know radiation poisoning can “turn them good.” Was that intended as a message about the “bad brain chemistry” that creates schizophrenia in humans, for example, or is just “Let’s give the Daleks radiation poisoning and pacify them” as a future weapon if Rusty doesn’t do the job?

Because the deeper message starts off with the Doctor’s question to Clara, “Am I a good man?” Neither of them can answer that, yet Rusty sees the Doctor’s inner “evil.” I do hope that’s to be explored further. Because IMO the Doctor has an awful lot to answer for.

For example, while I loved “You don’t need to be liked; you’ve got all the guns,” the Doctor’s refusal to let Journey Blue tag along because “I just wish you hadn’t been a soldier” doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Can we remember what happened to Martha Jones courtesy of his intervention? He should talk.

I’m probably giving this far more thought than I should for what’s essentially a fun show, but still.

So in this episode we have the familiar trappings. Lots of ‘splosions, lots of running, the Companion being the one responsible for coming up with “something brilliant.” Gives it a familiar feel.

Not sure what to make of Missy just yet. Liked Diacanu's suggestions about Mary Poppins and yet another Time Lord. River Song has her place in the history; let's leave her there, please.

One more little niggle: I’d have liked a brief scene of the survivors being reverted to normal size (awfully convenient that the shrinky-device wasn’t destroyed in the battle). Just run the footage of them being shrunk backwards to save a few bucks. Instead, there they are, no longer covered with slime, every hair in place, no ill effects. Ready to go home now, ta!

But Capaldi’s brilliant. Agile without being goofy, nuanced, edgy, conflicted, intelligent without having to remind everyone every five minutes about how brilliant he is. Complex, as a thousand-year-old being should be. I like.

"Pure evil" is how the Doctor describes the Daleks. They are, as I think you mentioned in your earlier thread, very simple antagonists: they want to destroy everyone who isn't a Dalek. This is the antithesis of the Doctor's outlook, which is generally in favor of life, even life that's trying its best to not get along with him at the time. In this episode, in fact, he says that he saw the Daleks' horror and decided to define himself as the opposite of everything they stood for, in which case they are pure evil from his standpoint, by definition.

If anything, the remark about the Doctor having "divinity" is more religious than calling someone evil.

I find the categorical abhorrence of soldiers curious as well. It's not surprising that the Doctor would find soldiering distasteful, since he's basically Chaotic Life and a soldier is by definition Lawful Death, but he's gotten along fine with soldiers as recently as Matt Smith. It might have been just for this episode, it might have been to set up tension with Clara's budding boyfriend, or it could be part of the broader pattern of Capaldi's developing personality. Personally, I'd think having around someone who could follow directions would appeal to him!

That's what fandom's all about!

Speaking of

No, it's because these are slaver Daleks. We've had them before, they first turned up in the second Dalek story ever. Notice how they call their antagonists "rebels". That's not a word for a species you want to eradicate, but for subjects you want to rule over. (Oh, and they got the "resistance is futile" thing going before the Borg ever made it to our screens.)

The abruptness of turning away from Blue, especially as Clara went along with it so easily, is one of the rough edges, of which there were several; the whole episode seemed to lack the second rewrite. But the Doctor's hatred for soldiers is well-established, has always been a hate/love/self-hatred kind of oscillation, and started off with his dislike for UNIT even as he first started working for them. And with this Doctor having basically spent the last 500-odd years defending a little pacific hamlet against various armies, it does make sense that it would be on the top of his mind. Especially since it's also always been about his being a soldier, and hating it. I read Clara's line that she doesn't have a rule against soldiers as a hint that she recognizes that the Doctor, among many other things, is one, and she's prepared to travel with him even if he isn't.

NAHTMMM, Packard, this is the difference between a n00b and a couple of veteran fans.

I only started serious watching with Matt Smith's first season, so I'm pretty noobish myself

River Song is in the Library, where dead "souls" get saved in an artificial world. I don't think it's River, but never underestimated Moffats ability to shoehorn her in where she isn't needed.

The Daleks design works in universe because there isn't really anyone saying they are incredibly well designed, and in fact the first time characters who haven't heard of Daleks encounter them they almost universally have the reaction you do. Right until the shooting starts.

They were built as weapons by a mad man, and deemed themselves to be the universes supreme form of life. Remember that the Daleks draw a lot from Nazis. Just because they think of themselves as superior doesn't mean they are, but don't dare underestimate them,because the instant you do they'll have you.

Shrinky-device wasn't needed, there was already a scene where they told Clara she just had to push a button on her wristband (I think) to return to normal size.
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Indeed.
Garamet, watch "genesis of the Daleks".
When you see Davros, you'll go "ohhhh, okay".

And I just pictured Gwyneth Paltrow dealing with the results of Tony Stark's over indulgence at the taco bar.

But you write about it all with such authority...I'm impressed. I didn't start until they announced Capaldi would be taking over, then did an Eccleston-to-Smith marathon over several weeks.

Forgot about that...

I do remember that one.

Don't like Daleks. Weeping Angels, now. That's some scary.

You found Genesis of the Daleks boring?

I'm not sure whether that is mathematically possible.

Don't like Daleks. Sue me.

You beat me to it...it's really the perfect set up for this. If River's gone balmy in there and taken over Cal's computer world she could very easily be "saving" those people.

Episode 7 of this season is called "Kill the Moon"...There was Doctor Moon in that computer world, a River episode called "Day of the Moon"...I could see this all leading up to her being River.

Unfortunately.

However....the actress playing Missy has an incredible likeness to Kate O'Mara (The Rani) which would be a much more interesting twist.

That's certainly more likely. If you look at the garden it has a very TARDIS style layout, and this episode made a point of showing us the Doctor using his TARDIS to pick someone up at the moment they would have died.

I like Capaldi, and as I've said like the new tone as we. I hope this isn't River, I'll be pissed if it is. Hopefully the parallels with saving people via TARDIS in this episode mean we're looking a some sort of Time Lord.

Oh and Black Dove, stop watching.

I'll still pass.

As for the authority with which I write . . . I'm just good at thinking about stuff and picking up on whaddayacallit, cultural undercurrents or whatever. Something French I think.

I hope not, hopefully Rusty will start killing Daleks in the way Daleks kill other beings, especially as as there was no way for Rusty to transmit his change - it was a hardware rather than software alteration.

As for there being a 'good' Dalek, that possibility was baked in during Genesis when Davros opted to excise moral cores from them, the prospect of someone reversing that is something that ought to have been revisited before. What better weapon to tackle the Daleks than, well, Daleks?

It was hardly the most exciting ep, and was during the early days of pointless escapes only to be caught again, plus was a poor riff on Frankenstein (although done a lot better than Brain of Morbius' hamfisted Tempest)

It wasn't even internally consistent, with Davros being horrified at his creation destroying both his enemies and his allies - he ought to have been cackling after his little chat with the Doctor about a virus capable of killing anything, and only pissy at not having control over them.

Even the standout scene, with the Doctor querying if he had the right to kill all the Daleks was made moot by him blowing up the chamber later anyway.

Hell, part of the Doctors remit was to see if he could the Daleks a little less genocidey, which he ought to have been able to do by reversing some of Davros' programming.

The Tom Baker era had an awful lot of episodes that, if they had used a less bonkers actor, wouldn't have been viewed as well as they are.