Dr. Who and the Daleks

"We will go to the city of the Daleks..."

Writer: Milton Subotsky

Format: Movie

Released: 25th June 1965

Series: Movie Adaptation #1

Featuring: Dr. Who, Susan, Barbara, Ian 

Synopsis 

Accidentally thrown together, Dr. Who, his granddaughters, and their friend Ian cross the universe in Who's new invention, the space and time machine known as TARDIS. When they land on the planet Skaro, the travellers meet the kind and placid Thals, who live in fear of the dreaded Daleks. Somehow, the Doctor and his party must find a way to help the Thals overcome the deadly mutants who live inside impenetrable metal casings.

Verdict 

Dr. Who and the Daleks was a very interesting watch and serves as my first blog entry that I would consider not to be canonical. For a start, it's name is something I immediately dispute as although it was common throughout the 1960s and a good proportion of the 70s, this programme is called Doctor Who. Doctor is not a two letter word when it comes to this glorious show and it's the one thing that pains me about the early Classic era. This film is obviously based upon The Daleks but this really was a quite different story. For a start Susan and Barbara were sisters! Susan was a young girl of around nine years old and Ian arrived as Barbara's boyfriend. Now there's no secret that we know Ian and Barbara had feelings for each other we didn't quite see things like this movie portrayed. Despite my annoyance, I will call Peter Cushing's character Dr. Who because he is absolutely not the Doctor. It's a very strange interpretation of the lead character from Doctor Who and we actually see him in his bloody living room! It's claimed that he invented TARDIS and for some reason we seem to have lost a 'the' prior to referring to the time and space machine. I thought the interior was absolutely shocking to be honest and considering some of the sets in the Dalek city, the inside of the TARDIS was just clustered. It looked tacky and just a downright mess which was a shame. The fluid link section looked horrendously bad I must say. I did like though that we could see the police box doors from inside the TARDIS and that's something that the modern interior would have. Well it's good that at least something good came from this movie. I thought the design of the Daleks was actually brilliant and seeing them in colour in the 1960s must have been a real treat for fans, even if the story wasn't too good. I actually love The Daleks and it is up there with my favourite stories of all time, but the deviations in this film really ruined it. It was rushed, sloppy and unclear in a lot of places. If you weren't an avid Doctor Who fan and were watching this film I imagine you'd be confused. The petrified jungle looked similar to the original televised version which was good but I'm not sure why Ian was so clumsy about pretty much everything. The Thals looked good but I wasn't too struck on the women looking to impress. That seemed to be the excuse for mirrors to be used to interfere with Dalek signalling in what was a pretty poor resolution to dealing with the Daleks and help prevent the atomic bomb from being dropped. The radiation inclusion was good and they didn't really deviate from that part of the story but things leading into the Dalek city, the ambush on the Thals and Susan retrieving the radiation tablets just seemed rushed. Alydon was a good character once again although he still trusted the Daleks far too quickly. I can understand that it had been generations since the war had raged on Skaro but things were still premature. The ending was at least exciting and you always need a good climax in a movie, even if it is based on a Doctor Who story. The film must have been a success for a second Dalek movie to have been commissioned and I will also be shortly blogging that but sadly I must say that I wasn't a huge fan of this adaptation for the big screen. Peter Cushing played his role well, but for me he is not the Doctor. Overall, strange and intriguing but just not for me. 

Rating: 6/10