Daleks Are Forever

[00:51]

Hello, dear listeners, and welcome back to Flight Through Entirety, the only Doctor Who podcast who promises you unlimited suet pudding.

I'm Brendan.

I'm Nathan, and I'm a curious amoeboid with oddly grafted features.

Just what you'd expect to find in 1963 shortage.

It's remembrance of the Daleks.

Can I just be Pamela?

I'd like to start this episode with a correction from a friend of the podcast.

I do apologise.

I've looked through Twitter and I can't find the original tweet, but it turns out that Doctor Who last season did not go up against Coronation Street.

It was went out on Mondays in the UK, but this year it is going up against Coronation Street.

Really?

Yeah, it's against all Lawrence Miles and Tutwood received wisdom.

[01:51]

Yes I know. perish that those 2 would move him. make an error.

Rock's the faction paradox to its foundation.

I think it's also a good time to mention Jody Bleeding Whittaker, gentlemen.

How exciting.

I'm terrible excited.

Is that her middle name?

I thought it was David.

Or Davo to her mate.

Um...

Yes, Borian Levine.

I don't think there's a lot to be said, but at the end of the day.

J.D. Whittaker's been gone now and we're done. we've said everything My friend Drew, I'm not sure if she listens to the podcast, but she put up a wonderful imagined conversation between the various doctors, the 1st doctor that just says, what are you talking about, change?

Who are you people?

Well, I mean, that is exactly the point.

You know, people keep talking about the doctor being a shape shifting alien, which I just think is kind of ridiculous.

It's just a person who gets recast every year.

The idea that there's no one's told him.

[02:52]

There's some sensible in universe reason for it.

It's just absurd.

They don't invent regeneration until, you know, well and truly into the 1970s after it's kind of happened twice.

And, uh, it's just a way of getting rid of Bill Hartnell and casting Pat Trout and there's nothing sort of really...

And then a woman, if you're, yes.

I was going to say Tom Baker, but no, if you're the lovely founder of our lovely program, David Williams slash Sydney Newman.

Yes, that's right.

I wonder, that's an interesting combination, fiction effort, isn't it?

I'm fiction for Sydney here.

The funny thing is I...

She can come back as a woman.

I think for this podcast, I would block you off that we need to celebrate the introduction of Jody, Whitaker, by supposing what would other characters be like?

I would like to recast the nemesis as Brian Blessed.

And both is lady painful. of my life, fire of my loin.

I want to say that.

[03:55]

Have you never wondered who he is?

I'm 57 and I shag everything.

You know, he said that too, my llama.

We've all been discussing it this week.

I'm 57.

I can't keep it.

The statues are alive.

Look, I'm...

The thing is, I'm in the...

I think wonderful situation of I've never seen Jodie Whittaker in anything.

I saw her last night and hardly noticed her.

She's in Titanic slash Dunkirk.

Oh, right. whatever.

She's a Geordie, isn't she?

she's northern.

She does a northern accent in a film.

She is actually northern.

I've seen her interviewed on a breakfast Prague.

She's Gracie Fields.

We're going to be hearing.

Because that's but just threaten the world or the universe sung out there.

Well, she does that accent in adult life skills, but I watched her in Attack the Block last night and I thought, I thought that was really fun.

That might be my pick of the week later.

And, um, you.

And she's just doing a sort of standard sort of London accent.

[04:58]

Nice accent.

Yeah.

I'm actually more concerned.

This is an honest to goodness.

I am more concerned.

I'm so bloody relieved at the casting.

You know, it's 8 years too late.

We've all, we've all thought it and said it.

It does feel like a drastic repitch for falling ratings, but it's about bloody time.

But my real concern is what's she going to do with the accent?

I really am.

I'm really...

Russell said it.

I don't want to hear us rattling around the Midlands.

Yeah, well, we've had I mean, we've just had a Scottish accent.

I think probably they'll go traditional.

I hope so.

I'm looking to do Lumley. like a super posh accent.

Well, because, you know, it's Canon now.

Yeah, the 13th doctor's a woman again.

Yeah.

It was a raised eyebrow from radio.

But, um, I, as I say, I haven't seen her in anything, and I'm actually kind of determined not to, because with Matt Smith, I'd never...

Not going to watch you and Ian Levine, you're refusing to.

I'm going to see the program, but Matt Smith and Christopher Eccleston.

[05:59]

I'd never seen in anything before I watched them in Doctor Who.

So I came I came to Doctor Who without expectations, whereas Peter Capaldi, I was familiar with, for, you know, he did an early Poirot.

He did guest spots in lots of things.

He did the thick of it. familiar with all that.

Brendan personally with vile Scottish himself.

I wish whenever I see him interviewed.

He just seemed so lovely.

I think I've told the story where I almost ran it, literally ran into him in Coffin Garden when I was living there in lush.

I know.

I'm waiting for the euphemism.

I was right there.

You didn't even have to pause and draw breath.

I was bounding down if I was he was coming up and even though I almost ran into him.

He stood off to one side. and he said, oh, I'm so sorry, please.

Please, would you care to share my bars?

Given that he was only Malcolm Tucker at the time?

I fully expected to be given some instructions on how to do impossible things to my anatomy in a Scottish accent.

And he didn't If you have suggestions.

Anatomy, please do writing on a piece of soap.

But, you know, I thought to myself, oh, I should go off and watch Broadchurch, and I should watch Attack the Block, and I should watch all these things she's in, and then I thought, no, wait, and have the 1st thing you see, Jodie, were to get in, be Doctor Who.

[07:10]

So it's it's a matter of, you know, if if Rod Sudley said to me, oh, I fancy watching Broadchurch, I'd watch it, but I'm not going to go out of my way to watch anything Jodie Whittaker.

I want to come to it completely fresh.

So a long time to wait, though.

Bring back the doctor. don't hesitate Have you seen the people on Twitter have started writing doctor in address?

Dr. in a dress?

He's a doctor, not a doctor.

Make an address.

Bring back his cock.

We won't take lessons.

Yeah, so should we have a little Delphic bay leaf chewing moment, oracle moment and say what we feel is going to happen with the show?

Is that correct?

appropriate thing, do this and that?

I think my favourite daily match headline has been 1st Doctor Who story with Jodie Whittaker will just be men telling her how time travel works.

But no, I think a wonderful way to do it would be if We do say get some returning characters maybe Kate and all is good, and if they do react differently to the doctor who then uses that as a point to make, no, you don't have to react differently because I'm a woman.

[08:20]

I'm still the same person.

I am still the doctor.

I think Kate would say you've based yourself on me.

And well, not only that, but remember, Bill's last words that the doctor heard were, you know how I'm into girls and people around my own age?

I'm glad you know that.

I thought he said, I thought he heard stay.

I thought you said stay warm.

That ended on the cutting room floor, didn't it?

Dirty old mug.

Because that's the thing.

I think they are going to address the change in gender. somehow in the dialogue and in the narrative. you've hit it right there.

It's actually built.

You say that, I just think, will your partner say that?

Yes, yes.

Not really.

I still hear that as William Hartner.

And he could he could carry it off too.

Yeah, no, that's why.

Just I don't mind that there's an excuse.

There's a reason that he picks up faces and that he picks up accents in the same way. the only way to excuse David Tennant.

Well, I mean, I'm more interested in seeing what Chris Chibnall's going to do because I kill it, obviously.

[09:23]

Yeah, I don't think it's that good a writer, but he's...

Is it wounds?

Cyberwoman person, but also the power of three.

Yeah, the power of 3 is pretty good.

Yeah, but how much of that was Moffat fingering?

With his finger of omega.

Moffat slash.

You know, it seemed a step above the stuff Moff was doing that year, I have to say.

To say, I'm in like power of three.

Yeah.

It was homey again.

It had people that we liked.

Actually, that's what I want to see.

Whoever the companion is, and I think they are going to go from a male primary companion.

They may also bring in a female companion.

John and Julian, yes.

Yeah, whoever the companion is, yeah. want them to have a family again.

Really good legs.

Yeah, bring back a young Jamie type in a...

He could wear skimpy clothes and be hot and ask dumb questions.

What's happening, doctor?

That be awesome.

Let's bring back Jeff from the 11th hour.

Yes.

Yeah, why not?

The one with the one with the laptop.

She'll remember that too.

[10:24]

She'll dash right.

Didn't they tell you to get a girlfriend, Jeff?

Jump at my box.

Well, we're about 3 hours into our...

Remembrance of the Daleks.

First story with Ben Aronovich. as a writer.

Have you read his other stuff?

I really like his London plodder books. you read those?

No, like Rippers of London and things.

There'll be Rivers of London.

It's a great speech in Parliament by Sir Ian Benerangovic Paisley.

No, they're really good.

It's kind of like, you know, slight psychic and woo-woo stuff, but it's a, so it's a crossover and it's very 270s, 80s TV cop show with, with Doctor Who mashed up in it.

Well, the novelisation was amazingly good.

I remember that.

It is, sorry, tear once.

It is the best target novelisation.

I think it is.

Well, it has, I think the new adventures owe a lot to it.

Yeah, it wouldn't have commented.

Absolutely.

[11:25]

And also, not that I think it's a direct influence by any means, but if you haven't read, say, the novelisation of Remembrance of the Daleks, and I should mention, where about the 5th Australian podcast doing a remembrance of the Daleks episode this month?

No.

Like new to who's done one.

I think Crinoid podcast has done one in the UK.

Just serendipity that all these people are doing those.

But I was going to say that...

But Game of Thrones, the Game of Thrones.

He's doing a podcast on Remembrance of the Daleks because the books are told.

Each chapter is from the perspective of a different character.

So instead of having chapter one, chapter 2, chapter 3, you've got Arya one and then a few other people and then Arya 2 and then a few other people, Arya 3.

I have no idea what he's talking about.

It's the way Christopher Nolan makes films and the new Dunkirk one is the same thing he's documented before and he talks about it as time comparisons.

But yes, you reshoot the scene from a different perspective.

It's confusing for a viewer, but as the narrative goes on, you feel even more drawn in.

Well, that's the idea.

[12:25]

You either do that or you're not off.

Well, that it really works in this novelisation of this story, because we are constantly shifting characters and we're getting some insight into them, and it just shows how much thought Beneronovich put into his characters, because as explored, getting ahead of ourselves, later in the countermeasures spinoff, which features characters from this, Rachel, Professor Rachel Jensen, is Jewish, and that comes up in the novel and her feelings 20 years after the war and what have you.

And also comes up with these spoiler alert racism of Mike Smith.

You know the original character boots in this, don't you?

Well, I can always just 1st off say this is so much better than unit ever was.

Yeah.

And that's a little bit embarrassment-y to say that, but it really, really, really is.

But before we talk about antecedents, we should really talk about the characters because Rachel was, of course, written as Dr. Rachel Israel.

Yeah, yeah, it was really sort of pointed.

[13:26]

Yes, just in case you missed it the 1st time around.

And of course, Ratcliffe was Mr. Gummer.

Do you know who Gumma was?

I had to write it down myself.

Um, but he was, um, Industry secretary, John Selwyn Gummer, and he loudly and formally resigned from the Church of England when they ordained Dawn French.

It is amazingly, amazingly good, isn't it?

Like it's a massive, massive jumping quality.

I didn't think season 24 was bad.

But do you remember, Richard?

They actually showed remembrance of the Daleks with season 24.

So we 1st saw it tagged after Dragonfire.

And we didn't expect it.

And it was so good instantly, just so amazing.

And it manages to constantly reference things.

So it, it does unit only well, you know.

And, you know, like I loved unit, unit was, you know, the family, you know, back in the 1970s. it was sort of sweet and fun and it's comfort food, but it was always a sort of uh sort of incompetent television army.

[14:31]

Whereas this is it sort of reimagined as something else.

But this is absolutely packed full of references to previous Doctor Who.

Without, you know, requiring you to have the Doctor Who Monster book on hand.

Well, that's a bit of a relief, isn't it?

Because it's entirely about It's entirely about contemporary Britain's take on the present and the past at the same time, just like Christopher Nolan.

Yeah, like Ben Aronovich said, one of his purposes in setting the story in 1963 is he didn't want to sugarcoat the past and he wanted to point out that, okay, yeah, we defeated the Nazis and one of ideas with the Daleks was Nazism.

We also discussed that communism was an influence way back in episode one.

But Benoranovich's perspective was, that doesn't mean we defeated racism, and that still existed in the 1960s, and he said to Andrew Cartmel, I'm not going to sugarcoat it, and Cartmel said, yep, brilliant.

And we get these dynamics between the characters.

There's a deleted scene between Rachel, Allison and Mike, where they're waiting for Ace to come out of the boarding house.

[15:35]

Rachel and Alison kind of tease Mike that he fancies Ace and Mike says, oh, not yet.

Yeah, I know.

But not yet, but I want to know more about her and then say, what do you mean?

And he says, well, I wouldn't want it to be foreign, would I?

That's cut out though, isn't it?

It's cut out.

And I think it's a good thing it's cut out because it makes his, it makes his bigotry a bit more nuanced, but at the same time, that is something someone would have said without, without shame in the 19th.

It is.

And also, and it's nice that Mike's racism is so received from his mum.

We need to talk about who his mum is too, because she crops up quite a bit.

She's Mrs. Bigmead.

Kathleen bit me.

No, she may not be our Mrs. B. But she, but bid me did use her.

So said, oh, God.

Aronovich wasn't the only one looking at the early 60s and certainly around this Bay of Pigs, Kennedy's assassination time. just happened to be 25 years, but a lot of other contemporary fiction TV shows.

Britain just generally politically socially was looking at this stuff.

[16:39]

And as we've talked about Judge Dread, and we've talked about Alan Moore, and we've talked about films of the time, scandal comes out 2 years later about the Profumo affair with Ian McKellen, as John Profumo.

But not in a gray, a lovely long gray curtain.

We just have the outline around.

British culture was reanalyzing its post-war past, and finally, not as the golden age that our parents professed it had been, you know, and there were people like Nathan and I who were born a little while ago.

I think that Mike's final funeral is actually a funeral for the blanket blinkered optimism of our parents' generation about this time.

We're reappraising it in a truthful way, and you're seeing it all across TV and film at the time.

The novel is clearer about that because it deals with the characters, thoughts about the war.

Like, think about the title, right?

By this point, you have to have blank off the Daleks ever since.

[17:40]

But you have Genesis Destiny, and then it's our word of the Daleks, isn't it, after that?

Yeah, ritual reticule of the Daleks. relocation, rehash of the Daleks, repetition of the Daleks.

Reticular vector gate.

But, um, Recidivism.

Remembrance is, because it ends with a funeral, it sort of makes sense. on the in the televis show, it doesn't really make sense as a title.

Apart from the fact that we're remembering the origins of Doctor Who as a show.

But in the novel, what we're remembering is the war, like we're remembering the Second World War.

It's telling, you know, TV of the period is so post-war, isn't it?

You know, even when you watch Fulty Towers, you know, the war is still there in people's minds and that's in the early 70s, you know.

So it's an important thing in the lives of everyone.

And that having the villains literally be Nazis is, or, you know, fascists, British fascists, is fantastic.

[18:43]

And, and for the novel, I think Aronovic invents Manisha, doesn't, yeah, Ace's friend Manisha, who will become a bigger part of her story next season and through to the new adventures.

Yeah, yeah.

So you've got, you know, like her Asian friend who's flat is fire bombed by sort of white supremacist by skinheads in the 1980s and uh, you know, that's why Ace takes that thing so, so seriously.

And I love the scene where she finds the no coloured sign because it's the kind of thing that Doctor Who hasn't had, you know, Doctor Who very rarely goes back to the recent past, it very...

No.

That was quite an issue at the time.

You know, that's the scene that GNT wanted to cut out.

Yeah, because it was too political, I imagine.

And yet when they took it to show it to Jonathan Powell, famously, um, Cartmel, tell us a story that Jonathan Powell took a phone call during the episode and so it was turned away from the screen when that scene went on and Andrew Cartmel did something that he found out later.

[19:47]

You just do not know.

You're not allowed to do it, yeah.

He grabbed the remote and said to Jonathan, I'm so sorry.

I think it's very important you see the scene, rewound it and played it.

And at the end of the episode, Jonathan Powell said, thank you for rewinding it.

That scene is the point of the episode.

She should have torn the sign up.

And then punched Mrs. Smith in the face.

It is such a powerful moment, especially because, you know, we've seen with Ace already, just in 2 stories, that she is the kind of person who will take actions before she considers them, not all the time.

But the thing is, she goes to challenge Mrs. Smith and then kind of just goes.

Besides, yeah, what's the point, you know, and I'm going out for some fresh air, like, no, I can't I can't be here with you.

I would rather go fight a bunch of Daleks.

And I think, which is a proper British or small.

Yeah, it is actually.

There's the thing of taking on the tune. also a very wartime thing of, you know, there was candour in not in non-disclosure.

[20:50]

So yeah, intimacy was expressed by what you didn't say.

Oh, I shouldn't say, it just me, intimacy.

But understanding and compassion was conveyed by what isn't said.

As a kid watching that?

I didn't know what coloured meant in that sense.

So my parents had to explain it to me.

And I think I said during a live tweet, I think that was my 1st knowledge of what racism was.

We kind of said last season that Doctor Who is being they're attempting to make Doctor Who on several levels again.

And here they're more capturing the child teenage and older audience, I think, in this story than last year.

And I think the whole story sends a really good message about racism, especially when Mike tries to justify his actions and uses the words, you know, you've got to keep everyone out to give your own people a chance and Ace just rounds on him.

Yeah.

And, you know, it makes it clear.

Five of them rapidly. makes it clear that I could have liked you.

We could have been something, but...

It could have been someone, but you just keep rattling on about Adam Faith.

[21:52]

These pretty blonde hair.

I've got blonde hair.

He freaks out and fake.

But that's what makes this so good is that the Daleks are having a racial divide.

Rachel Divine.

Rachel Divine. great, isn't it?

Make sure Sue is crisis.

Rachel Panama.

No, we're not going there again.

What do you call it?

What do you call a divisive article in a tabloid?

Miranda Divide.

Okay.

The Daleks have a racial divide.

And you know, we're as humans go, oh, I could see the viewers for the listener in the UK.

Yeah.

And we go, oh, we're so much better than Daleks.

It's like, really?

Are we?

You know, we've got a boarding house who doesn't allow, quote unquote, as the episodes as coloured people in there, but we also have a speaking black character in the form of Joseph Marcel in the cafe scene.

Which is another beautiful scene where the doctor comes to get his cup of tea late at night and the whole bit about...

It is a bit good, isn't it?

Sure.

I think that's a little secret name they have for each other. anything to do with what appeared on screen.

[22:57]

Well, I quite like that because it gives the doctor a little bit of interiority because what does the doctor think about, you know, overthrowing the Daleks or uniting Paradise Towers or doing whatever the hell it is he does in Dragonfire.

Um, here, he's planning to do.

He's planning to do something.

He's planning to do something big.

You know, he's planning to destroy Skaro and it's all in his mind from the very beginning.

And so we get a scene where he thinks about whether that's the right thing to do or not.

And the way that's told.

We don't directly get to see what the doctor's thinking, but we do get him to have that lovely conversation with the cafe owner.

And I love that the cafe owner, just, not the cafe owner because he's, um, That's Harry, isn't it?

Yeah, the guy working.

Barry Fowler. you know his 1st film is in 1947, Ewan cry.

And in the 50s, he played paramour to Joan Collins.

I had enough of that.

[23:58]

That's why they called him...

He's had another...

That's why that's why they just called him Harry because she can't, you know, everyone, everyone knew him.

No, there's lots of old faces in this.

But Joseph Marcel plays John.

So I love the fact that he just dismisses the whole angst about it.

He has no sort of particular philosophy.

It's just best thing is to get on with it.

And you know, all of that agonising gets kind of laughed at and thrown out the window.

It's very cool.

And another thing I love about that scene is actually where they cut it.

They cut it after that line of best thing is just to get on with it, which is the human reaction, and it's showcasing the human reaction versus the doctor's alien reaction.

The scene as originally shot then goes on that the little girl is standing outside looking at the doctor, the girly dalek controller.

And she runs off and the doctor says to John, uh, look, I think you should get away for a few days.

Things are likely to get nasty around here and John's like, yeah, sure, whatever.

The doctor leaves a pound coin on the bench, goes outside.

John picks up the coin that says 1991 and the doctor's looking at him through the window and gives him a nod and walks off.

[25:02]

And I'm glad they didn't include that because it changes the emphasis of the scene.

Because the emphasis of the scene is the doctor's interiority.

But that end of the scene is the doctor doing something quirky for the sake of being quirky.

You know, when he's when he's just given ace, a bag of proper currency so she can blend in.

He chucks in a 1991 £one coin and then lectures ace.

Oh, you know, someone had found your tape deck, they could have reversed engineered it.

Well, what about this?

Yeah, they could have reverse engineered the pound coin and we would have had pound coins, you know, decades before they ever existed.

It's post-defin currency.

And then we would have never had that glorious scene.

Carol Anne Ford.

Well, that's a reference.

Again, it's one of these references is the fact that...

Caroline Ford can't add up.

Okay, no, that Ace doesn't know about pre-decimal currents.

Yeah.

And it's full of references, just overflowing with them.

No, we're not just, I think we like Nathan's reference from wherever it was 300 years ago when we 1st started this, that this is actually from the universe of the pilot rather than the broadcast series because of the dust jacket being... revolution.

[26:15]

I'm actually quite one with that one, yes.

Yeah.

Yeah, well, you know, it doesn't look the same.

A friend of the podcast, I believe it was Hooa Pete, but I apologise.

If it wasn't, and it's someone else pointed out that maybe while she was travelling through time and space, Clara actually swapped, swapped the books around.

So, Moffatt, he'll always be here because he had to put his grubby little protuberances into everything, didn't he?

I think that's actually kind of died for me. that's here a time for me when he just had to he just had to put himself in every moment of every story that's ever been. couldn't just carry on.

I think that is actually a good point.

Doctor Who dies when it becomes self-referential.

But in this case, it isn't because it's referencing what everybody else is doing, which is razor glass.

Weve moved on from Germany.

We are in England.

So we're talking about postmodernism.

Hooray!

Or even to the point where we have a sitting down to watch the show that she's in.

Within the show.

Thank you.

Absolutely there.

[27:16]

And the cornerstone of... thing, which really was what we were talking about at the time.

It's to analyse and reinvent the past with constant referencing and deflation of that past and then reinterpretation as to what is realistic.

But the humour of the 80s came from that deflation from that self mocking.

There were ads on British TV, in grainy black and white of products from that time, and then someone would come in in colour and make a deadly piece steak on it, or do you remember that?

And Ben Elton's entire career, and therefore Rowan Atkinson's, and therefore the young ones, and therefore, really all the stuff that we've got, are Sandy Toxic would not exist if it wasn't for remembrance.

She was in one, you know, when Rachel says, I think I'm going to be sick.

It was.

Very, very cruel, yeah.

Or to be Susan Coleman now, wouldn't it?

I tweeted her and told her that.

She didn't respond.

So she better look out.

She did mention being cast as the doctor.

A doctor.

Yes, she did, yes.

You know, I have wondered to myself because Ben Aronovich deliberately decided it was his choice to tie this story in with an unearthly child.

[28:24]

The 1963 setting in Shoreditch and Andrew Cartmel and John Nathan Turner were only too happy to because they did want this to be the, you know, this is the 25th anniversary.

Really would think it was a JNT idea, wouldn't you?

No, I mean, he supported it, but it was Aronovich's idea.

But Aronovic then discovered that Attacker the Cyberman had been back to the junkyard as well.

So he actually toned down some of the references.

But it gets me wondering, in a show.

Yeah, exactly.

In Attack of the Cybermen, in episode two, we have that, oh, like 3 or 4 minute info dump scene where the doctor and Lytton explain how the Cybermen came from Mondas, but then they went to Telos, and then they invaded Earth, and then...

And then all the...

I can't remember.

Oh, I've seen it.

And then all the dinosaurs died and turned into oil and then Charles started wearing all of Lady Dye's dresses. can't believe it Anyway, that's actually in it.

Yeah.

I must have slipped into a coma at that part of it.

But in this, we do get another info dump scene.

[29:27]

It's where the doctor has explained Ace what the hand of Omega is and why it came into being and who the 2 factions of Daleks are.

It does sound like a lavatory product, doesn't it?

A remote.

A remote manipulator, indeed.

But I was thinking to myself, what makes the attack of the cyberman saying, you know what?

I quite like attack of the cyberman, but what makes that scene quite leaden, but makes this one really electric?

and I think it's 2 things.

First of all, the stuff in remembrance of the Daleks is all new information.

The only thing that sort of comes back in there is other names wrestle on and Omega and then the story.

But then the story does new things with them in the post-modern way.

Whereas Attack of the Siamen is just bringing us up to speed on something in the park.

You know what this really is.

This was as if David Whittaker, Jody, to his mates had never... retired.

This is the Dalek Whittaker universe.

Did you notice the planet reference fan people?

[30:30]

I had to write it down as well.

Phoebius.

Three ringed planet who were in Scuro's system is in the Daleks Whitaker strip.

And there's a little corner of it, pink with 3 rings around it.

When Scaro explodes.

Yeah, just in case you missed it.

David Wood owns the universe.

I actually think he has reincarnated as Jody, I think. to find out.

He's just acquired an extra tea and taken our back to it.

Stop it there.

Gotten rid of his Thunderbird's eyebrows.

I think the Daleks are fantastic in this.

I mean, they're really good.

And I remember rattlingly good, aren't they?

At the time, I remember wondering about the 2 factions because of course that's introduced in Revelation, which it manages to reference without being boring.

You see, I didn't have a copy of Revelation as a kid didn't matter.

I understood this.

Yeah, no, you don't need to, but the reason I've been rattling around so much in this podcast is that I'm now sporting an extra inflatable ball.

Well, yes, because, of course, the Daleks on this at Silv is want to tell anyone who will listen.

[31:35]

He was in the Hobbit, you know, but the Daleks in this, instead of having wheels, have 3 balls, which is why they sort of, but it was so they could get over the cobblestones easier, but it does rather make them look drunk.

Yeah, in the 60s, they used to put down a bit of fibreboard and just have them...

Well, they couldn't afford it anymore.

I remember the 1st time I watched it thinking that they'd got the continuity wrong because I had my copy of the Doctor Who Monster book on hand.

Which is amazing because it doesn't even cover the car.

No, you get that car.

So, Davros was picked up by normal coloured daleks after creating a race of sort of white and gold.

Yeah, that suited the kind of loveliness.

Yeah.

Have you noticed that?

Can we have a little nerdy tech moment that Dalek tech from now on?

Is Art Deco?

The trans mat.

Yeah, the game show set, as you mentioned.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think they look fantastic too.

They don't have the light bulbs from a Morris minor anymore and they don't have a sync plunger.

[32:39]

You know, all of that stuff has been updated.

They look really good and I think the colours look great.

Yeah, and that wasn't a feature of the of those cream coloured Daleks in Revelation.

But of course, you know, we are led to believe that Davros is leading the gray daleks from his, from his little motorcycle.

How does that work?

He captured them.

Yeah exactly.

And that the white Daleks, Supreme Daleks are being led by.

But the emperor.

But then shock horror.

The emperor looks terrible, doesn't it?

Like, it's straightly shockingly bad.

Yeah, yeah, someone wants to describe the dessert.

A shrieking airball, I see.

Sophie Aldred's had a glittering career since this, isn't she?

Really?

Putting on makeup and chanel earrings and pouting about being upper middle class.

Sorry, Soph.

I loved you, but then on all the bloody DVD extra say, well, she and I were terribly up in middle class.

It was lovely of them to give me a girly chum.

Every story.

[33:40]

My lovely girly chum in this one was Alison Bleep because now one can fricking remember what she is or watching it.

Who is she in this?

Listen to countermeasures, he still wafts about in a number 2 prisoner scarf. and, you know, looks tries to look useful.

I think she makes the two.

So much feminine. very good actually.

Green Garson. who it is?

Yeah.

Karen Gladhill.

She's charming.

Yeah, yeah. doesn't do anything.

She has she has a couple of great lines and one of them is when Mike Clobber's that that pretty ginger soldier.

Oh, hello.

And Rachel says to Alison, is he all right?

And Alison responds, I don't know, I'm the physicist.

I think that's a dig at Liz Shaw, who just conveniently becomes a medical doctor for no reason at some point in info. like to think they thought that way.

But the brigadier does say that Liz has degrees in half a dozen other subjects.

We've covered this.

She only looks 28.

Any doctorate takes at least 4 years.

Well, remember, her husband is the master, so he absorbs life energy and gives it to her.

[34:45]

That'd be an interesting take on breakfast table conversation, wouldn't it?

What have you got for me to absorb sporting date?

Sarah Sutton's career.

God, that's like a value out of torping the doctor's future lives, isn't it?

I think part of what makes this story works so well and what makes this season works so well. what makes the continuity work so well is Sylvester's insistence that Sophie's character as ace gets more to do.

And it was something that Andrew Cartmel was very passionate about as well, because as much as he thought too much has been revealed about the doctor.

As much as he thought, the doctor is not a positive influence on stories, which is something we complained about during Collins era.

He also thought that the companion, you know, if the doctor is being pushed down in the order of the story, the companion gets pushed down with him.

So bring them both up together at the same time.

So in that scene, where the doctor's explaining the hand of Omega, rather than Nate's just saying, what is it, Doctor Who's Omega Doctor?

[35:48]

Whats this?

WhatsApp?

She asks questions like, so it manipulates starts.

You know, she asks for clarification, using information, and when the doctor slips up and says, didn't we have trouble with the prototype, she is immediately on it.

Yes, we and it'll come back again in Silver Nemesis as well.

You know, Sudech is very talkative today. everyone's got something to say about this story.

I really like that hilarious response where the doctor says it's called the Hand of Omega because Time Lords have an infinite capacity for pretention, much like this. much like this podcast.

She just says, yeah, I've noticed that. which I just think is wonderful.

And you know, she uses the anti-Tank rocket on the Dalek and the doctor's like, you destroyed it?

She like, I aim for the eye.

Okay, yeah, aim for the eyepiece with a handgun.

It doesn't particularly matter when you use an anti-tank rocket.

That actually is an ATR.

And she was, and that is a powder burn on the back wall.

[36:52]

And she did get the recoil in the shoulder.

You can tell my every little girl of a certain inclination and age, I've done it frame.

I've done that frame by frame and you see the backblast, make the make the burn mark.

She also did the jump through the window herself.

No, she didn't.

That was tip tipping's wife, but she did all the shots before and on.

She wanted to, but it was the one thing they would not let.

Oh, okay.

Okay, okay.

Because, oh, that's right.

Yeah, she does, sorry. being a girl, she'll sprain her ankle.

And actually, she does that.

Yeah, so she jumps towards the window.

They use the other shot. with the stuntwoman going through the window, but she then does crash into the wall, does the running through the corridor, et cetera, et cetera.

And tip tipping kind of said to her, okay, after that take was done.

He took her by the arm, took her to a chair, sat her down, and he said, now you sit here.

And she's like, why?

And he said, you just sit here and she says, you know, a few minutes later, I was essentially in shock.

[37:53]

And he said, look, that happens even to experience stunt people and I just, I knew it was going to happen.

Pushy cows like you, they got jobs away from a lot of workers.

Well, that will eventually see the end of tip tipping on the show, won't it?

But we're getting ahead of ourselves.

No, not Sophie Aldred, but a stuntman situation.

Yeah, but you didn't tell Doctor Who.

No, no, no, no.

Just everyone else's career.

Yeah, a couple of years later.

He's bit lovely too.

He's the he's the lad that brings in Mike.

It's Mike.

For a get about Tommy.

He's really got a bit of a Jesus fixation.

He dies 3 or 4 times in this show.

You seem quite clearly in the junkyard. quite clearly corralling the troops.

Of course, he'd been in the SA yes.

He got all that precision happening.

And the big thing in fan crap at the time was that that extra at the end was out of sync and they said, no, no, that's an homage to Clive Dunn in dad's army.

Oh, right.

Was it Luddy fans?

It works because this is the best dialect story in Doctor Who so far?

[38:56]

No.

I think Power of the Daleks is the best Doctor Who story. the best Dalek story.

It is very, very good though.

And we haven't had a good Dalek story for, well, maybe since Genesis.

You're right, because at the time we thought it was, but no one had seen power since the time.

You know what?

It knocks spots off the other Deveraux stories mainly because Deveraux's innocent in it so much. in a roll-on.

Yes.

That's not a slight against Terry Malloy.

Terry Malloy is a really...

I'd like a saucy calendar of him floating in a bathtub of rice pudding.

But I think in the mask, obviously.

Well, you know, we've discussed before that Terry Nation was of the opinion that he had to create Davros because Daleks can't deliver dialogue for sustained periods of time.

What?

We've discussed... shown that that's not necessarily the case.

Russell as well.

I mean, it was a long time before Dave Ross was reintroduced.

There are plenty of Dalek stories. and they're fine.

You know, you just have to write for them.

Nick Priggs has the range.

[39:57]

He does.

Well, he does.

No, quite literally has the range.

But the thing is, Terry Terry Nation, of course, still had vetting rights on scripts at this point.

Yes.

Originally, Ben Aronovich discussed not using Dabros at all, and JNT said to him, no, he's got to be he has to be in there somewhere because otherwise we won't get it past tearing.

And even then, when Terry got the scripts that...

Even then when Terry got the scripts and Davros was only revealed like in the last 10 minutes.

Terry did complain.

He said Davro should be in it more, Deborah, should be in it more.

And John Nathan Turner pointed out, ah, yes, but you see, this Dalek controller that we've got on the other side. is going to look like Davros from behind.

So everyone's going to think Davros is on the side of the black Daleks until it's revealed to be the little girl and then we revealed Davros.

And at that point, Terry Nation was happy because Davros would be felt, as it were, throughout the story, without actually being in it.

I think this is a good time, though, to talk about Yasmin breaks as the girl.

[40:57]

One of many little girls in the Sylvester McCoy era of Andrew Carmel's Little Girls.

The last one, Stella, was not particularly successful.

Yeah, like really terrible and we couldn't work out why she was even in it.

They owe a lot to the 1962 film.

We've already addressed the bad seed.

Which is John one of John Walter's greatest favourite films of all time, which has a little girl, exactly, like Jasmine Brakes, who knocks about in some poor bloke's nicked bike helmet. with a torch on the end of it.

Yeah, well, you know she's got the bicycle helmet over the incontinence chair.

We're kind of used to children being in Doctor Who now, but they weren't really in it very much at all in the classic series.

Good reason.

I mean, yeah, I'm thinking...

Reign of Terror, had a child.

Yeah.

And he's good.

Yeah, probably.

Debbie Watling, lovely our Debbie Watling, played a child.

She was only meant to be a child.

Yeah, and as we record today.

Yeah, Debbie passed away yesterday.

[41:59]

Yeah, which is, which is very sad.

We'd met her at a convention.

Yeah, yeah. was lovely. highly encased in cylinder of smoke, just like the hand of home.

It was a Nikoner at the right every moment.

Don't forget gin.

But I do like a woman who likes a gin movie suit.

A segue to say, the last time I met Debbie, because of course, met her in 2005, we had a convention with her.

Yes, and Fraser?

Yeah.

A few years later in the UK, I met her at convention again, and she said to me in the bar, I know you.

And I said, yes, but I have less hair now.

But then I met her, again, a few years ago at another convention here where I was dressed like Daphne Ashbrook in the telly movie, if we remember.

We dated.

Um, and Debbie just looked at me and said, What is it you're wearing?

And I pointed at Daphne and said, oh, well, you see, I like dressing up as Doctor Who Girl, so I'm dressed up as her.

And so the last words Debbie Watling ever spoke to me were, oh, darling, I thought you were one of the normal ones.

[43:06]

I was hoping she was going to say when are you going to do me?

Yes.

But that is how I shall remember her thinking I was normal.

In such an enclosed petri dish, she would look for a norm.

But but sinister children in the 80s were the bread and butter of horror films, you know, children doing horrible things.

And, you know, in the 60s, we'd had Village of the Damned children of the Damned.

Macaulay Culkin.

Yes that's right.

But I think she does an incredible job.

And I think Cody Olson twins.

If I were to criticise Jasmine breaks for something.

It would be, you know, she's given a few lines and they're not particularly great, but at the same time, she's dialect controlled.

So things like time controller activated.

It's just, it's just a little bit, it's just a little bit stagey.

[44:08]

But when she's silent and just looking around and looking at things, she's incredibly sinister.

Well, I think she's just it. channelling later 18th season, Lal Awards, isn't she?

It's as if Tom Baker is constantly just off camera.

Because that whole slitch as soon as look at you.

You know what?

I kind of wish all of her diary was.

That's why she was giving him eyes because, you know, women tended to do that to Tom at that period of his life.

I kind of wish all of her dialogue had been in the nursery rhyme hopscotch tune that she sings because of course that wouldn't have been irritating at all.

But that had been made sinister at the time by the Freddy Krueger films.

No, it would have been really good.

And in iambic pentameter, obviously.

But, you know, that is a minor criticism of a really good use of a character.

She only 12 you bastard.

I'm a Doctor Who fan. have to find something to criticise.

We've already criticised the Daleks testicles.

Well, you may say that I'm finding them extremely comfortable, but... buoyantly so.

[45:12]

I think you'd look really good in that.

She is even cosplaying Lala in France.

Oh, dear.

And as Rachel is cosplaying.

Just take a moment.

Barbara.

Yeah, Barbara.

Oh, that is so deliberate and so wonderful.

The cardigan.

You feel like unravelling it or... some great moments.

She's in the back of the transit van, which, by the way, that Bedford van is not a 19623 model for the fanboys out there, is a later one.

The black one with the the red prop on the top. when she says, group captain, I've got a man.

Even that's really good.

You know, fabulous.

It moves at such a pace.

Yeah, they're starting to do things on location, which are really good.

There's a lot of stuff on location.

People look like they're enjoying themselves.

Yeah.

And there's action, like there's proper action with stuff exploding and things.

Wordgasm, peril.

Yes.

Time Incorporated.

I think everyone's pretended that never happened.

[46:12]

Including me and I spent like 2 weeks editing it.

Even when we do have WordParel, like when the doctor says the Daleks have weapons capable of cracking this planet open like an egg.

No, that works because we have seen their firepower.

And it's 1963 and there's a cold war on.

Yeah, we just had the Bay of Pigs.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, that hence that opening, you know, the cold open, which so rarely happens in Doctor Who.

Is it the 2nd one after Castravalva?

only the 3rd time.

Flight doctors had a cold open as well.

Okay.

Yeah.

That's a bit harsh on Billy.

He was dead.

Do you know, that was going to be her Madge.

It was going to be the queen in that thing. and I asked it, and they approached the palace.

You cannot, cannot, do you?

You cannot sound bite, the queen.

Majesty, but you can add Prince Pillow.

That is a bit of Prince Philip in there.

Yeah, yeah.

As many a showgirl has attested.

Yeah, I think that's a bloody wonderful opening shot as well.

[47:16]

It's weird that it ends in a freeze frame, but the sign from that.

My father was at a party in 1968 with Shirley Bassey, where she did something I cannot mention on this podcast, but she was also flirting with him because he was attractive in his day and that she'd had a fling with Prince Philip.

She was very strong about suggesting that to the civil gentleman at the time.

She was having a fling with Prince Philip at the time, 68.

So she's in this and all.

You're going to be executed for treason.

Well, I don't think...

I don't think it's tearing the Lord.

Prince Philip without makeup.

That's really bassy, obviously.

I will teach you the fully of your words.

Actually, I think that might catch on.

Jodie Whitaker is the doctor.

Shirley Bassey is Davros.

I think every single person in the news show should be a lady type.

Is the future?

I like it.

Zion inversion.

[48:16]

Yeah.

You know what?

I like to see Oswald Oswald coming as the companion for a little while.

Charming, but Chipman won't do that because it wasn't his idea.

No.

I think it's time to move away from all of the Moffat paraphernalia, really.

Although, I think it would be a great time to bring Ace back.

School reunion style.

Just one story?

She said that on the TVD.

I'm up a meal car side.

No, people know that.

I would I would just like to say one more thing before we go because we've mentioned the rest of the primary guest cast.

We should really mention, we should really mention Simon Williams was the brigadier we never had.

Isn't he a bit lovely?

Gilmore.

Were you always downstairs looking at him upstairs or were you upstairs looking at him downstairs?

I never bloody watched it.

It looks...

Frizzingly boring, although Lana Ward was in it.

And of course, Gene Martin.

Oh no, that's Duchess of Duke Street.

Yeah, Gene Marsh was.

Yes, that's right. was actually fingering from the, you know, with a Ian McKellen cape on a pointy hat.

[49:17]

Up upstairs, downstairs at the Duchess of Duke Street with the House of Idiot next door.

Yeah.

You know that's what this was.

The House of Idiot.

No, it was Battlefield.

Battlefield is the story he pitched, but they went, oh, no, because we've actually got a show that's a bit like that.

So you should do this one, which turns out to be exactly like another one called Silver Nemesis that was coming later in the season.

And of course, the working title for this one was Nemesis of the Doctor.

Yeah. which is also a comic strip in the Doctor Who Monthly.

Well, that's where the title then.

I think we're going to implode inside our own fandom, like a tiny neutron star, aren't we?

You know earlier where you said that something annoying, yes.

Yes.

You said that Moffat had, we'll probably have cut it out.

I'll do that this.

Everything.

I take up an hour and they only need 5 minutes.

Where you said that Stephen Moffat had sort of colonised the whole show by inserting Clara into every scene.

Aronovich does this to the doctor because when the doctor's in London in 1963, he's not a timelord.

[50:22]

He's not from the planet Galifre.

He's not hiding the hand of Omega somewhere.

You know, he's a mysterious old man from a distant planet.

And this is the show kind of trying to rope him back in and make him be what the doctor ended up being.

Right.

Is this the rise of the moths?

This is that this is the seed, the kernel, which should all blues.

It's the show going back and changing its own past.

In a way that Attack of the Sidemen didn't do at all.

No, it was just too busy giving David Banks opportunities to write sort of lead and you know, compendiums of drawings of various cybermen designs.

I do think it's Episode one is Colin Baker's greatest moment as the doctor.

I think Attack of the Simon episode one is just hilarious with full colon.

Yeah, yeah, running around.

You asked me to say something nice last time.

No, but I mean, it really is.

If it had stayed like that, I wouldn't have minded.

Yeah, they're lovely together in it.

[51:23]

Be those policemen.

Sad lacking of Brian Blessed in the episode.

Yeah.

No, I quite like him in that too.

I think excitement is terrible.

Terrific.

Yeah, I mean, I think it's another example of why remembrance works better than Attack of the Sidemen because...

Well, because yes, it does recon, but it recons in a way that doesn't necessarily contradict what we knew before.

So even though you sort of look at the 1st doctor and you go, he's not a man with a mission.

Nobody could be a man with a dangerous machine on board that he's trying to keep out of alien hands, especially with his lecture to Susan about how these savages will never understand our technology.

So, you know, okay, why bury it in their graveyard?

But...

The point is...

My, my, it's another Jeffrey Beaver's moment to carry is, my darling.

You know why this works?

[52:25]

All that stuff's just for us.

It works because it talks about us now and us back then and us at whatever age sitting there, when our parents were doing the groove in 6263, saying, parents were wrong, they weren't cool.

They were actually like this, and we all went, yeah.

And it's got a proper story.

It's garlic shooting each other. you know, like it's very clear.

Because every, yeah, because it's got your guns, as you've put it, it's got your frocks, and it's got a bit of truthiness as well.

Casual reviewers.

If the BBC could, and they did promote this and it didn't do that badly, did it?

No, this guy...

This got 5 million. they're going to get even more later in the season.

If they just chose to promote, they actually ended up doing quite well, they just tended to ignore it.

Yeah, average ratings for this are around 5.45.5.

Audience appreciation index around the 70s.

Which is extraordinary.

We haven't that for a while.

In fact, I don't think we've had that, gosh, since Revelation.

And this is around the time it was up against Coronation Street.

[53:25]

Imagine if they put it on Saturday night.

Those ratings would have gone up by at least a million, which would have been what Peter was getting at the end and Colin was getting in his 1st season because Collins ratings in his 1st season were respectable.

So, yeah, the BBC is trying to kill it and JNT and Andrew Cartmel are saying, fine, we're going to make the best damn show we can.

This is the season where everyone cares a lot and it will show.

Stay tuned to someone used to say.

Well, dear listener, that's all the time we have for remembrance of the Daleks as part of Australia's remembrance of the Daleks podcast month.

Do come back next week for the happiness, patrol.

In the meantime, in the show notes for this episode, you can vote for your choice of a Colin Baker story commentary and we have 4 stories nominated.

[54:33]

Todd has nominated the mark of the Rani.

Richard has nominated Revelation of the Daleks.

I am nominating the Mysterious Planet, a.k.a.

Trial of a Time Lord, episodes one to four, and Nathan has nominated Terror of the Verboids, a.k.a.

Trial of a Time Lord, 9 to 12.

So, sorry, folks, you won't get us to watch Time Lash.

Meanwhile, over on Bondfinger, we are about to get 3 quarters of the way through the Pierce Brosnan era of James Bond.

Next week we'll be releasing our commentary for the world is not enough.

So do check that out on bondfinger.com.

Bondfinger on Facebook and Apple Podcasts and at Bondfingercast on Twitter.

We, of course, are flightthrough entiret.sexy.

Flights are entirety on Facebook and Apple Podcasts and at FTE podcast on Twitter.

Until next time, don't bloody throw us in a lake because you better believe there'll be consequences.

Thank you very much for listening and good night.

Good night. 3 settings.

Good night.

[55:44]

That was Flight Your Entirety with Nathan Bottomley, Brennan Jones and Richard Stone, theme arrangement by Cameron Lamb, logo designed by Anthony Wells.

This episode, Daleksa Forever, was recorded on the 22nd of July, 2017.

Next episode will be released on August 6th.

We dedicate this episode to the memory of Deborah Watley, who played Victoria in Doctor Who.

She sleeps in our mind, but we won't forget.

I think I've now officially run out of closing credits jokes.

Base them on a line from the episode.

That's what I always do.

Okay.

Or just steal them from Steven.

Since he's stolen our entire ball now.

And had success.

Tagline.

Yeah, no, I hate I hate talented, attractive people.

If I knew someone, I'd probably be all right with that.

[56:50]

So you start off by slagging off Stephen Muskovsky.

And they just slag off all of our listeners, but then you don't know any attractive people.

Hooray We have very attractive listeners, right?