Day 802: Into the Dalek

I mentioned yesterday about how the Capaldi era focuses more on the prospect of character interaction and character study. Whilst this impression is certainly formed after watching Deep Breath, it's with Into the Dalek that the concept really cements itself with an episode that is strikingly good, because of the way in which it deals with character.

The story is really all about the Doctor facing the prospect of a good Dalek. We go from him being sceptical about the prospect to a quiet joy as he learns more about the Dalek, and discovers that it has discovered beauty in a world of hatred. And that's quite a good concept, because the Daleks are set up to be one-dimensional villains with no care for anything that isn't Dalek. It's part of their appeal as villains; that there is absolutely no reasoning with them, they are just a destructive force of nature. It's all very interesting, but it's fairly expected that the Dalek being revealed as good would just be a defect in the Dalek's programming and it really is bad after all. In effect, then, it renders the first half hour or so of the episode a missed opportunity, presenting us with an interesting concept and then cruelly snatching it away from us before we got to know it.

But then writers Phil Ford and Steven Moffat elect to do something more interesting with it, and have the Doctor try to convince the Dalek to be good. The Doctor does this by hooking his brain up to the Dalek's, reminding him of all the beauty that the Dalek saw, everything which drives the Doctor to go forth and be a good man in the Universe. But the Dalek doesn't just see that, it also sees hatred and anger within the Doctor's mind. There's so much hatred of the Daleks impressed within the Doctor's mind that it inspires the Dalek to go forth and kill all other Daleks in the nearby vicinity, which it does in a very impressive action sequence. But beyond that, we also see heartbreak on the Doctor's face. Because he was presented with this concept of a good Dalek, and he tried to bring it back, but he got it slightly wrong. And he got it slightly wrong because of his own faults as a person, because he has so much anger and hatred within him that he tries to ignore, but he's forced to by the end of the episode.

It's an argument that's summed up by the top and tail of the episode. At the start, the Doctor asks Clara whether he's a good man. At the end, the allied Dalek tells the Doctor that he is a good Dalek. It's a subtle moment, but one that sums up much of the episode in my view. Certainly another good start to this strong series.