Doctor Who: The Power of the Daleks

Yes, that man who looks like one
of the Three Stooges IS the Doctor.

The Power of the Daleks is the third serial of Season Four and the first serial really featuring Patrick Troughton as the Second Doctor who newly regenerated at the end of the last serial. It was originally broadcast in six weekly parts between November 5 and December 10, 1966. Once again, this serial is completely missing with only production stills and the audio available which some wonderful group (Loose Cannon Inc.) put together to create a reconstruction of the episode.

I think this just shows how incompetent BBC is because this is a Doctor's first serial. It's important.

And they let it get destroyed!

Idiots!

Thank God for computers these days. Try losing a modern Doctor Who episode. I'll find a pirated version of it in ten minutes MAX.

Months later...

Well... erm... I'm sorrry?

I had A LOT of difficulty getting through this episode and I'm quite sorry about this. I really am. I intended to watch and write this episode at the beginning of May... I think. However, a number of things got in the way of that. First my uncle died and that really broke my heart because that uncle was very close to being a father to me. Also, he's one of the two main reason I really love most nerdy things; the other being my grandmother. Then, I also switched shifts from first shift at my job to second shift. So I was depressed and suddenly deprived of sunlight which just made me more depressed and confused my internal clock. Then I was also doing an apartment search and trying to have a life on second shift while still mourning. Then, I was preparing to move and also move back to first shift. Then I was sick. Now, everything's okay and I'm ready to keep this blog again!

Oh yes, I also have a social life now. That gets in the way of most internet activities and watching Doctor Who from the beginning because I'm apparently the only person who does that!

There's another reason I had a lot of trouble getting through this serial that are based completely on this episode. See, I've seen the New Series. I have whole episodes nearly memorized in my head to the point I can fall asleep watching them and wake up, hear a single noise and know exactly what's going on.

There is an episode in the New Series very similar to this one with a faster pace... but it's also far inferior. It's actually the Worst Episode of the Moffat Era... according to some people because Moffat pretty much took the Daleks and made them more ridiculous.

Yes, I'm referring to Victory of the Daleks.

And I'm serious. Just replace "I. AM. YOUR. SOLDIER," with "I. AM. YOUR. SERVANT," and you've got the gist of things.

The newly regenerated Doctor shows up on a planet with Ben and Polly just in time to find the corpse of a guy who everyone calls The Examiner. The Doctor poses as the Examiner to uncover the murder and discovers that this human colony on this lone planet has found a capsule of some kind in a swamp and dug it up. A capsule containing Daleks.

The scientist in charge powers up the Daleks and we get the plot. The scientist, Mayor of the Colony, second-in-command, guy lower on the pecking order who manages to weasel his way into the top spot by the end of the serial by offing the other two, and everyone else thinks the Daleks are harmless machines.... when they're blood-thirsty, planet-destroying aliens and the Doctor is the only one who knows the truth.

Eventually, there's a civil war going on between the humans, one side using the Daleks when the Daleks turn on their human "masters" and start killing everyone. The only way the Doctor can defeat them is to destroy their power supply, thus destroying the colony's power supply at the same time because the two have become inextricably linked.

If the episode hadn't been lost, it may have been one of my favorites. If Steven Moffat hadn't copied it so poorly and inserted Winston Churchill, I could have really enjoyed it instead of giggling every time someone claimed the Daleks worked for them.

Instead, I kind of felt it was dull and only liked the part where the Doctor played his recorder/flute thing.

There was a nice bit of continuity to the first Dalek episode EVER where the Daleks are powered by static electricity and must convert the power supplied to them into static electricity and they can't power themselves due to no metal flooring.  That made me happy, but it didn't redeem the episode.

Oh well, next time: we meet Jamie in The Highlanders!