Writer: Steven Moffat.
Director: Nick Hurran.
Starring: Matt Smith, Karen Gillan, Arthur Darvill.
It’s been a long time since Doctor Who last graced our screens. The Christmas special episode, ‘The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe’ from last year, the first official episode of the seventh series of the show, was nine months ago. This year, unlike most, the show did not return in the spring season, nor did it return in summer. The rumours of an August 25th release date for one of the most hotly-anticipated seasons of the show yet had most fans waiting on tenterhooks, but that too was delayed, leaving the Doctor’s return until September 1st, the longest delay since the show’s return.
And it was worth every second of the wait.
Returning in typically epic style, the Doctor is back in the Steven Moffat-written ‘Asylum of the Daleks’, an extremely-intriguing and very eerie episode that continues Moffat’s usual vein of perfectly blending humour and chills, with a host of continuity references and a plot twist that will probably have you sitting down for quite a long time trying to wrap your head around it (very much speaking from personal experience, here).
(Incidentally, this review will be as spoiler-free as possible, so have no fear reading on ahead!)
The episode opens with the Doctor having received a mysterious message from an equally-mysterious woman (the message itself having been shown in the recently-released prequel to the episode), summoning him to a planet with enormous significance in the Time Lord’s life: Skaro, the home planet and birthplace of the Daleks, oldest and most terrible foes of the Doctor. Naturally, this being Doctor Who, this message is less a friendly one and more of a trap, set by the Daleks themselves, and the Doctor is taken prisoner. A quick setting switch to Earth catches us up with the lives of the Doctor’s companions, the Ponds, whom he has not travelled with in quite some time. All is not well with Amy and Rory, however. As was revealed in the mini-episode prequels to this episode, Pond Life, their marriage is falling apart, and the couple are separating. This, however, rapidly proves to be the least of their worries, as the two are also captured by the Daleks, being reunited with the Doctor aboard a ship, the Parliament of the Daleks.
The Doctor, demanding to know what is happening to them, is informed that they are above the Dalek Asylum, a place of myth, a hollowed-out planet containing all of the Daleks that were too insane and vicious for even the “normal” Daleks to control. The Asylum is to be destroyed, and who better to take on a planetful of insane killing machines than the man who is officially known as “the Predator of the Daleks”? The Doctor finds himself with the tasks of bringing about the destruction of the Asylum, surviving a horde of Daleks, and saving the marriage of his companions!
And with the plot set down, the title sequence starts. Yup, you heard me.
With a pre-title sequence full of so much plot that it runs a good bit longer than average, it should come as no surprise that the episode itself has a fantastic story to it, the plot being very tight and well-written, as is Moffat’s standard. It’s engaging, it’s got more twists to it than a very twisty thing indeed, and chances are you’ll be on the edge of your seat for the vast majority of it. The lines are fantastic, the interplay between the Doctor, Amy and Rory being as natural as ever, if a little more stilted in the case of Amy and Rory (understandably). In fact, that episode feels quite a bit like a Dalek episode of the Classic series, very tense and genuinely scary. The Daleks themselves are on top form in this outing, whether it be the new Dalek Parliament organisation with their truly massive numbers, or whether it be the insane Daleks of the Asylum.
Indeed, this episode is probably the scariest Dalek episode since the episode ‘Dalek’ itself, during Christopher Eccleston’s reign on the show. During Russell T. Davies’ run on the show, it was definitely noticeable that the Daleks had something of a comic vein to them, some of their appearances being positively funny. Steven Moffat made it a point in the lead-up that the Daleks would have to become scary again, and in this aspect, he truly delivered. Some of the lines from the Dalek Prime Minister, in particular, are very chilling, not only to us but to the Doctor himself, and the entire part of the episode focusing on the Asylum resembles a horror movie more than anything else, even reinforced by dark lighting and very slow, deliberate camera work. Chills, scares, laughs, and tears. Everything you could want from an episode of Doctor Who!
I appreciate that I’m mostly going on about the Daleks here, but really, they stand out even more than usual, perhaps aided by their general absence in the last series. Here, the conclusion of the Series 5 episode ‘Victory of the Daleks’ really comes into play, showing us what exactly has happened in the interim. The Daleks are back as a truly powerful force, more so than ever now.
Another point that really bears mentioning is how the episode fits into overall Doctor Who continuity. There are a host of references and little touches, such as the sheer variety of Dalek models seen on-screen (the Dalek Parliament made up of Time War-era Daleks led by the New Paradigm models, while the Asylum plays host to those plus the many models of the Classic series, including good old Special Weapons Dalek from the Seventh Doctor’s run!)
The appearance of Skaro, as mentioned above, is something that hasn’t been seen in a long time, and had me delighted at its appearance. As for how the episode affects the overall canon? Well, you’ll just have to watch it and find out…
The episode both looks and sounds fantastic throughout. The set design is great, focusing mainly on either the extremely impressive-looking Parliament of the Daleks, with its row upon row of Daleks all looking down on the centre, or the dreaded Asylum, which looks as run-down and broken as you would expect of a place filled with millions of insane death machines and left to rot. Special effects-wise, the show is keeping to the usual Moffat standards as of late, being very good-looking. Skaro, in particular, looks fantastic, a truly destroyed, desolate planet that looks exactly as you would expect the home planet of the Daleks to look. Music-wise, Murray Gold is keeping up the good work, with some nice tense pieces, although there’s a lot more noticeable silence in this episode than usual, the dialogue being the focus for much of the episode.
All in all, ‘Asylum of the Daleks’ gets a massive thumbs-up from me. It’s a great, dark episode, it looks as gorgeous as ever, it’s immensely intriguing and raises about sixteen million questions, and all in all, it’s a great opener. Very different to the other Dalek episodes we’ve seen recently, this is one not to be missed.
It’s good to have the Doctor back.
Next week: ‘Dinosaurs on a Spaceship’!
