h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I just watched the last episode of and was thoroughly underwhelmed. Honestly, the writers keep trying to crowbar a bit of moral ambiguity into the Daleks, but it always comes back to >Exterminate<. Is it not time the file was closed on this tired formula and a new nemesis emerged, for a new generation of Doctor Who fans? Has the Evil Cruet Set had its day? Or is this blasphemy?

I didn't strike me as a great double episode, agreed. The writers seem to have forgotten the menacing, stealth aspect that made the Daleks great when Jon Pertwee was running about with them.

Personally, I'd like to see a return of the Robots Of Death, although since they were apparently confined to one Sandcrawler, it seems unlikely.

B

THE DALEKS ARE SUPREME. YOU SHALL BE EXTERMINATED FOR YOUR INSOLENCE!!!

Although, the return of the Sontaarens (spelling?) or the Sea Devils would be good.

i missed it just watched it on catch up agree time to exterminate the daleks

I have to say I have gone off Dr Who a bit, I was glued to first series and liked the second Doctor, but I don't know if it is new asssistant but I seem less gripped by this series.
Perhaps there should be longer gaps between each series, don't know, just less gripped I suppose.

I did find the end an anti-climax - oh it's temporal-shifted again. Getting almost as easy as using that screwdriver for everything!

that screwdriver must have had a parachute he dropped it of the top of the empire state building next time he used it it was in one piece no sticky tape or glue in sight

The special effects don't make up for the the story line which was a bit far fetched even for Doctor Who and could have been done better in one episode.I miss the wobbly sets and the old tardis.

I think there's still space for interesting Dalek storylines, but this one simply wasn't very good. The first one back in the first series managed moral ambiguity in a way that was at least a bit subtle, but this time it just ran roughshod.

And Daleks huddled together in the sewers discussing whether or not they agree with their boss? It was at that moment they lost the last shred of credibility (within the confines of Dr Who, of course - I know they don't really exist <hide-behind-sofa-just-in-case-smiley&gt.

Enough already. They need to be exterminated once and for all.

Deb

Seemed like a poor idea from the get-go to me. Rather fed up of the monotonous eulogising of the human spirit in sci-fi.

Also, we now live in a society which makes regular practical use of genetic engineering and where the very basics of genetics are supposed to be taught to most teenagers. Why, then, did we have to put up with such awful examples of technobabble?

I think there were good points in the episode, but this particular writer is perhaps the wrong person to be using the daleks? A quick bit of research reveals she also wrote 'The Ghost Machine', a Torchwood episode which I thought was quite good.

We have been getting a lot of running through tunnels, an old Doctor Who favourite.
Dont forget, run upstairs to escape Daleks.
I like the jackboot marching we get in Doctor Who now, like SS Stuerm troopers.
We nearly got a cleavage shot in yesterday's programme, would that be a Doctor Who first?
To be honest the programme was beginning to bore me, but I really liked the Shakespeare programme, shown a couple of weeks ago.

I had a dream last night where a dalek was trying to get me. I ran for David Tennant. ( - maybe that was the point of the dream, not the daleks? ) So I suppose I'm not bored of them, but then I've only seen modern Who.

Why cant David Tennant play the Doctor with his Scottish accent.

>And Daleks huddled together in the sewers discussing whether or not they agree with their boss?<

The Dalek looking over his shoulder! That has to best thing about that episode!

Interestingly, of course, the BBC/RTD could decide to kill of the daleks now and you'd never know. Who's to say that Khan wasn't the dalek they found in Arizona?

I suspect much will depend on how much the Nation estate try to keep screwing out of Auntie Beeb.

I must say I was hoping for either the Sontarans or the Ice Warriors to make a comeback this season. But then I am a hopeless sentimentalist and rather enjoyed this stories sly little nods to all sorts of stuff.

"Interestingly, of course, the BBC/RTD could decide to kill of the daleks now and you'd never know. Who's to say that Khan wasn't the dalek they found in Arizona?"
That's my theory. In fact, I thought it was actively implied.
By the way, has anybody else noticed a similarity between Richard Hammond and David Tennant's portrayal of The Doctor?...

I did love the Doctor's quick comment when the lift arrived at the top floor... "First floor perfumery". Most amusing.

Then I thought about it a bit more and thought... hang on. The Doctor watches Are You Being Served? Eh? Does that seem odd to anyone else?

Agree the Daleks are becoming a bit dull. But, RTD loves them. Loves them. So on that basis, as long as this show is his baby, count on the Daleks turning up every year. Of course RTD won't be in charge forever. My guess is he'll probably hand over the reins to someone else, maybe this year, maybe next. He's got lots of other shows still in him, he's not going to stick with Who for much longer, I think.

I would like to see another Dalek story, though. One that demonstrates, once and for all, why we should be scared of the things. "Dalek" was a missed opportunity in that regard.

A few examples:
- when Rose first saw it, she took pity on it. It expressed pain. Now, one might say, yes, it was in pain. And that was how it was played - there was no overt demonstration that anything else was going on. OR... if you're charitable, you can impute to the Dalek another motive. You can infer that it realised that Rose held the key to its regeneration and self-repair, and it needed to manipulate her into touching it. All it would have taken was a Dalek-eye view overlayed with a heads-up display readout saying "Time Traveller detected. Attempt to initiate physical contact". Of course, you'd have a hard time explaining why the readout was in English... But any indication that the Dalek was, in fact, a nasty manipulative b'tard would have been good.
- at one point, the Doctor said "the Dalek's a genius". Some better demonstration of that would have been good.
- the big firefight. Surrounded by gun toting special-forces types, the Dalek flew up in the air, set off the sprinklers, then electrocuted everyone. If I'd been the writer I'd have had the thing roll nonchalantly into the middle of them all, allow them to begin firing, then say "Exterminate", and shoot every one of them, one after the other, using its whizzy new rotating central section feature, all within less than a second. A Matrix-style flurry of movement and firing demonstrating that although *most* of the time Daleks move slowly, on the rare occasions when they can be bothered they can be blindingly fast and deadly. Now that we have CGI Daleks, there's no reason not to.

If a Dalek did *that*, demonstrated real intelligence and massive, overwhelming *speed* as well as firepower, the audience would look at them differently, I think.

So I still think there's room for another Dalek story. But then again, who knows, they could crop up again this year. (Although I think the whole "Mr. Saxon" thing is more likely. Who is he? What is he?).

SoRB

>By the way, has anybody else noticed a similarity between Richard Hammond and David Tennant's portrayal of The Doctor?...<

Due to a DVD frell up on Saturday night, rather than watching the recorded Who, we ended up watching Top Gear on BBC3. So when watching Who last night that similarity occured to me, also.

I don't think you can, ultimately, kill off the Daleks, they are too ingrained in Who mythos. We need a new Davros and I think it was a shame that Sec was killed as he could have occupied that role quite well imo.

SoRB - are you serious? Are you the one person in the country whose managed to avoid the hype surrounding Saxon?

Thanks to the Beeb's desperate need to turn Who into another soap, that plotlines been blown for ages.