An Hour of Who a Day: June 2: Day of the Daleks Episodes One & Two

June 2: Day of the Daleks Episodes One & Two

"The Daleks are back!" proclaimed the Radio Times cover for this, the opening story in season 9. And it had been five years since The Evil of the Daleks had them definitively meet their "final end". But Terry Nation had failed to sell his Dalek spinoff show in the United States, and so the production team has decided (at the prompting of BBC Managing Director and Dalek superfan Huw Wheldon, who had previously successfully lobbied for a 12-part Dalek epic in the 60s) that it's time for the Daleks to make their return to Doctor Who. Thus Day of the Daleks (the earliest story to still exist completely on its original 2" videotape) arrives to reintroduce the Daleks, and in color too!

And it's a pretty confident production that they've put together. It may start with a rehash of the TARDIS shenanigans from the beginning of The Ambassadors of Death, but it quickly moves on to a tale of guerrilla fighters from the future who, for some as yet unknown reason, are attempting to kill Sir Reginald Styles, a man who's involved in an effort to hold a peace conference and who holds considerable sway in the negotiations. The "time tunnel" effect is a good one, particularly as it evokes the look of the Pertwee title sequence and thus makes that also, pleasingly, look like a form of time travel. And we're introduced to the Ogrons, large ape-like mercenaries sent from the future to stop those guerrilla fighters. This also leads to the most entertaining part of this episode, as the Ogrons, back in their own time, report on the success of their mission: "We... found... and... destroyed... the... enemy," one Ogron says slowly, implying that this race isn't terribly bright. "Any complications?" their Controller asks. "No complications," the other Ogron replies offhandedly, with none of the struggle to speak that his colleague experienced. So maybe it's just that one Ogron who's unusually thick. The Ogrons themselves are a masterpiece of design, looking alien and strong, with really impressive headpieces. And, breaking with tradition (a bit), the Daleks aren't held back until the cliffhanger but are given a brief moment at the halfway point, as it becomes clear that the Ogrons and the Controller are all servants of the Daleks.

Meanwhile, back in the 20th century, UNIT investigates the attempted assassination of Sir Reginald by a seeming ghost, which leads to the Doctor and Jo spending the night in the building waiting for another attack. The most remarkable thing about these scenes is how much an establishment figure the Doctor is -- talking about conversations with Napoleon and enjoying the cheese and wine ("Yes, that's a most good-humored wine. A touch sardonic perhaps, but not cynical") with the air of an experienced gourmand. But other than that, and Jo attempting to feed Sergeant Benton, until Mike Yates swoops in and takes the food from him, nothing happens during the night. No, it's in the morning when the guerrillas make another attempt to kill Sir Reginald, which leads to the sight of the Doctor fighting off soldiers literally single-handedly (as his other hand is holding a glass of something or other), thanks to his Venusian karate skills. It's a very entertaining sight, showing the third Doctor at the top of his game. Only he's also been fiddling with the primitive time machine found earlier, which is sending a signal that the Daleks can trace -- leading to their full reveal, in all their colored glory. Except they've been repainted in dark grey and black, with one gold and black Dalek, so they don't actually look much different from how they did in black-and-white.

Weirdly, the cliffhanger reprise at the start of episode two includes the "sting" that normally signals the end credits. It's said this is because director Paul Bernard assumed that's how these things were done, but it's not at all clear why he would think this. But in any case, it's there and is as jarring as you'd think. However, the bulk of this episode involves establishing that the Doctor is not, in fact, Sir Reginald Styles, which leads to the guerrillas tying him and Jo Grant up in the wine cellar. And that's about it. The Doctor speculates on how the guerrillas must have traveled back in time to kill Styles in order to change history, and we get our first mention of the Blinovitch Limitation Effect (the reason the guerrillas can't go back to yesterday and try to assassinate him again, although no explanation is actually given), and that's largely it.

Well, until the last few minutes, when Jo is accidentally sent into the future, which allows the Controller to know when and where to send Ogron troops to deal with these rebel fighters. The Ogrons evidently don't care about being sneaky, as they march right up to Auderly House to kill the guerrillas -- leading Boaz and Anat to retreat while the Doctor ends up holding them off before following the rebels. This leads to the rather surprising sight of the Doctor gunning down an Ogron in cold blood, which is treated as nothing special at all but just a minor incident along the way. Certainly the Doctor doesn't show any sort of remorse or reluctance to kill the Ogron. It's a strange moment, and it's rather odd that both Terrance Dicks and Barry Letts were happy to let this bit through without complaint.

And then the episode ends when the Doctor, who's entered a disused railway tunnel in search of Anat and Boaz, is confronted by a Dalek! It's actually not a bad cliffhanger, even if it's the sort that normally tend to occur in Dalek stories -- it helps that it's shot very effectively, with a good use of lighting and framing.