Destruction of the Daleks (Spoilers)
Warning: Spoilers for Victory of the Daleks follow.
When Steven Moffat took over the realms of Doctor Who he expressed fear that he might “break” the show. He hasn’t done that but, judging by Victory of the Daleks, he has broken the Doctor’s most formidable enemy. The Daleks have been transformed from terrifying killing machines to hunchbacked figures of fun.
There have been a lot of design changes to accompany the start of Matt Smith’s era in the Tardis and stamp Moffat’s vision on the show. On the whole I like them – I’m even one of those who likes the new theme music. But this reworking of the Daleks is a disaster. OK, Moffat probably didn’t design them personally – but he would have had to ok them. Instead of ticking the box marked “Approved” he should have ticked the box marked “Burn these abominations and never speak of this again”.
The new design is ugly, the key word being “chunky”. In the past I’ve been able to forget the operator inside – with this design you can’t avoid imagining not just the operator but a couch for him to sit on along with a TV and games console for shooting breaks! This chunkiness extends throughout the design, especially the ground skirt and central band. Perhaps a clue to the design philosophy is given by the size comparison with the old Daleks: the theory seems to be that “bigger is better”. In this case bigger is just crass.
And the colours. Oh my god, they look like something out of a sweet shop. These new Daleks would make great Christmas tree decorations. Daleks should have a palette made up from black, greys and metallic shades. Yes, there have been coloured Daleks in the past but usually in the movies or as “specials”. A rainbow assorment of Daleks strikes me as simply an excuse to sell more merchandise. Well I won’t be buying it.
And double jointed Daleks that can look round corners?!? Please tell me this is a belated April Fool joke.
What makes this destruction of the greatest Who monster even worse is that the design for the RTD era was absolutely beautiful. Seeing the last three of these in the universe exterminated by their inbred replacements was a painful experience.
Yes, these new Daleks are scary – but for all the wrong reasons.
