How the Daleks should be?

[Brian G Turner]

So I was watching some tank museum videos on YouTube, saw this, and thought - this is what a Dalek should really look like:

At least some of them, anyway.

I still find it odd that Who has kept strictly to pepperpot Daleks - flights of Daleks in space just looked a little ... daft, to me.

IMO the Daleks are due their own regeneration - one that makes them visually more powerful, and technologically superior.

I mean, imagine seeing something like the above, and hearing a shrill robotic voice cry, "Exterminate!"

 

[Cathbad]

Be some mean Daleks!

 

[The Ace]

Or what it would look like after the accountants got hold of it :

 

[thaddeus6th]

There was the special weapons Dalek in Remembrance of the Daleks.

It seems the Teletubby Daleks were an attempt at the new generation. Turns out colour-coding in bright colours isn't terribly impressive

 

[TheDustyZebra]

Well, it would limit them to being outdoor enemies, though. Those things aren't going to chase anyone through the corridors.

 

[Danny McG]

Well, it would limit them to being outdoor enemies, though. Those things aren't going to chase anyone through the corridors.

The early ones were flummoxed by a flight of stairs, long before the lev pack things some then got fitted around their mid-sections

 

[Cathbad]

Way back when it was the b&w age, the Daleks were what turned me off Dr. Who.

 

[Dave]

Way back when it was the b&w age, the Daleks were what turned me off Dr. Who.

Really?? It was turned me on to Doctor Who (admittedly, I was only about 2 and far easier to impress.)

It was also what turned the UK on to Doctor Who, because before them it was a rather tame history for kids show. I've just watched The Dalek Invasion of Earth again, and the acting, the science and effects were terrible, but the idea of the Daleks is still way ahead of its time, or (if you substitute the kind of totalitarian regime Terry Nation loved to write about) then very "of" its time.

In that story they were first able to travel anywhere (rather than just across an indoor metallic floor) so some progression even back then. Later (Remembrance the Daleks) they could climb stairs and had they had the special weapons Dalek, so I have no trouble with them evolving even further.

Unfortunately, that isn't what happened though. If there was a Dalek vs. Time Lord War then isn't that the very point at which we would have seen the ultimate Dalek created? Of course, we have never seen that War (on screen) only the aftermath.

 

[Vladd67]

Imagine the dramatic impact of the Dalek's appearance then, something now long lost.

 

[Cathbad]

Really?? It was turned me on to Doctor Who (admittedly, I was only about 2 and far easier to impress.)

I was a teenager, first time I saw them. To me, they seemed ridiculous and childish.

 

[Dave]

I think we could more easily suspended our disbelief back then. The stories were also ridiculous, the science was much worse than the Moon being an egg (which everyone bitterly complained about last year), and the sets wobbled and shook like the cardboard and polystyrene they were made of. However, it was a phenomenal success (in the UK anyway.) I had a Dalek battery operated toy.

Now people will complain about small details

Spoiler: Spolier for GoT Season 7

i.e. that blue dragonfire should be hotter than normal dragonfire.

 

[BAYLOR]

So I was watching some tank museum videos on YouTube, saw this, and thought - this is what a Dalek should really look like:

View attachment 38873

At least some of them, anyway.

I still find it odd that Who has kept strictly to pepperpot Daleks - flights of Daleks in space just looked a little ... daft, to me.

IMO the Daleks are due their own regeneration - one that makes them visually more powerful, and technologically superior.

I mean, imagine seeing something like the above, and hearing a shrill robotic voice cry, "Exterminate!"

It would be a real challenge for The Doctor to defeat that.

 

[Onyx]

It would be a real challenge for The Doctor to defeat that.

The current Daleks can be defeated by the lack of a handicap access ramp.

 

[BAYLOR]

The current Daleks can be defeated by the lack of a handicap access ramp.

They can levitate and fly so that's no longer the case.

 

[thaddeus6th]

Their flying is especially deadly, as it can cause their opponents to laugh so hard their hearts burst. [Honestly].

 

[BAYLOR]

Their flying is especially deadly, as it can cause their opponents to laugh so hard their hearts burst. [Honestly].

You know ? now that I think about , your absolutely right ! (LOL)

 

[BAYLOR]

Something they haven't been for a longtime. Menacing.

 

[Vince W]

One of the things that made the Daleks so menacing in the past was the serial format of the show. When you were left with a cliffhanger at the end of each episode your mind had a week to imagine what might happen next. This added suspense was a powerful tool to fill in gaps the writers didn't even consider.

Now everything has to be wrapped up in a neat simple package in less than 55 minutes. Everything has to be explained to the point where intelligent viewers would rather drive a toothbrush into their brains than have the Doctor or one of the companions tell us how to win the day, again. And again.

 

[Danny McG]

I was 6 and, with my mate and two of my sisters, watching the Doctor and his team entering the city on Skaros, electronic eyes shovelling to watch them walk the corridors.
Suddenly some double doors shot open and a Dalek emerged in all it's menacing power.
Cue 4 kids with hair sticking up in sheer terror leaping behind the sofa and squealing in panic!

My dad just glanced up over his newspaper and muttered about "bloody rubbish they put on telly nowadays, keep it down you kids"

I appreciate that they don't seem very scary these days but nobody had saw anything like them back then - apparently in the Dr Who museum they still have a big sofa in the Dalek room so clearly it happened countrywide.

 

[Dave]

the Doctor and his team entering the city on Skaros, electronic eyes shovelling to watch them walk the corridors.

Those weird camera shots were definitely odd for the time. I was much younger than you so I didn't understand what was going on, only that the Daleks were "bad."

I agree that in later years that "terror" was much less. They made up for that by putting them in "normal" and "everyday" scenes in London; on famous streets or coming out of the river Thames, and then later they used scenes of trench warfare to emphasise that they were "evil" monsters. For me, it never quite captured the same feelings, but that is probably almost all to do with my age at the time of the episodes. However, those plastic things coming to life in Terror of the Autons really freaked me out and I was relatively old then.

They did do camera shots from the point of view of the Dalek in an episode with Christopher Eccleston and Billie Piper, but they did that to encourage sympathy, and had the Dalek in chains. That isn't how the Daleks should be at all!