Doctor Who: Day of the Daleks: Episode One starts as an attempt is made on the life of Sir Reginald Styles (Wilfred Carter) at Auderley House, the chief representative of the UN who is shortly to fly to Peking & chair a peace conference to try & stop World War III breaking out. His secretary (Jean MacFarlane) informs the proper authorities who in turn inform UNIT & Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart (Nicholas Courtney) who is ordered to investigate the claim & arrange protection for Sir Reginald. Because of the importance of Sir Reginald the Brigadier insists the Doctor (Jon Pertwee) join his investigation, once at Auderley House the Doctor & UNIT find evidence of a sinister plot involving time travel & futuristic laser guns not from this time period...
Episode 1 from season 9 this Doctor Who adventure originally aired here in the UK during New Year's Day in January 1972, it was the first story from Jon Pertwee's third season as the Doctor & as you can guess from the title it marked the return of the Daleks to Doctor Who after an absence of five years since they last appeared in the Patrick Troughton story The Evil of the Daleks (1967) & notably the first time British TV audiences saw them in colour. Originally worked on under several titles like The Ghost Hunters, Years of Doom & The Time Warriors the script by Louis Marks initially didn't have any Daleks in it but they were thrown in there to probably entice viewers to the new season. For a series where the lead character has a time machine the idea of time travel & it's possibilities have been largely ignored in favour of using the TARDIS as a means to get from 'A' to 'B' & little else, I suppose The Time Meddler (1965) is an exception but even that stayed in exactly the same location & time throughout. During this opening episode the Daleks are little seen, in fact they don't really do anything at all. There's a strong mystery element as various themes & intriguing possibilities are brought up & the script deliberately tries to keep the audience guessing & involved. At twenty five minutes in length it moves along at a nice pace & it's good solid Doctor Who fun.
Like during the previous seasons The Mind of Evil (1971) there's yet another world peace conference & yet again it's the Chinese who are causing concern. When Day of the Daleks went into production it was learned that only three Dalek casings were retained by the BBC & no more new ones were made so after a nice new paint job director Bernard only had three Daleks to work with at any one time & one of those was painted gold. One other notable aspect of the Daleks here are their annoying whiny electronic voices which irritate as they speak breaking their words up into very distinct syllable's. The Doctor notes in this that he once met Napoleon & gave him advice while both the Doctor & Jo are visited by their future selves at the start which is quite odd.
Day of the Daleks: Episode One is a good solid intriguing start to Doctor Who's ninth season & it sees the return of the most popular & famous of Doctor Who monsters in glorious colour for the first time.
Episode 1 from season 9 this Doctor Who adventure originally aired here in the UK during New Year's Day in January 1972, it was the first story from Jon Pertwee's third season as the Doctor & as you can guess from the title it marked the return of the Daleks to Doctor Who after an absence of five years since they last appeared in the Patrick Troughton story The Evil of the Daleks (1967) & notably the first time British TV audiences saw them in colour. Originally worked on under several titles like The Ghost Hunters, Years of Doom & The Time Warriors the script by Louis Marks initially didn't have any Daleks in it but they were thrown in there to probably entice viewers to the new season. For a series where the lead character has a time machine the idea of time travel & it's possibilities have been largely ignored in favour of using the TARDIS as a means to get from 'A' to 'B' & little else, I suppose The Time Meddler (1965) is an exception but even that stayed in exactly the same location & time throughout. During this opening episode the Daleks are little seen, in fact they don't really do anything at all. There's a strong mystery element as various themes & intriguing possibilities are brought up & the script deliberately tries to keep the audience guessing & involved. At twenty five minutes in length it moves along at a nice pace & it's good solid Doctor Who fun.
Like during the previous seasons The Mind of Evil (1971) there's yet another world peace conference & yet again it's the Chinese who are causing concern. When Day of the Daleks went into production it was learned that only three Dalek casings were retained by the BBC & no more new ones were made so after a nice new paint job director Bernard only had three Daleks to work with at any one time & one of those was painted gold. One other notable aspect of the Daleks here are their annoying whiny electronic voices which irritate as they speak breaking their words up into very distinct syllable's. The Doctor notes in this that he once met Napoleon & gave him advice while both the Doctor & Jo are visited by their future selves at the start which is quite odd.
Day of the Daleks: Episode One is a good solid intriguing start to Doctor Who's ninth season & it sees the return of the most popular & famous of Doctor Who monsters in glorious colour for the first time.