History of the Daleks
Encyclopedia
The Dalek
s (icon ) are a fictional extraterrestrial
race of mutant
s from the British
science fiction television
series Doctor Who
. The mutated remains of the Kaled people of the planet Skaro
, they travel around in tank
-like mechanical casings, and are a race bent on universal conquest and destruction. They are also, collectively, the greatest alien adversaries of the Time Lord
known as the Doctor
, having evolved over the course of the series from a weak race to monsters capable of destroying even the Time Lords and achieving control of the universe.
(1963
). In this version of Dalek history, the Dalek home-world Skaro
was once home to two humanoid
races: the peaceful and scientifically advanced Kaleds/Dals (who were described as philosophers
and teacher
s) and the warlike Thals
. Following a short but terrible nuclear war
between the races, the Dals were mutated and became the aggressive
and xenophobic
Daleks. In the second episode the Daleks state the war occurred "over five hundred years ago". They were more or less confined to their city, their motive power being static electricity
conducted from metal walkways. At the end of this serial, the Daleks were seemingly wiped out. However, the popularity of the Daleks ensured their return.
They next appeared in The Dalek Invasion of Earth
(1964), which showed the Daleks having conquered and occupied the Earth
in the mid 22nd century. The Doctor explained the presence of the Daleks by saying that the events were taking place "a million years" before The Daleks, and that what they were witnessing was the "middle period" of Dalek history. However, these Daleks as an invasion force were able to move without the need for metal paths, drawing power through what appear to be radio dishes on their backs.
Over the course of their next few appearances, the Daleks developed, variously, time travel
(The Chase
, 1965), an interstellar empire
in the year 4000 (The Daleks' Master Plan
, 1965), and factory ships for conquest seen before the Earth occupation (The Power of the Daleks
, 1966). The radio dishes also vanished, and Daleks were able to move under their own power. Given the time travel nature of the series, whether these stories took place chronologically in the order they were transmitted is uncertain. The only given date is 4000AD for The Daleks' Master Plan.
A second attempt to end the Dalek saga was made in The Evil of the Daleks
(1967), which also introduced a Dalek Emperor. In that story, the conflagration caused by a Dalek civil war was declared by the Second Doctor
to be "the final end." This was because Terry Nation was in negotiations to sell the Dalek concept to American
television. Although the sale did not succeed, the Daleks did not appear again for five years. An untransmitted line of dialogue in the original script for Day of the Daleks
mentions the supposed final end, when one of the Daleks says that the humanised Daleks were wiped out by the true Daleks. However, the humanised Daleks would later appear in a comic strip (Children of the Revolution) in Doctor Who Magazine
.
The Daleks returned in the Third Doctor
serial, Day of the Daleks
(1972), where once again they used time travel technology. The Daleks were re-established as a species bent on universal conquest, as seen in 1973's Frontier in Space
(which led directly into Planet of the Daleks
) and later on in Death to the Daleks
(1974). The Dalek Emperor was not in attendance, the Daleks being led by a Supreme Dalek instead, with references made to a Dalek High Council. Frontier and Planet are set in the 26th Century, while Death refers to the recent "Dalek Wars".
In 1975, Terry Nation revised the Daleks' origins in the serial Genesis of the Daleks
, where the Doctor was sent by the Time Lord
s (or possibly their Celestial Intervention Agency
) to the moment of the Daleks' creation, in order to stop the Dalek race before it could begin.
The Kaleds (an anagram of Daleks), are a race of humanoid extraterrestrials and the forebears of the Dalek
s. The Kaleds, with their grey-black uniforms, stylised salutes and authoritarian
political structure, were thinly veiled analogues of the Nazis
. In this serial, it was the Kaleds who waged war on the Thals. The Daleks originated during the Kaled-Thal War, which was portrayed as a thousand-year-long war of attrition
, fought with nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, with weapons becoming progressively less sophisticated as resources became scarcer, not the short nuclear exchange previously described. It is not clear if this was the nuclear exchange between Daleks and Thals referred to in The Daleks or an even earlier conflict.
The crippled Kaled chief scientist and evil genius Davros
deemed the mutations from the fallout irreversible, and then experimented on living cells, treating them with chemicals and accelerating the mutations to discover the eventual mutated Kaled form and ensure its survival. The serial suggested that mutations among the general Kaled populace were not as advanced as implied by the earlier account, and that the development of the mutated creatures that became the Daleks was engineered by Davros for his own purposes. Ostensibly he was only speeding up the process, in order to predict the final form of the Kaled mutation; seeing its helplessness he devised the means for his race's continued existence. Ultimately he used his creations to prematurely replace the non-mutated members of his race with the Daleks.
These genetically conditioned forms were placed in Mark III "travel machines" whose design was based on his own life-support chair. The tank
-like travel machines coupled with the mutants became the first Daleks.
The Fourth Doctor
's appearance on the scene (to try to prevent the creation of the Daleks or at the very least lessen the damage they would do in future) leads other Kaled scientists to try to shut down the Dalek project. To prevent this, Davros arranged for the Thals to wipe out his own people. The Daleks were then sent to exterminate the Thals, but later turned on Davros and apparently killed him.
While a group of surviving Thals wired the Kaled research bunker with explosives, the Doctor had the opportunity to fulfill his mission and destroy the Daleks at their genesis, but when the time came the Doctor could not perform what he saw as an act of genocide. He believed that despite the horror, evil and destruction that the Daleks would inflict on the universe, ultimately there must be 'some greater good.'
He later returned to the incubation chamber and did destroy the Dalek embryos, but afterwards the Doctor concluded that this action, together with the Thals' sealing them in the bunker, had only retarded their progress by a thousand years. The Discontinuity Guide
by Paul Cornell
, Martin Day
and Keith Topping
argues that the Doctor did succeed in changing Dalek history. However, other commentators argue that it is possible to reconcile the pre- and post-Genesis stories without the need to invoke two versions of Dalek history.
(1979), it was revealed that Davros had survived the Daleks' attack and lived on, buried in a bunker in suspended animation
. During the time Davros was sleeping, the Daleks had abandoned the ruins of Skaro and established a vast interstellar empire, eventually encountering a hostile race of androids called the Movellans. The Dalek and Movellan warfleets were very evenly matched, and neither side's purely logical battle computers could find a successful strategy for an attack against the other. As a result, the two fleets remained locked in a standoff for centuries, constantly maneuvering and probing for an opportunity to break the stalemate
but without either side actually firing a single shot.
The Daleks sent an expedition to the ruins of Skaro to recover Davros and seek his help to upgrade their designs in the hope of finding a way through the impasse, and the Movellans sent an expedition to stop them. The Daleks succeeded in reviving Davros, who theorised that the extreme intelligence and rationality of the battle computers were to blame and that the first side to take a seemingly reckless gamble would tip the balance in their favour. However, the Doctor intervened and prevented either the Dalek or Movellan expeditions from returning with this insight. Davros fell into the hands of a Human space empire and was put back in suspended animation for indefinite imprisonment.
This impasse continued for nearly a century until the Movellans finally developed a weapon capable of breaking it — a highly virulent biological agent that targeted Daleks. In Resurrection of the Daleks
(1984), having lost the war, the Daleks rescued Davros from the Human prison station where he had been frozen for ninety years and demanded that he develop a defence against the disease. This time it was Davros who double-crossed the Daleks, deciding to take personal command of the Dalek race rather than merely serving it. Davros's continuing influence eventually led to a schism among the Daleks, with one faction following Davros's leadership and another rejecting their creator to instead follow the Supreme Dalek.
By the time of Revelation of the Daleks
(1985), Davros was in hiding at the Tranquil Repose funeral facility on the planet Necros, experimenting with physically transforming humans into Daleks. He was also placing those Daleks loyal to him into white and gold casings to distinguish them from the usual black and grey Daleks, but his plans were undone when a worker at the facility contacted the original Daleks. These Daleks arrived on Necros, exterminated the white and gold Daleks and captured Davros, who was returned to Skaro to face trial.
(1988). Apparently, events had taken place off-screen, as he appeared in the guise of the Dalek Emperor, leading his gold and white Imperial Daleks with control over Skaro . Davros had at this point modified the Imperial Daleks, adding cybernetic enhancements to their organic components. A new model "Special Weapons Dalek" was introduced with an enormously powerful cannon and armour capable of deflecting regular Dalek weaponry. Also, for the first time, a Dalek was clearly seen on screen to hover up a flight of stairs.
Pitted against the Imperial Daleks were the Renegade Daleks, led by a black Supreme Dalek. The name "renegade" suggests that the tables had turned and Davros' side had the upper hand. Both Dalek factions became aware that the Hand of Omega
, a Gallifrey
an stellar engineering device, was hidden on Earth in the year 1963. Both factions sent expeditions to Earth, battling each other to retrieve it, hoping to use the Hand to create a power source that would refine their crude time travel technology.
Ultimately, the Imperial Daleks succeeded, not knowing that the Doctor had inserted a booby trap into the Hand's programming. When Davros activated it, Skaro's sun went supernova
, and both the Dalek homeworld and the Imperial Dalek fleet were destroyed. Davros, however, apparently escaped his flagship's destruction in an escape pod. The Renegade Supreme Dalek self-destructed when the Doctor informed it that it was failed and the last of its kind. It's unclear if it was the last dalek on earth or at all. Remembrance of the Daleks marked the last on-screen appearance of the Daleks in the context of the programme until 2005, save for charity specials like Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death
and the use of Dalek voices in the Doctor Who television movie
with the second seems to happen before the events of 'Remembrance of the daleks'.
In the first series of the revival, the Daleks serve as the main antagonist
s.
The new Daleks exhibited abilities not seen before, including a swivelling mid-section that allowed it a 360-degree field of fire and a force field that disintegrated bullets before they struck it. In addition to the ability to fly, it was also able to regenerate itself by means of absorbing electrical power and the DNA
of a time traveller. The "plunger" manipulator arm was also able to crush a man's skull in addition to the technology interfacing abilities shown by earlier models. The laser was shown to be conducted like electricity, when the Dalek fired in a wet metal room. The Doctor described the Dalek as a "genius", able to calculate a thousand billion lock combinations in a single second and to download the entire contents of the Internet
. A more sophisticated model of the Dalek mutant was also shown.
", it was revealed that the Daleks were rebuilt and that they were involved with the Time Lords in a Time War
, in which the Doctor obliterated the entire Dalek race. The same war destroyed the Time Lords as well, with the Dalek that appeared in the episode and the Doctor the only apparent survivors. The Dalek had somehow fallen through time, ending up on Earth
in the 21st century. By 2012, it had passed into the hands of American billionaire Henry van Statten, who dubbed it a "Metaltron" and kept it in a secret underground museum called the Vault along with other alien artifacts.
The Dalek was damaged, remaining silent and helpless until the Ninth Doctor
arrived at the Vault. Absorbing DNA from the Doctor's companion
Rose Tyler
, it regenerated itself and went on a killing spree. However, having absorbed Rose's DNA, it continued to mutate and found itself beset with unfamiliar, human feelings. Realising it was now "contaminated", the mutant asked Rose to order it to destroy itself, rather than continue to live in that way. It then disintegrated itself with an energy field created by the spheres along its lower casing.
" and "The Parting of the Ways
" revealed that this Dalek was, in fact, not the sole survivor of its race. The Emperor Dalek's ship had also survived, falling through time much as the lone Dalek did. Hidden, it began to rebuild, infiltrating Earth society over the course of centuries and using human genetic material to create a new Dalek race. This Emperor - being "contaminated" with human genetic material came to see itself as a god, and built its new society around the Daleks' worship of itself. The new Daleks, because of origin as being spawned from impure genetic material, became as mad as their creator and even more dangerous as a result.
Subtly manipulating the Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire of the year 200,000 by means of news programmes transmitted from Satellite 5
in Earth orbit, the Daleks installed the monstrous Jagrafess as mankind's keeper. The Doctor removed the Jagrafess in "The Long Game
", but was unaware that the Daleks were behind it. Over the next hundred years, the Daleks continued their scheme, recreating Satellite Five as the Game Station, acquiring more humans for mutation by subjecting them to twisted reality television
games. The station's Controller was able to transport the Doctor and his companions into the station, where the Doctor discovered the Dalek presence. The race, now numbering close to half a million, were poised to invade Earth with a fleet of 200 ships.
The Doctor built a Delta Wave projector that would wipe out the Daleks, but would also eliminate all life on Earth, and found himself unable to trigger it. However, Rose had absorbed energies from the spacetime vortex by staring into the heart of the TARDIS and used those energies to reduce the Daleks and their fleet to atoms.
" and "Doomsday
", it was revealed that members of the Cult of Skaro
had also escaped during the Time War by going into the nothingness between dimensions — the Void — taking with them a Time Lord prison, dubbed the Genesis Ark, which contained millions of Daleks. The Daleks' Void Ship finally emerged in 21st century Earth, where it was examined by the Torchwood Institute
. The path of the void ship also left a breach in spacetime that allowed the parallel Earth Cybermen to cross over into the Doctor's universe.
The Daleks rejected the Cybermen's proposal for an alliance to conquer the universe and the Ark was opened, releasing millions of Daleks to wage all-out war against the Cybermen across the planet. Ultimately, both armies were sucked back into the Void due to the actions of the Tenth Doctor
. However, Sec was seen activating an "emergency temporal shift" before being sucked in. The following series revealed that Caan, Thay and Jast were also able to escape in the same fashion.
Ending up in 1930's New York during the 2-part event of "Daleks in Manhattan
" and "Evolution of the Daleks
", after a failed attempt to restart their species via cloning, Sec hatched a plan of evolving the species into a new race that would adapt to the changing times, noting that despite their quest for perfection, their race was close to extinction. To that end, he telepathically contacted a human, Mr Diagoras, to serve as their servant in finishing the Empire State Building and reinforcing it with Dalekanium metal. The other Cult members (Dalek Thay, Dalek Caan, and Dalek Jast) were assigned to capture humans, which would be split into two groups. Through a quick brain scan, the Daleks determined the intelligence of each captured human. The more intelligent humans became part of the Final Experiment, while the less intelligent were transformed into pig slaves, humanoid creatures with pig-like faces, to capture more humans. The Final Experiment involved Dalek Sec making the ultimate sacrifice, despite objections from his comrades, absorbing Diagoras which transformed Sec into a new species of Hybrid Dalek, a Human Dalek.
While having the Doctor as his captive, Sec revealed that his transformation was the first part of the Final Experiment. The next stage involved the introduction of his hybrid DNA into thousands of captured and mind-wiped Humans, whose DNA would be spliced through gamma radiation from the Sun, channelled into the Empire State Building and into the transgenic laboratory where the bodies were held. Notable changes came to this plan upon the transformation of Dalek Sec who was filled with new emotions; the first time the Daleks have felt in centuries. He believed that a return to their biological roots was necessary and even made peace with the Daleks' arch nemesis the Doctor, and asked for his help in relocating the new Dalek species. However, Sec failed to realise the Dalek imperative for racial purity among his comrades, who turned on him and replaced his genetic sample with their own so the Dalekised Humans would wipe out Humanity and transform Earth into New Skaro. Sec was killed and the Daleks' plans fell into ruin when their Dalek army was corrupted with Time Lord DNA. Daleks Thay and Jast were killed leaving the new commander, Dalek Caan, the only survivor as he terminated the Dalek-Human army by remote, killing the newly born species. The Doctor attempted to show mercy to Caan despite everything, but the Dalek initiated an emergency temporal shift to escape.
It would be revealed later that Caan forced himself into the Time War
to save Davros from destruction at the Gates of Elysium. He took his creator to safety, but the ordeal from forcing himself into the time-locked moment left him insane and partially destroyed, mumbling predictions about a forthcoming showdown with the Doctor.
" both Davros and the Red Dalek were seen as rulers of the New Dalek Empire. While Davros led the forces, he referred to the Red Dalek as being the Supreme Dalek. Davros then used cells from his own body to create a new race of Daleks which began stealing planets from time, creating an artificial solar system. The planets of the artificial solar system are arranged in such a way that they uniquely channel energy that can be harnessed. These planets were placed in the rift in the Medusa Cascade, which was set a second out of sync from time, making it the perfect hiding place.
"Journey's End
" shows Davros gloating that his plan is to destroy reality itself. "The Crucible" is revealed to be a gigantic space station that houses the entire empire and is used for twisted experimentations on the reality bomb. The bomb is a device that uses the energy of the 27 planets, and is powerful enough to cancel out even the slightest atoms outside of the Medusa Cascade. The Supreme Dalek plans to use this device to destroy reality itself, using Davros' genius and Caan's prophetical powers for guidance. Ultimately, the Daleks hoped to make themselves the sole living race in the universe that survived. The interference of The Doctor and his companions had stopped Davros' plans, who learns that Caan engineered it so the Daleks would be destroyed forever. With the Crucible exploding from all the Daleks self-destructing and the Supreme Dalek destroyed, the fates of both Davros and Caan are left ambiguous.
", Adelaide Brooke recalls how a Dalek spared her life during the 2009 invasion
. The Doctor concluded that the Dalek knew she was fixed point in time, and thus could not kill her without threatening the laws of time.
the Doctor described the inside of the Time Lock which as being created to stop any entry or exit from the events of the Time War, which Dalek Caan somehow helped Davros escape. In this Lock, Gallifrey
is seen with hundreds of Dalek ships destroyed outside the ruined City of the Time Lords. Rassilon
, having become corrupt because of the War, attempt to escape the Lock and recreate Gallifrey. The Doctor mentions that Skaro would also be restored, the Daleks would return and the Time War would continue, though the combined efforts of the Doctor and the Master restore the Time Lock.
", a Dalek shadow can be seen during Prime Minister
Winston Churchill
's telephone conversation with the Eleventh Doctor
.
In "Victory of the Daleks
", it is revealed that a Dalek ship survived the destruction of the New Dalek Empire and fell back through time to 1941. The ship appears to be badly damaged, with only three surviving Daleks on board. The surviving Daleks discovered that a Progenitor, a small capsule containing pure Dalek DNA, had also fallen back though time. The Daleks retrieved it, planning to create a new race of Daleks, but were unable to activate the capsule, as it couldn't identify them as pure Daleks, due to their DNA coming from Davros. To solve this problem, they set a trap for the Doctor, since the Progenitor would recognize the Doctor as the Daleks' greatest enemy and activate. This trap consisted of building an android who claimed to have invented two of the daleks. With Dalek blueprints and Two daleks painted in British Army Khaki Winston Churchill uses them as War weapons, although they are mostly seen to be carring around files and asking staff : "Would you care for some tea?" The Doctor is surprised as these Khaki daleks appear to have forgotten their own purpose and reminds them by proclaiming "I am the Doctor, and you are the Daleks!" thus activating the progenitor. Though their plan was a success, the
five new advanced Daleks that appear then exterminated their predecessors, each Dalek is a different color and each represents a specific place in Dalek Hierarchy - Red/Drone, Orange/Scientist, Blue/Strategist, Yellow/Eternal and White/Supreme. The Daleks activate a time corridor, and escape into the future, delaying the Doctor by threatening to destroy Earth.
Amy doesn't recognize the Daleks when she first meets them, despite the events of "Doomsday" and "The Stolen Earth", which the Doctor says is impossible. In "Flesh and Stone
", the Doctor theorizes that the cracks in the universe caused the events to be unwritten. The purpose of the yellow Eternal Dalek is still yet to be decided.
s of Doctor Who: The Adventure Games
's first episode: "City of the Daleks".
Following their escape
, the Daleks discovered the lost Time Lord artefact, The Eye of Time, allowing them to alter time as they saw fit with few consequences. The Daleks left earth behind in the 1940s and returned to Skaro, rebuilt their capital city of Kaalann, appointed a new blue Dalek Emperor, possibly the same Blue Strategist Dalek, and begun rebuilding their Empire. One of the Daleks' first acts with their new found power over time was to invade London, Earth in 1963. In this new timeline, they succeeded in killing every member of the Human race. However, the Doctor and Amy successfully undid these events, leaving Earth unconquered and Kaalann still abandoned. What became of the daleks is unknown, along with how they broke the Time War Time Lock in order to reach Skaro in the first place.
" as part of the Alliance. They were present at the Opening of the Pandorica and the Supreme Dalek revealed the origin behind the Pandorica, the Alliance and Stonehenge
before the Doctor is imprisoned in the Pandorica prison.
In "The Big Bang
", following all of reality cracking, the Daleks were turned to stone, due to their history/creation being erased. A Stone Dalek was later seen at a museum with the Pandorica, and was awoken when it was hit by the light of the Pandorica. It shot the Doctor, but due to its power being weak it was not a fatal shot. However, River Song
, enraged and believing the Doctor to be dead, aimed her gun at the Stone Dalek, knowing that its defences were weak. She later claimed to have killed the Dalek but this was not shown onscreen. By the end of the episode, the Doctor reversed the explosion of the TARDIS, so it is assumed that the alliance which trapped the Doctor was never formed, and so the Daleks are presumably still at large.
. Vorgenson's idea had him create his own machine, called the Minimiser, and used it to head a travelling show dedicated to the Doctor, and featured many mind controlled versions of his recently encountered enemies, apart from the Daleks, dismissed by Vorgeneson as "too dangerous". The Dalek's plan for this was to attract the Eleventh Doctor to the show with Vorgenston's monsters, and capture him in the Minimiser. This plan worked, although later Vorgenson realised the truth. The audience managed to save the Doctor, and help him to release the Cybermen from the Minimiser to destroy the Daleks.
", having been heavily damaged by the Doctor, who then rips it's dome off and scans it's data core for information about the Silence. This Dalek is the same design as the New Paradigm Daleks, but has gray-colored armor, possibly meaning it is the White Supreme in the dark room.
, sometimes opposing the Doctor and sometimes on their own. All these spin-offs are of uncertain canonicity, and not all of them can be easily reconciled with the television series or with each other. Where they fit in the Dalek timeline is also uncertain.
began publishing The Daleks, which was written by Whitaker and included an account of the Daleks' origins. (The comic strip was, years later, collected together in an edition titled The Dalek Chronicles).
The TV 21 strips portrayed the opposing sides in Skaro's war as the Thals and the Daleks, shown as diminutive blue men with large heads somewhat similar in appearance to Dan Dare
's Mekon
. According to the comic, these humanoid Daleks built neutron bombs which were accidentally detonated by a meteorite storm. (The idea of the war having an accidental, rather than deliberate origin, goes back to an earlier draft of the first Dalek television story.) The Daleks' chief scientist, Yarvelling, had built Dalek casings as war machines prior to the nuclear holocaust. After the neutron bombs exploded, Yarvelling and Zolfian, the warlord of the humanoid Daleks, discovered that a mutated Dalek had survived in the war machine casing. This Dalek persuaded Yarvelling and Zolfian to build more Dalek casings for their mutated descendants. Before the last two humanoid Daleks died, it declared itself the Dalek Emperor, and had a new casing built to reflect its new rank, slightly shorter than the other Daleks, with a disproportionately large spheroid
head section and in gold rather than grey.
Later stories in the Dalek comic told of the expansion of the Daleks' empire, including a lengthy war against the Mechanoids. In the last published comic in this series, the Daleks learned the location of Earth, which they proposed to invade. Although much of the material in these strips directly contradicted what was shown on television later, some concepts like the Daleks using humanoid duplicates and the design of the Dalek Emperor did show up later on in the programme.
The Doctor Who Magazine
comic strips pitted the 26th century Daleks against the formidable Dalek Killer Abslom Daak and several more times against the Doctor. Emperor of the Daleks (DWM #197-#202) revealed the Sixth Doctor had deliberately rescued Davros from his trial (at the end of Revelation of the Daleks) and that the Seventh Doctor (with help from Bernice Summerfield
and Daak) helped ensure Davros obtained control of the thousands-strong Dalek army frozen on Spiridon
and began the Dalek civil war that would lead to the events of Remembrance of the Daleks.
The Eighth Doctor faced the Daleks twice: once to stop them from taking control of all realities (Fire and Brimstone, DWM #251-#255), and a second time when he encountered the humanised Daleks created in The Evil of the Daleks, who were in hiding on the planet Kryol (Children of the Revolution, DWM #312-#317).
added background detail to both the Dalek Wars of the 26th century and the Daleks' 22nd century invasion of Earth, including detailing the events of the Dalek conquest of Mars
(and a battle against the Ice Warrior
s) at that time in GodEngine
by Craig Hinton
.
The Eighth Doctor Adventures
novel War of the Daleks
by John Peel
is set after the apparent destruction of Skaro in Remembrance of the Daleks, and reveals that the planet had not, in fact, been destroyed. A convoluted explanation included the revelation that the planet Antalin had been terraformed to resemble Skaro and destroyed in its place. It is also revealed the Dalek/Movellan war (and indeed most of Dalek history before the destruction of "Skaro") was actually faked for Davros' benefit. Having discovered records of Skaro's destruction during their invasion of Earth, and after their attempts to change history failed, the Daleks created an elaborate deception to save Skaro by moving Davros to Antalin and faking the situation to maintain history. Davros is put on trial by the Daleks under the Dalek Prime and disintegrated at story's end, and the Eighth Doctor sends their factory ship back in time to be discovered by the Second Doctor in Power of the Daleks. Critically, War was badly received by some fans, who even disavowed it within the continuity of the novels. Others welcomed War for having the Daleks reassert their original independence from Davros.
The Eighth Doctor faces the Daleks again in Legacy of the Daleks
, when he returns to Earth in the aftermath of the Dalek Invasion, although in this case the Daleks are basic versions who have been reactivated by the Master (Whom the Doctor unintentionally confronts out of sequence), the novel concluding with the Daleks being destroyed and the Master being left in the condition that he was seen in during "The Deadly Assassin
".
The Telos novella The Dalek Factor
by Simon Clark
features a Dalek task-force using an amnesiac Doctor to trap and genetically re-engineer Thals with the "Dalek Factor" (the thoughts and instincts of a Dalek) so they can spread it throughout the Thal gene pool. Once this is accomplished, the Daleks plan to trigger the factor, wiping out the Thals by turning them into Daleks. The New Series Adventures
novella I am a Dalek
by Gareth Roberts
has the Daleks attempting the same stratagem on humans during the Time War, but on a smaller scale that infects only one 20th century human.
A new novel, Prisoner of the Daleks
, was released in April 2009. In it, the Doctor crosses into the pre-Time War Dalek timeline by accident, and lands in the 26th centurey, references are made to a recent conflict with the Draconians (Fontier in Space) and the Osterhagen Principle is said to have been invented 500 years before (Journey's End). In this period of history, the pre-Time War Dalek Empire is fighting a huge galactic war against Earth, possibly the same war referred to in the Virgin New Adventures, with Earth Command forced to hire bounty hunters to help them. However, despite the Daleks being superior in technology, the war has reached stalemate, and can go either way. To win the war, the Daleks plan to open the Arkheon Threshold, a schism in time and space, and launch a huge Dalek force into the time votex to conquer the whole of time and space. They capture a fleet of ships escaping from a colony planet and force them to work on breaking through to the Threshold with manual labour. Their plan is however defeated when the Doctor lures them to an abandoned refueling planet where the TARDIS is located- the Daleks needing the TARDIS to make the experiment work-, and then detonates the remaining fuel stores, destroying a Dalek science squad and a small Dalek fleet. The novel ends with the Earth forces overwhelming the Dalek forces at the Arkheon Threshold, and Earth going on the offensive.
by Big Finish Productions
. The first four Doctor Who audio plays starring the Daleks were released under the "Dalek Empire
" banner, and portrayed a territorially expansive Dalek army under the command of the Emperor (who did not appear to be Davros). Three of the four occurred consecutively (though not from the POV of the Doctor), and it's not entirely clear whether they are before or after Remembrance. In The Genocide Machine
, the Daleks invaded the Kar-Charrat Library to learn information they eventually use in The Apocalypse Element
. In that play, the Daleks invade the Time Lords' home planet, Gallifrey
, but are eventually defeated. They also use the eponymous "apocalypse element" to burn an entire galaxy, Seriphia, and plan to conquer the now-empty galaxy and use it as a new base for their empire. The final story, The Time of the Daleks
, showed that the Daleks had gained much greater knowledge of time travel from their invasion of Gallifrey. The third play, The Mutant Phase
, had few links with the others in the series and occurred around the time of Dalek Invasion Of Earth; the events of this story were erased
at its conclusion.
The Big Finish audio Jubilee
depicted an alternate Earth in which the Sixth Doctor
had helped defeat a Dalek invasion in 1903. Most of the story is set a hundred years later, in a world in which Dalek technology and ideals have been used to create a fascist
and sexist
"English Empire". This timeline is largely erased at the story's end, but the Sixth Doctor warns that this nightmarish history will "live on, in the shadows." Jubilee was written by Rob Shearman, who used elements of it- such as the Doctor's companion bonding with a lone Dalek- for his 2005 television episode, "Dalek".
Davros has also appeared in several Big Finish audios. He appears without the Daleks in the eponymous Davros
, set between Resurrection of the Daleks and Revelation of the Daleks. In The Juggernauts
, set between Revelation and Remembrance of the Daleks, the Daleks manipulate the Sixth Doctor for the purpose of recapturing Davros (who had escaped his Dalek captors after the end of Revelation). Davros adds human nervous tissue to robotic Mechanoids to create the Juggernauts of the play's title; he hopes to use these as an army to destroy the Daleks. At the end of the story, the self-destruct mechanism of Davros' life-support chair explodes after it is damaged by a conflict between the Daleks and the Juggernauts, destroying an entire human colony. It is not clear how Davros survives to become the Dalek Emperor, as seen in Remembrance.
The Bernice Summerfield
audio Death and the Daleks
features the Daleks of the 26th century secretly controlling the Fifth Axis, a military force based on ideals of human superiority and the extermination of aliens, using them as proxies to conquer various worlds the Daleks did not want to be seen conquering, including the Braxiatel Collection
. Through the efforts of Benny Summerfield and her allies, the Axis was defeated and the Dalek control exposed.
By the time of the Eighth Doctor
audio play Terror Firma
(set after Remembrance), Davros is commanding a Dalek army which has successfully conquered the Earth. His mental instability has grown to the point where "Davros" and "the Emperor" exist within him as different personalities
. His Daleks recognise this instability and rebel against Davros. By the story's end the Emperor personality is dominant, and the Daleks agree to follow him and leave Earth. How this can be reconciled with War of the Daleks is uncertain, and may support the proposition that the various spin-off media take place in their own respective parallel universes
. It is possible this takes place (from the point of view of the Daleks) before the original Dalek Empire Doctor stories.
A spin-off series of audios, also titled Dalek Empire, is set after Time Of The Daleks and features a successful Dalek invasion of the Milky Way during an Earth Empire. The Daleks make great headway and manage to conquer their way up to Earth's solar system in a prolonged war against both humans and the Daleks of an alternate reality. They are finally defeated by a psychic attack that causes every piece of Dalek machinery to self-destruct in an ever-expanding wave which obliterates their forces and kills the Emperor. However, this also cripples civilisation of the Milky Way and sets galactic development back by a substantial amount. Centuries later, when only a handful remember the Daleks, the Dalek Empire attacks again under the command of a Dalek Supreme, which infects the borders of the galaxy with a virus that genetically re-engineers humans into Daleks. By the end of the third Dalek Empire series, the Daleks have a new giant army and are poised to go to war with the Galactic Federation, with the outcome uncertain. The Seventh Doctor audio Return of the Daleks
, set during the first Dalek Empire series, features the Daleks and Kalendorf trying to awaken their army buried on Spiridon, only for the Doctor to thwart their plans by infecting them with light-wave sickness when they attempt to recreate their old experiments to master the secret of invisibility.
Dalek
The Daleks are a fictional extraterrestrial race of mutants from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Within the series, Daleks are cyborgs from the planet Skaro, created by the scientist Davros during the final years of a thousand-year war against the Thals...
s (icon ) are a fictional extraterrestrial
Extraterrestrial life in popular culture
In popular cultures, "extraterrestrials" are life forms — especially intelligent life forms— that are of extraterrestrial origin .-Historical ideas:-Pre-modern:...
race of mutant
Mutant
In biology and especially genetics, a mutant is an individual, organism, or new genetic character, arising or resulting from an instance of mutation, which is a base-pair sequence change within the DNA of a gene or chromosome of an organism resulting in the creation of a new character or trait not...
s from the British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
science fiction television
Science fiction on television
Science fiction first appeared on a television program during the Golden Age of Science Fiction. Special effects and other production techniques allow creators to present a living visual image of an imaginary world not limited by the constraints of reality; this makes television an excellent medium...
series Doctor Who
Doctor Who
Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a time-travelling humanoid alien known as the Doctor who explores the universe in a sentient time machine called the TARDIS that flies through time and space, whose exterior...
. The mutated remains of the Kaled people of the planet Skaro
Skaro
Skaro is a fictional planet from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who created by the writer Terry Nation as the home planet of the Daleks and, at times, the centre of the Dalek Empire....
, they travel around in tank
Tank
A tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility, tactical offensive, and defensive capabilities...
-like mechanical casings, and are a race bent on universal conquest and destruction. They are also, collectively, the greatest alien adversaries of the Time Lord
Time Lord
The Time Lords are an ancient extraterrestrial race and civilization of humanoids in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, of which the series' eponymous protagonist, the Doctor, is a member...
known as the Doctor
Doctor (Doctor Who)
The Doctor is the central character in the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who, and has also featured in two cinema feature films, a vast range of spin-off novels, audio dramas and comic strips connected to the series....
, having evolved over the course of the series from a weak race to monsters capable of destroying even the Time Lords and achieving control of the universe.
Origins
The Doctor first encountered the Daleks in the second serial of the show, The DaleksThe Daleks
The Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in seven weekly parts from 21 December 1963 to 1 February 1964...
(1963
1963 in television
The year 1963 in television involved some significant events.Below is a list of television-related events in 1963.-Events:*January 13 – BBC Television broadcasts the play The Madhouse on Castle Street in the Sunday-Night Theatre strand...
). In this version of Dalek history, the Dalek home-world Skaro
Skaro
Skaro is a fictional planet from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who created by the writer Terry Nation as the home planet of the Daleks and, at times, the centre of the Dalek Empire....
was once home to two humanoid
Humanoid
A humanoid is something that has an appearance resembling a human being. The term first appeared in 1912 to refer to fossils which were morphologically similar to, but not identical with, those of the human skeleton. Although this usage was common in the sciences for much of the 20th century, it...
races: the peaceful and scientifically advanced Kaleds/Dals (who were described as philosophers
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
and teacher
Teacher
A teacher or schoolteacher is a person who provides education for pupils and students . The role of teacher is often formal and ongoing, carried out at a school or other place of formal education. In many countries, a person who wishes to become a teacher must first obtain specified professional...
s) and the warlike Thals
Thal (Doctor Who)
The Thals are a fictional race of humanoid aliens from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, originating on the planet Skaro.-History within the show:...
. Following a short but terrible nuclear war
Nuclear warfare
Nuclear warfare, or atomic warfare, is a military conflict or political strategy in which nuclear weaponry is detonated on an opponent. Compared to conventional warfare, nuclear warfare can be vastly more destructive in range and extent of damage...
between the races, the Dals were mutated and became the aggressive
Aggressive
“Aggressive” is a New York-based Grammy award-winning music video and commercial directing team of Alex Topaller and Daniel Shapiro.Aggressive has been described by Movie Creation Mag as “having a fascination with the wonderful, in the likes of the surrealist Rafal Olbinski” and “tenacious about...
and xenophobic
Xenophobia
Xenophobia is defined as "an unreasonable fear of foreigners or strangers or of that which is foreign or strange". It comes from the Greek words ξένος , meaning "stranger," "foreigner" and φόβος , meaning "fear."...
Daleks. In the second episode the Daleks state the war occurred "over five hundred years ago". They were more or less confined to their city, their motive power being static electricity
Static electricity
Static electricity refers to the build-up of electric charge on the surface of objects. The static charges remain on an object until they either bleed off to ground or are quickly neutralized by a discharge. Static electricity can be contrasted with current electricity, which can be delivered...
conducted from metal walkways. At the end of this serial, the Daleks were seemingly wiped out. However, the popularity of the Daleks ensured their return.
They next appeared in The Dalek Invasion of Earth
The Dalek Invasion of Earth
The Dalek Invasion of Earth is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which originally aired in six weekly parts from November 21 to December 26, 1964....
(1964), which showed the Daleks having conquered and occupied the Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
in the mid 22nd century. The Doctor explained the presence of the Daleks by saying that the events were taking place "a million years" before The Daleks, and that what they were witnessing was the "middle period" of Dalek history. However, these Daleks as an invasion force were able to move without the need for metal paths, drawing power through what appear to be radio dishes on their backs.
Over the course of their next few appearances, the Daleks developed, variously, time travel
Time travel
Time travel is the concept of moving between different points in time in a manner analogous to moving between different points in space. Time travel could hypothetically involve moving backward in time to a moment earlier than the starting point, or forward to the future of that point without the...
(The Chase
The Chase (Doctor Who)
The Chase is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from 22 May to 26 June 1965. The story is set on multiple locations including the Mary Celeste, the Empire State Building, and the planet Aridius...
, 1965), an interstellar empire
Dalek Empire
The Dalek Empire refers to the sphere of influence of the Daleks, a fictional extraterrestrial race of mutants from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Dalek Empire is also a series of audio plays produced by Big Finish Productions, featuring the Daleks. The series begins in...
in the year 4000 (The Daleks' Master Plan
The Daleks' Master Plan
The Daleks' Master Plan is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. The twelve episodes were aired from 13 November 1965 to 29 January 1966...
, 1965), and factory ships for conquest seen before the Earth occupation (The Power of the Daleks
The Power of the Daleks
The Power of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from 5 November to 10 December 1966. It is Patrick Troughton's first full story as the Doctor.-Plot:...
, 1966). The radio dishes also vanished, and Daleks were able to move under their own power. Given the time travel nature of the series, whether these stories took place chronologically in the order they were transmitted is uncertain. The only given date is 4000AD for The Daleks' Master Plan.
A second attempt to end the Dalek saga was made in The Evil of the Daleks
The Evil of the Daleks
The Evil of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which originally aired in seven weekly parts from 20 May to 1 July 1967. This serial marked the debut of Deborah Watling as the Doctor's new companion, Victoria Waterfield.Evil was initially intended to...
(1967), which also introduced a Dalek Emperor. In that story, the conflagration caused by a Dalek civil war was declared by the Second Doctor
Second Doctor
The Second Doctor is the second incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by character actor Patrick Troughton....
to be "the final end." This was because Terry Nation was in negotiations to sell the Dalek concept to American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
television. Although the sale did not succeed, the Daleks did not appear again for five years. An untransmitted line of dialogue in the original script for Day of the Daleks
Day of the Daleks
Day of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 1 January to 22 January 1972.-Synopsis:...
mentions the supposed final end, when one of the Daleks says that the humanised Daleks were wiped out by the true Daleks. However, the humanised Daleks would later appear in a comic strip (Children of the Revolution) in Doctor Who Magazine
Doctor Who Magazine
Doctor Who Magazine is a magazine devoted to the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who...
.
The Daleks returned in the Third Doctor
Third Doctor
The Third Doctor is the third incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by actor Jon Pertwee....
serial, Day of the Daleks
Day of the Daleks
Day of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 1 January to 22 January 1972.-Synopsis:...
(1972), where once again they used time travel technology. The Daleks were re-established as a species bent on universal conquest, as seen in 1973's Frontier in Space
Frontier in Space
Frontier in Space is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from February 24 to March 31, 1973...
(which led directly into Planet of the Daleks
Planet of the Daleks
Planet of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from April 7 to May 12, 1973.-Synopsis:...
) and later on in Death to the Daleks
Death to the Daleks
Death to the Daleks is a four-part serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. First broadcast from February 23 to March 16, 1974, it comprises four 25-minute episodes. The narrative begins as the TARDIS suffers an energy drain and crash-lands on the planet Exxilon...
(1974). The Dalek Emperor was not in attendance, the Daleks being led by a Supreme Dalek instead, with references made to a Dalek High Council. Frontier and Planet are set in the 26th Century, while Death refers to the recent "Dalek Wars".
Genesis of the Daleks
Genesis of the Daleks
Genesis of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who that was originally broadcast in six weekly parts from 8 March to 12 April 1975. It marks the first appearance of Davros, the creator of the Daleks.-Plot:...
, where the Doctor was sent by the Time Lord
Time Lord
The Time Lords are an ancient extraterrestrial race and civilization of humanoids in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, of which the series' eponymous protagonist, the Doctor, is a member...
s (or possibly their Celestial Intervention Agency
Celestial Intervention Agency
The Celestial Intervention Agency is a fictional organization of Time Lords in the universe of the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who....
) to the moment of the Daleks' creation, in order to stop the Dalek race before it could begin.
The Kaleds (an anagram of Daleks), are a race of humanoid extraterrestrials and the forebears of the Dalek
Dalek
The Daleks are a fictional extraterrestrial race of mutants from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Within the series, Daleks are cyborgs from the planet Skaro, created by the scientist Davros during the final years of a thousand-year war against the Thals...
s. The Kaleds, with their grey-black uniforms, stylised salutes and authoritarian
Authoritarianism
Authoritarianism is a form of social organization characterized by submission to authority. It is usually opposed to individualism and democracy...
political structure, were thinly veiled analogues of the Nazis
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
. In this serial, it was the Kaleds who waged war on the Thals. The Daleks originated during the Kaled-Thal War, which was portrayed as a thousand-year-long war of attrition
Attrition warfare
Attrition warfare is a military strategy in which a belligerent side attempts to win a war by wearing down its enemy to the point of collapse through continuous losses in personnel and matériel....
, fought with nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, with weapons becoming progressively less sophisticated as resources became scarcer, not the short nuclear exchange previously described. It is not clear if this was the nuclear exchange between Daleks and Thals referred to in The Daleks or an even earlier conflict.
The crippled Kaled chief scientist and evil genius Davros
Davros
Davros is a character from the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Davros is an archenemy of the Doctor and is the creator of the Doctor's deadliest enemies, the Daleks...
deemed the mutations from the fallout irreversible, and then experimented on living cells, treating them with chemicals and accelerating the mutations to discover the eventual mutated Kaled form and ensure its survival. The serial suggested that mutations among the general Kaled populace were not as advanced as implied by the earlier account, and that the development of the mutated creatures that became the Daleks was engineered by Davros for his own purposes. Ostensibly he was only speeding up the process, in order to predict the final form of the Kaled mutation; seeing its helplessness he devised the means for his race's continued existence. Ultimately he used his creations to prematurely replace the non-mutated members of his race with the Daleks.
These genetically conditioned forms were placed in Mark III "travel machines" whose design was based on his own life-support chair. The tank
Tank
A tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility, tactical offensive, and defensive capabilities...
-like travel machines coupled with the mutants became the first Daleks.
The Fourth Doctor
Fourth Doctor
The Fourth Doctor is the fourth incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC British television science-fiction series Doctor Who....
's appearance on the scene (to try to prevent the creation of the Daleks or at the very least lessen the damage they would do in future) leads other Kaled scientists to try to shut down the Dalek project. To prevent this, Davros arranged for the Thals to wipe out his own people. The Daleks were then sent to exterminate the Thals, but later turned on Davros and apparently killed him.
While a group of surviving Thals wired the Kaled research bunker with explosives, the Doctor had the opportunity to fulfill his mission and destroy the Daleks at their genesis, but when the time came the Doctor could not perform what he saw as an act of genocide. He believed that despite the horror, evil and destruction that the Daleks would inflict on the universe, ultimately there must be 'some greater good.'
He later returned to the incubation chamber and did destroy the Dalek embryos, but afterwards the Doctor concluded that this action, together with the Thals' sealing them in the bunker, had only retarded their progress by a thousand years. The Discontinuity Guide
The Discontinuity Guide
The Discontinuity Guide, by Paul Cornell, Martin Day and Keith Topping, is a humorous guidebook to the serials of the original run of the BBC science fiction series Doctor Who. It was first published in 1995 by Virgin Books, which at the time also published licensed Doctor Who...
by Paul Cornell
Paul Cornell
Paul Cornell is a British writer best known for his work in television drama as well as Doctor Who fiction, and as the creator of one of the Doctor's spin-off companions, Bernice Summerfield....
, Martin Day
Martin Day
Martin Day is a screenwriter and novelist best known for his work on various spin-offs related to the BBC Television series Doctor Who, and many episodes of the daytime soaps Doctors and Family Affairs.-Work:...
and Keith Topping
Keith Topping
Keith Andrew Topping , is an author, journalist and broadcaster most closely associated with his work relating to the BBC Television series Doctor Who and for writing numerous official and unofficial guide books to a wide variety of television and film series, specifically Buffy the Vampire...
argues that the Doctor did succeed in changing Dalek history. However, other commentators argue that it is possible to reconcile the pre- and post-Genesis stories without the need to invoke two versions of Dalek history.
Post-Genesis history
In Destiny of the DaleksDestiny of the Daleks
Destiny of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 1 September to 22 September 1979. The story introduces Lalla Ward as the newly-regenerated Romana....
(1979), it was revealed that Davros had survived the Daleks' attack and lived on, buried in a bunker in suspended animation
Suspended animation
Suspended animation is the slowing of life processes by external means without termination. Breathing, heartbeat, and other involuntary functions may still occur, but they can only be detected by artificial means. Extreme cold can be used to precipitate the slowing of an individual's functions; use...
. During the time Davros was sleeping, the Daleks had abandoned the ruins of Skaro and established a vast interstellar empire, eventually encountering a hostile race of androids called the Movellans. The Dalek and Movellan warfleets were very evenly matched, and neither side's purely logical battle computers could find a successful strategy for an attack against the other. As a result, the two fleets remained locked in a standoff for centuries, constantly maneuvering and probing for an opportunity to break the stalemate
Stalemate
Stalemate is a situation in chess where the player whose turn it is to move is not in check but has no legal moves. A stalemate ends the game in a draw. Stalemate is covered in the rules of chess....
but without either side actually firing a single shot.
The Daleks sent an expedition to the ruins of Skaro to recover Davros and seek his help to upgrade their designs in the hope of finding a way through the impasse, and the Movellans sent an expedition to stop them. The Daleks succeeded in reviving Davros, who theorised that the extreme intelligence and rationality of the battle computers were to blame and that the first side to take a seemingly reckless gamble would tip the balance in their favour. However, the Doctor intervened and prevented either the Dalek or Movellan expeditions from returning with this insight. Davros fell into the hands of a Human space empire and was put back in suspended animation for indefinite imprisonment.
This impasse continued for nearly a century until the Movellans finally developed a weapon capable of breaking it — a highly virulent biological agent that targeted Daleks. In Resurrection of the Daleks
Resurrection of the Daleks
Resurrection of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in two weekly parts between 8 February and 15 February 1984...
(1984), having lost the war, the Daleks rescued Davros from the Human prison station where he had been frozen for ninety years and demanded that he develop a defence against the disease. This time it was Davros who double-crossed the Daleks, deciding to take personal command of the Dalek race rather than merely serving it. Davros's continuing influence eventually led to a schism among the Daleks, with one faction following Davros's leadership and another rejecting their creator to instead follow the Supreme Dalek.
By the time of Revelation of the Daleks
Revelation of the Daleks
Revelation of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in two weekly parts on 23 March and 30 March 1985...
(1985), Davros was in hiding at the Tranquil Repose funeral facility on the planet Necros, experimenting with physically transforming humans into Daleks. He was also placing those Daleks loyal to him into white and gold casings to distinguish them from the usual black and grey Daleks, but his plans were undone when a worker at the facility contacted the original Daleks. These Daleks arrived on Necros, exterminated the white and gold Daleks and captured Davros, who was returned to Skaro to face trial.
Civil War
Davros made his next televised appearance in the serial Remembrance of the DaleksRemembrance of the Daleks
Remembrance of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 5 October to 26 October 1988....
(1988). Apparently, events had taken place off-screen, as he appeared in the guise of the Dalek Emperor, leading his gold and white Imperial Daleks with control over Skaro . Davros had at this point modified the Imperial Daleks, adding cybernetic enhancements to their organic components. A new model "Special Weapons Dalek" was introduced with an enormously powerful cannon and armour capable of deflecting regular Dalek weaponry. Also, for the first time, a Dalek was clearly seen on screen to hover up a flight of stairs.
Pitted against the Imperial Daleks were the Renegade Daleks, led by a black Supreme Dalek. The name "renegade" suggests that the tables had turned and Davros' side had the upper hand. Both Dalek factions became aware that the Hand of Omega
Hand of Omega
The Hand of Omega is a fictional device from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who.In Remembrance of the Daleks the Seventh Doctor explains that the "Hand of Omega" is the mythical name for the remote stellar manipulator invented by Omega, the first of the Time Lords of the...
, a Gallifrey
Gallifrey
Gallifrey is a fictional planet in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who and is the homeworld of the Doctor and the Time Lords...
an stellar engineering device, was hidden on Earth in the year 1963. Both factions sent expeditions to Earth, battling each other to retrieve it, hoping to use the Hand to create a power source that would refine their crude time travel technology.
Ultimately, the Imperial Daleks succeeded, not knowing that the Doctor had inserted a booby trap into the Hand's programming. When Davros activated it, Skaro's sun went supernova
Supernova
A supernova is a stellar explosion that is more energetic than a nova. It is pronounced with the plural supernovae or supernovas. Supernovae are extremely luminous and cause a burst of radiation that often briefly outshines an entire galaxy, before fading from view over several weeks or months...
, and both the Dalek homeworld and the Imperial Dalek fleet were destroyed. Davros, however, apparently escaped his flagship's destruction in an escape pod. The Renegade Supreme Dalek self-destructed when the Doctor informed it that it was failed and the last of its kind. It's unclear if it was the last dalek on earth or at all. Remembrance of the Daleks marked the last on-screen appearance of the Daleks in the context of the programme until 2005, save for charity specials like Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death
Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death
Doctor Who and the Curse of Fatal Death is a four-episode special of Doctor Who made for the Red Nose Day charity telethon in the United Kingdom, and broadcast on BBC One on 12 March 1999...
and the use of Dalek voices in the Doctor Who television movie
Doctor Who (1996)
Doctor Who is a television movie based on the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Developed as a co-production amongst Universal Television, BBC Television, BBC Worldwide, and the American network FOX, the 1996 television film premiered on 12 May 1996 on CITV in Edmonton,...
with the second seems to happen before the events of 'Remembrance of the daleks'.
Revived series
A new Doctor Who series was announced for 2005 and the Daleks have subsequently appeared in every series since.In the first series of the revival, the Daleks serve as the main antagonist
Antagonist
An antagonist is a character, group of characters, or institution, that represents the opposition against which the protagonist must contend...
s.
The new Daleks exhibited abilities not seen before, including a swivelling mid-section that allowed it a 360-degree field of fire and a force field that disintegrated bullets before they struck it. In addition to the ability to fly, it was also able to regenerate itself by means of absorbing electrical power and the DNA
DNA
Deoxyribonucleic acid is a nucleic acid that contains the genetic instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms . The DNA segments that carry this genetic information are called genes, but other DNA sequences have structural purposes, or are involved in...
of a time traveller. The "plunger" manipulator arm was also able to crush a man's skull in addition to the technology interfacing abilities shown by earlier models. The laser was shown to be conducted like electricity, when the Dalek fired in a wet metal room. The Doctor described the Dalek as a "genius", able to calculate a thousand billion lock combinations in a single second and to download the entire contents of the Internet
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
. A more sophisticated model of the Dalek mutant was also shown.
The Lone Dalek
In "DalekDalek (Doctor Who episode)
"Dalek" is an episode in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who that was first broadcast on 30 April 2005. It should not be confused with the first Dalek serial, The Daleks...
", it was revealed that the Daleks were rebuilt and that they were involved with the Time Lords in a Time War
Time War (Doctor Who)
The Time War, more specifically called The Last Great Time War, is a conflict within the fictional universe of the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who...
, in which the Doctor obliterated the entire Dalek race. The same war destroyed the Time Lords as well, with the Dalek that appeared in the episode and the Doctor the only apparent survivors. The Dalek had somehow fallen through time, ending up on Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
in the 21st century. By 2012, it had passed into the hands of American billionaire Henry van Statten, who dubbed it a "Metaltron" and kept it in a secret underground museum called the Vault along with other alien artifacts.
The Dalek was damaged, remaining silent and helpless until the Ninth Doctor
Ninth Doctor
The Ninth Doctor is the ninth incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He is played by Christopher Eccleston....
arrived at the Vault. Absorbing DNA from the Doctor's companion
Companion (Doctor Who)
In the long-running BBC television science fiction programme Doctor Who and related works, the term "companion" refers to a character who travels with, and shares the adventures of the Doctor. In most Doctor Who stories, the primary companion acts as both deuteragonist and audience surrogate...
Rose Tyler
Rose Tyler
Rose Marion Tyler is a fictional character portrayed by Billie Piper in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who, and was created by series producer Russell T Davies...
, it regenerated itself and went on a killing spree. However, having absorbed Rose's DNA, it continued to mutate and found itself beset with unfamiliar, human feelings. Realising it was now "contaminated", the mutant asked Rose to order it to destroy itself, rather than continue to live in that way. It then disintegrated itself with an energy field created by the spheres along its lower casing.
The Emperor Survived
The two-part 2005 series finalé, comprising "Bad WolfBad Wolf
"Bad Wolf" is an episode in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast on June 11, 2005. The TARDIS crew find themselves trapped in the Gamestation, also known as Satellite 5, where they must battle to survive the cruel games...
" and "The Parting of the Ways
The Parting of the Ways
"The Parting of the Ways" is an episode in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast on 18 June 2005. It was the second episode of the two-part story that featured Christopher Eccleston making his last appearance as the Ninth Doctor...
" revealed that this Dalek was, in fact, not the sole survivor of its race. The Emperor Dalek's ship had also survived, falling through time much as the lone Dalek did. Hidden, it began to rebuild, infiltrating Earth society over the course of centuries and using human genetic material to create a new Dalek race. This Emperor - being "contaminated" with human genetic material came to see itself as a god, and built its new society around the Daleks' worship of itself. The new Daleks, because of origin as being spawned from impure genetic material, became as mad as their creator and even more dangerous as a result.
Subtly manipulating the Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire of the year 200,000 by means of news programmes transmitted from Satellite 5
Satellite 5
Satellite 5 is a major location in the 2005 series of the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. In the series, it is first seen in the year 200,000 and is the main setting for the episode "The Long Game"...
in Earth orbit, the Daleks installed the monstrous Jagrafess as mankind's keeper. The Doctor removed the Jagrafess in "The Long Game
The Long Game
"The Long Game" is an episode in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who that was first broadcast on May 7, 2005. Along with new companion Adam, the TARDIS deposits the Doctor and Rose on Satellite 5, a space station that broadcasts across the entire human empire...
", but was unaware that the Daleks were behind it. Over the next hundred years, the Daleks continued their scheme, recreating Satellite Five as the Game Station, acquiring more humans for mutation by subjecting them to twisted reality television
Reality television
Reality television is a genre of television programming that presents purportedly unscripted dramatic or humorous situations, documents actual events, and usually features ordinary people instead of professional actors, sometimes in a contest or other situation where a prize is awarded...
games. The station's Controller was able to transport the Doctor and his companions into the station, where the Doctor discovered the Dalek presence. The race, now numbering close to half a million, were poised to invade Earth with a fleet of 200 ships.
The Doctor built a Delta Wave projector that would wipe out the Daleks, but would also eliminate all life on Earth, and found himself unable to trigger it. However, Rose had absorbed energies from the spacetime vortex by staring into the heart of the TARDIS and used those energies to reduce the Daleks and their fleet to atoms.
The Battle of Canary Wharf
In the 2006 series finale, "Army of GhostsArmy of Ghosts
"Army of Ghosts" is the twelfth and penultimate episode in the second series of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who which was first broadcast on 1 July 2006...
" and "Doomsday
Doomsday (Doctor Who)
"Doomsday" is the thirteenth and final episode in the second series of the revival of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was first broadcast on 8 July 2006 and is the conclusion of a two-part story; the first part, "Army of Ghosts", was broadcast on 1 July 2006...
", it was revealed that members of the Cult of Skaro
Cult of Skaro
In the television series Doctor Who, the Cult of Skaro was an elite order of Daleks, and the first individual Daleks whose recurring nature has been explicit.-Background:The Cult of Skaro first appeared in the double-episode "Army of Ghosts"/"Doomsday"...
had also escaped during the Time War by going into the nothingness between dimensions — the Void — taking with them a Time Lord prison, dubbed the Genesis Ark, which contained millions of Daleks. The Daleks' Void Ship finally emerged in 21st century Earth, where it was examined by the Torchwood Institute
Torchwood Institute
The Torchwood Institute is a fictional secret organization from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who and its spin-off series Torchwood. It was established in 1879 by Queen Victoria after the events of "Tooth and Claw". Its prime directive, is to defend the earth against...
. The path of the void ship also left a breach in spacetime that allowed the parallel Earth Cybermen to cross over into the Doctor's universe.
The Daleks rejected the Cybermen's proposal for an alliance to conquer the universe and the Ark was opened, releasing millions of Daleks to wage all-out war against the Cybermen across the planet. Ultimately, both armies were sucked back into the Void due to the actions of the Tenth Doctor
Tenth Doctor
The Tenth Doctor is the tenth incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He is played by David Tennant, who appears in three series, as well as eight specials...
. However, Sec was seen activating an "emergency temporal shift" before being sucked in. The following series revealed that Caan, Thay and Jast were also able to escape in the same fashion.
The Final Experiment
Daleks in Manhattan
"Daleks in Manhattan" is an episode of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was broadcast on BBC One on 21 April 2007, and is the fourth episode of Series 3 of the revived Doctor Who series. It is part one of a two-part story, concluded in "Evolution of the Daleks"...
" and "Evolution of the Daleks
Evolution of the Daleks
"Evolution of the Daleks" is an episode of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was first broadcast on BBC One on 28 April 2007, and is the fifth episode of Series 3 of the revived Doctor Who series. It is the conclusion of the two-part story begun in "Daleks in...
", after a failed attempt to restart their species via cloning, Sec hatched a plan of evolving the species into a new race that would adapt to the changing times, noting that despite their quest for perfection, their race was close to extinction. To that end, he telepathically contacted a human, Mr Diagoras, to serve as their servant in finishing the Empire State Building and reinforcing it with Dalekanium metal. The other Cult members (Dalek Thay, Dalek Caan, and Dalek Jast) were assigned to capture humans, which would be split into two groups. Through a quick brain scan, the Daleks determined the intelligence of each captured human. The more intelligent humans became part of the Final Experiment, while the less intelligent were transformed into pig slaves, humanoid creatures with pig-like faces, to capture more humans. The Final Experiment involved Dalek Sec making the ultimate sacrifice, despite objections from his comrades, absorbing Diagoras which transformed Sec into a new species of Hybrid Dalek, a Human Dalek.
While having the Doctor as his captive, Sec revealed that his transformation was the first part of the Final Experiment. The next stage involved the introduction of his hybrid DNA into thousands of captured and mind-wiped Humans, whose DNA would be spliced through gamma radiation from the Sun, channelled into the Empire State Building and into the transgenic laboratory where the bodies were held. Notable changes came to this plan upon the transformation of Dalek Sec who was filled with new emotions; the first time the Daleks have felt in centuries. He believed that a return to their biological roots was necessary and even made peace with the Daleks' arch nemesis the Doctor, and asked for his help in relocating the new Dalek species. However, Sec failed to realise the Dalek imperative for racial purity among his comrades, who turned on him and replaced his genetic sample with their own so the Dalekised Humans would wipe out Humanity and transform Earth into New Skaro. Sec was killed and the Daleks' plans fell into ruin when their Dalek army was corrupted with Time Lord DNA. Daleks Thay and Jast were killed leaving the new commander, Dalek Caan, the only survivor as he terminated the Dalek-Human army by remote, killing the newly born species. The Doctor attempted to show mercy to Caan despite everything, but the Dalek initiated an emergency temporal shift to escape.
It would be revealed later that Caan forced himself into the Time War
Time War (Doctor Who)
The Time War, more specifically called The Last Great Time War, is a conflict within the fictional universe of the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who...
to save Davros from destruction at the Gates of Elysium. He took his creator to safety, but the ordeal from forcing himself into the time-locked moment left him insane and partially destroyed, mumbling predictions about a forthcoming showdown with the Doctor.
The New Dalek Empire
In "The Stolen EarthThe Stolen Earth
"The Stolen Earth" is the twelfth episode of the fourth series and the 750th overall episode of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. The episode was written by show runner and head writer Russell T Davies and is the first of a two-part crossover story; the concluding episode is...
" both Davros and the Red Dalek were seen as rulers of the New Dalek Empire. While Davros led the forces, he referred to the Red Dalek as being the Supreme Dalek. Davros then used cells from his own body to create a new race of Daleks which began stealing planets from time, creating an artificial solar system. The planets of the artificial solar system are arranged in such a way that they uniquely channel energy that can be harnessed. These planets were placed in the rift in the Medusa Cascade, which was set a second out of sync from time, making it the perfect hiding place.
"Journey's End
Journey's End (Doctor Who)
"Journey's End" is the thirteenth episode of the fourth series of British science fiction television series Doctor Who first broadcast on BBC One on 5 July 2008. It is the second episode of a two-part crossover story featuring the characters of spin-off shows Torchwood and The Sarah Jane...
" shows Davros gloating that his plan is to destroy reality itself. "The Crucible" is revealed to be a gigantic space station that houses the entire empire and is used for twisted experimentations on the reality bomb. The bomb is a device that uses the energy of the 27 planets, and is powerful enough to cancel out even the slightest atoms outside of the Medusa Cascade. The Supreme Dalek plans to use this device to destroy reality itself, using Davros' genius and Caan's prophetical powers for guidance. Ultimately, the Daleks hoped to make themselves the sole living race in the universe that survived. The interference of The Doctor and his companions had stopped Davros' plans, who learns that Caan engineered it so the Daleks would be destroyed forever. With the Crucible exploding from all the Daleks self-destructing and the Supreme Dalek destroyed, the fates of both Davros and Caan are left ambiguous.
Adelaide Brooke
In "The Waters of MarsThe Waters of Mars
"The Waters of Mars" is the second 2009 special of British science fiction television series Doctor Who, broadcast on BBC One on 15 November 2009. It aired on BBC America on 19 December 2009 and was released on DVD and Blu-ray in the UK on 11 January 2010 and in the US on 2 February 2010...
", Adelaide Brooke recalls how a Dalek spared her life during the 2009 invasion
The Stolen Earth
"The Stolen Earth" is the twelfth episode of the fourth series and the 750th overall episode of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. The episode was written by show runner and head writer Russell T Davies and is the first of a two-part crossover story; the concluding episode is...
. The Doctor concluded that the Dalek knew she was fixed point in time, and thus could not kill her without threatening the laws of time.
Time Lock
In the two part 2009-2010 specials The End of TimeThe End of Time
The End of Time: The Next Revolution in Our Understanding of the Universe, also sold with the alternate subtitle The Next Revolution in Physics, is a 1999 science book in which the author Julian Barbour argues that time exists merely as an illusion.-Auto-biography:The book begins by describing how...
the Doctor described the inside of the Time Lock which as being created to stop any entry or exit from the events of the Time War, which Dalek Caan somehow helped Davros escape. In this Lock, Gallifrey
Gallifrey
Gallifrey is a fictional planet in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who and is the homeworld of the Doctor and the Time Lords...
is seen with hundreds of Dalek ships destroyed outside the ruined City of the Time Lords. Rassilon
Rassilon
Rassilon is a fictional character in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. In the backstory of the programme, he was the founder of Time Lord society on the planet Gallifrey...
, having become corrupt because of the War, attempt to escape the Lock and recreate Gallifrey. The Doctor mentions that Skaro would also be restored, the Daleks would return and the Time War would continue, though the combined efforts of the Doctor and the Master restore the Time Lock.
The Ironsides Project
In "The Beast BelowThe Beast Below
"The Beast Below" is the second episode of the fifth series of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It was written by showrunner Steven Moffat and broadcast on BBC One and BBC HD on 10 April 2010....
", a Dalek shadow can be seen during Prime Minister
Prime minister
A prime minister is the most senior minister of cabinet in the executive branch of government in a parliamentary system. In many systems, the prime minister selects and may dismiss other members of the cabinet, and allocates posts to members within the government. In most systems, the prime...
Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...
's telephone conversation with the Eleventh Doctor
Eleventh Doctor
The Eleventh Doctor is the eleventh incarnation of the protagonist of the BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. Matt Smith plays this incarnation, replacing David Tennant's Tenth Doctor in the 2010 episode "The End of Time, Part Two"...
.
In "Victory of the Daleks
Victory of the Daleks
"Victory of the Daleks" is the third episode in the fifth series of British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It is written by Mark Gatiss and first broadcast on BBC One on 17 April 2010....
", it is revealed that a Dalek ship survived the destruction of the New Dalek Empire and fell back through time to 1941. The ship appears to be badly damaged, with only three surviving Daleks on board. The surviving Daleks discovered that a Progenitor, a small capsule containing pure Dalek DNA, had also fallen back though time. The Daleks retrieved it, planning to create a new race of Daleks, but were unable to activate the capsule, as it couldn't identify them as pure Daleks, due to their DNA coming from Davros. To solve this problem, they set a trap for the Doctor, since the Progenitor would recognize the Doctor as the Daleks' greatest enemy and activate. This trap consisted of building an android who claimed to have invented two of the daleks. With Dalek blueprints and Two daleks painted in British Army Khaki Winston Churchill uses them as War weapons, although they are mostly seen to be carring around files and asking staff : "Would you care for some tea?" The Doctor is surprised as these Khaki daleks appear to have forgotten their own purpose and reminds them by proclaiming "I am the Doctor, and you are the Daleks!" thus activating the progenitor. Though their plan was a success, the
five new advanced Daleks that appear then exterminated their predecessors, each Dalek is a different color and each represents a specific place in Dalek Hierarchy - Red/Drone, Orange/Scientist, Blue/Strategist, Yellow/Eternal and White/Supreme. The Daleks activate a time corridor, and escape into the future, delaying the Doctor by threatening to destroy Earth.
Amy doesn't recognize the Daleks when she first meets them, despite the events of "Doomsday" and "The Stolen Earth", which the Doctor says is impossible. In "Flesh and Stone
Flesh and Stone
"Flesh and Stone" is the fifth episode of the fifth series of British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Written by showrunner Steven Moffat and directed by Adam Smith, the episode was first broadcast on 1 May 2010 on BBC One...
", the Doctor theorizes that the cracks in the universe caused the events to be unwritten. The purpose of the yellow Eternal Dalek is still yet to be decided.
Might of the Daleks
The Progenitor Daleks returned as the main antagonistAntagonist
An antagonist is a character, group of characters, or institution, that represents the opposition against which the protagonist must contend...
s of Doctor Who: The Adventure Games
Doctor Who: The Adventure Games
Doctor Who: The Adventure Games is a series of episodic third-person adventure games, based on the BBC TV series Doctor Who and developed by Sumo Digital. Charles Cecil served as executive producer and worked with Sean Millard and Will Tarratt on the design...
's first episode: "City of the Daleks".
Following their escape
Victory of the Daleks
"Victory of the Daleks" is the third episode in the fifth series of British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It is written by Mark Gatiss and first broadcast on BBC One on 17 April 2010....
, the Daleks discovered the lost Time Lord artefact, The Eye of Time, allowing them to alter time as they saw fit with few consequences. The Daleks left earth behind in the 1940s and returned to Skaro, rebuilt their capital city of Kaalann, appointed a new blue Dalek Emperor, possibly the same Blue Strategist Dalek, and begun rebuilding their Empire. One of the Daleks' first acts with their new found power over time was to invade London, Earth in 1963. In this new timeline, they succeeded in killing every member of the Human race. However, the Doctor and Amy successfully undid these events, leaving Earth unconquered and Kaalann still abandoned. What became of the daleks is unknown, along with how they broke the Time War Time Lock in order to reach Skaro in the first place.
Opening of the Pandorica
The White Supreme Dalek, Yellow Eternal Dalek and Red Drone Dalek reappeared in "The Pandorica OpensThe Pandorica Opens
"The Pandorica Opens" is the twelfth episode, and first in a two-part story, in the fifth series of British science fiction television series Doctor Who, broadcast on 19 June 2010. The Doctor's friends send him a warning; he deals with a message on a cliff, a mysterious box and a love story that...
" as part of the Alliance. They were present at the Opening of the Pandorica and the Supreme Dalek revealed the origin behind the Pandorica, the Alliance and Stonehenge
Stonehenge
Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument located in the English county of Wiltshire, about west of Amesbury and north of Salisbury. One of the most famous sites in the world, Stonehenge is composed of a circular setting of large standing stones set within earthworks...
before the Doctor is imprisoned in the Pandorica prison.
In "The Big Bang
The Big Bang (Doctor Who)
"The Big Bang" is the 13th and final episode in the fifth series of British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It is the second part of a two-part season finale started with "The Pandorica Opens", at the end of which The Doctor is trapped, the TARDIS destroyed, and Amy Pond has been shot...
", following all of reality cracking, the Daleks were turned to stone, due to their history/creation being erased. A Stone Dalek was later seen at a museum with the Pandorica, and was awoken when it was hit by the light of the Pandorica. It shot the Doctor, but due to its power being weak it was not a fatal shot. However, River Song
River Song (Doctor Who)
River Song is a fictional character played primarily by Alex Kingston in the British science-fiction series Doctor Who. River Song was introduced to the series as an experienced future companion of series protagonist the Doctor, an alien Time Lord who travels through time in his TARDIS...
, enraged and believing the Doctor to be dead, aimed her gun at the Stone Dalek, knowing that its defences were weak. She later claimed to have killed the Dalek but this was not shown onscreen. By the end of the episode, the Doctor reversed the explosion of the TARDIS, so it is assumed that the alliance which trapped the Doctor was never formed, and so the Daleks are presumably still at large.
Curtain Call
The Daleks later planted an idea into the mind of Vorgenson, the son of the Lurman Vorg who had invented a machine called the Miniscope, encountered by the Third DoctorThird Doctor
The Third Doctor is the third incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by actor Jon Pertwee....
. Vorgenson's idea had him create his own machine, called the Minimiser, and used it to head a travelling show dedicated to the Doctor, and featured many mind controlled versions of his recently encountered enemies, apart from the Daleks, dismissed by Vorgeneson as "too dangerous". The Dalek's plan for this was to attract the Eleventh Doctor to the show with Vorgenston's monsters, and capture him in the Minimiser. This plan worked, although later Vorgenson realised the truth. The audience managed to save the Doctor, and help him to release the Cybermen from the Minimiser to destroy the Daleks.
Unwillingly Helping the Doctor
A Dalek briefly appears in "The Wedding of River SongThe Wedding of River Song
"The Wedding of River Song" is the thirteenth and final episode of the sixth series of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, and was first broadcast on BBC One, BBC America and Space on 1 October 2011.-Plot:...
", having been heavily damaged by the Doctor, who then rips it's dome off and scans it's data core for information about the Silence. This Dalek is the same design as the New Paradigm Daleks, but has gray-colored armor, possibly meaning it is the White Supreme in the dark room.
Spin-off media
The Daleks have appeared in many Doctor Who spin-offsDoctor Who spin-offs
Doctor Who spin-offs refers to material created outside of, but related to, the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who....
, sometimes opposing the Doctor and sometimes on their own. All these spin-offs are of uncertain canonicity, and not all of them can be easily reconciled with the television series or with each other. Where they fit in the Dalek timeline is also uncertain.
Comic strips
The first appearance of the Daleks beyond the television series was in The Dalek Book (1964), an illustrated volume written by Terry Nation and David Whitaker. It told the story of a Dalek invasion of Earth's solar system. In 1965, the comic book TV Century 21TV Century 21
TV Century 21, also known as TV 21, was a weekly British children's comic of the 1960s and early 1970s. It promoted the many television science-fiction puppet series created by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson's Century 21 Productions...
began publishing The Daleks, which was written by Whitaker and included an account of the Daleks' origins. (The comic strip was, years later, collected together in an edition titled The Dalek Chronicles).
The TV 21 strips portrayed the opposing sides in Skaro's war as the Thals and the Daleks, shown as diminutive blue men with large heads somewhat similar in appearance to Dan Dare
Dan Dare
Dan Dare is a British science fiction comic hero, created by illustrator Frank Hampson who also wrote the first stories, that is, the Venus and Red Moon stories, and a complete storyline for Operation Saturn...
's Mekon
The Mekon
The Mekon is the arch-enemy of the British comic book hero Dan Dare, first appearing in 1950 in the Eagle comic strip Dan Dare, Pilot of the Future and created by Frank Hampson. Apart from Dan Dare himself, he is the only character to appear in every one of the numerous versions of the comic strip...
. According to the comic, these humanoid Daleks built neutron bombs which were accidentally detonated by a meteorite storm. (The idea of the war having an accidental, rather than deliberate origin, goes back to an earlier draft of the first Dalek television story.) The Daleks' chief scientist, Yarvelling, had built Dalek casings as war machines prior to the nuclear holocaust. After the neutron bombs exploded, Yarvelling and Zolfian, the warlord of the humanoid Daleks, discovered that a mutated Dalek had survived in the war machine casing. This Dalek persuaded Yarvelling and Zolfian to build more Dalek casings for their mutated descendants. Before the last two humanoid Daleks died, it declared itself the Dalek Emperor, and had a new casing built to reflect its new rank, slightly shorter than the other Daleks, with a disproportionately large spheroid
Spheroid
A spheroid, or ellipsoid of revolution is a quadric surface obtained by rotating an ellipse about one of its principal axes; in other words, an ellipsoid with two equal semi-diameters....
head section and in gold rather than grey.
Later stories in the Dalek comic told of the expansion of the Daleks' empire, including a lengthy war against the Mechanoids. In the last published comic in this series, the Daleks learned the location of Earth, which they proposed to invade. Although much of the material in these strips directly contradicted what was shown on television later, some concepts like the Daleks using humanoid duplicates and the design of the Dalek Emperor did show up later on in the programme.
The Doctor Who Magazine
Doctor Who Magazine
Doctor Who Magazine is a magazine devoted to the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who...
comic strips pitted the 26th century Daleks against the formidable Dalek Killer Abslom Daak and several more times against the Doctor. Emperor of the Daleks (DWM #197-#202) revealed the Sixth Doctor had deliberately rescued Davros from his trial (at the end of Revelation of the Daleks) and that the Seventh Doctor (with help from Bernice Summerfield
Bernice Summerfield
Bernice Surprise Summerfield is a fictional character created by author Paul Cornell as a new companion of the Seventh Doctor in Virgin Publishing's range of original full-length Doctor Who novels, the New Adventures...
and Daak) helped ensure Davros obtained control of the thousands-strong Dalek army frozen on Spiridon
Planet of the Daleks
Planet of the Daleks is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from April 7 to May 12, 1973.-Synopsis:...
and began the Dalek civil war that would lead to the events of Remembrance of the Daleks.
The Eighth Doctor faced the Daleks twice: once to stop them from taking control of all realities (Fire and Brimstone, DWM #251-#255), and a second time when he encountered the humanised Daleks created in The Evil of the Daleks, who were in hiding on the planet Kryol (Children of the Revolution, DWM #312-#317).
Novels
The Virgin New AdventuresVirgin New Adventures
The Virgin New Adventures were a series of novels from Virgin Publishing based on the British science-fiction television series Doctor Who...
added background detail to both the Dalek Wars of the 26th century and the Daleks' 22nd century invasion of Earth, including detailing the events of the Dalek conquest of Mars
Mars (Doctor Who)
Mars, the fourth planet in our solar system, has been featured in the Doctor Who fictional universe on a number of occasions. In the various Doctor Who serials which feature the Ice Warriors, mention is made that Mars is their homeworld....
(and a battle against the Ice Warrior
Ice Warrior
The Ice Warriors are a fictional extraterrestrial race of reptilian-like humanoids in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. The race originated on Mars, and first appeared in the 1967 serial The Ice Warriors where they encountered the Second Doctor and his...
s) at that time in GodEngine
GodEngine
GodEngine is an original novel written by Craig Hinton and based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It features the Seventh Doctor, Chris, Roz, the Ice Warriors and the Daleks....
by Craig Hinton
Craig Hinton
Craig Paul Alexander Hinton was a British writer best known for his work on various spin-offs from the BBC Television series Doctor Who....
.
The Eighth Doctor Adventures
Eighth Doctor Adventures
The Eighth Doctor Adventures are a series of spin off novels based on the long running BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who and published under the BBC Books imprint. 73 books were published overall...
novel War of the Daleks
War of the Daleks
War of the Daleks is an original novel written by John Peel, published in 1997, based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It features the Eighth Doctor and Sam. This novel was the first appearance of the Daleks in an original Doctor Who novel; they had not...
by John Peel
John Peel (writer)
John Peel is a British writer, best known for his books connected to several television series. He has written under several pseudonyms, including John Vincent and Nicholas Adams. He lives in Long Island, New York and his wife is a U.S...
is set after the apparent destruction of Skaro in Remembrance of the Daleks, and reveals that the planet had not, in fact, been destroyed. A convoluted explanation included the revelation that the planet Antalin had been terraformed to resemble Skaro and destroyed in its place. It is also revealed the Dalek/Movellan war (and indeed most of Dalek history before the destruction of "Skaro") was actually faked for Davros' benefit. Having discovered records of Skaro's destruction during their invasion of Earth, and after their attempts to change history failed, the Daleks created an elaborate deception to save Skaro by moving Davros to Antalin and faking the situation to maintain history. Davros is put on trial by the Daleks under the Dalek Prime and disintegrated at story's end, and the Eighth Doctor sends their factory ship back in time to be discovered by the Second Doctor in Power of the Daleks. Critically, War was badly received by some fans, who even disavowed it within the continuity of the novels. Others welcomed War for having the Daleks reassert their original independence from Davros.
The Eighth Doctor faces the Daleks again in Legacy of the Daleks
Legacy of the Daleks
Legacy of the Daleks is an original novel written by John Peel and based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who...
, when he returns to Earth in the aftermath of the Dalek Invasion, although in this case the Daleks are basic versions who have been reactivated by the Master (Whom the Doctor unintentionally confronts out of sequence), the novel concluding with the Daleks being destroyed and the Master being left in the condition that he was seen in during "The Deadly Assassin
The Deadly Assassin
The Deadly Assassin is a serial in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 30 October to 20 November 1976...
".
The Telos novella The Dalek Factor
The Dalek Factor
The Dalek Factor is an original novella written by Simon Clark and based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It features a Doctor whose incarnation is unspecified. It was released both as a standard edition hardback and a deluxe edition featuring a frontispiece...
by Simon Clark
Simon Clark
Simon Clark is a horror novel writer from Doncaster, England. One of his most notable works is the novel The Night of the Triffids.Clark has been nominated for the Bram Stoker Award for Best First Novel, World Fantasy Award for Best Novella and British Fantasy Award...
features a Dalek task-force using an amnesiac Doctor to trap and genetically re-engineer Thals with the "Dalek Factor" (the thoughts and instincts of a Dalek) so they can spread it throughout the Thal gene pool. Once this is accomplished, the Daleks plan to trigger the factor, wiping out the Thals by turning them into Daleks. The New Series Adventures
New Series Adventures (Doctor Who)
The New Series Adventures are a series of novels relating to the long-running BBC science fiction television series, Doctor Who. The 'NSAs', as they are often referred to, are published by BBC Books, and are regularly published in the spring and autumn of each year. Beginning and concluding with...
novella I am a Dalek
I am a Dalek
I am a Dalek is a BBC Books original novella written by Gareth Roberts and based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It features the Tenth Doctor and Rose. This paperback is part of the Quick Reads Initiative sponsored by the UK government, to encourage literacy...
by Gareth Roberts
Gareth Roberts (writer)
Gareth John Pritchard Roberts is a British television screenwriter and novelist, best known for his work related to the science-fiction television series Doctor Who...
has the Daleks attempting the same stratagem on humans during the Time War, but on a smaller scale that infects only one 20th century human.
A new novel, Prisoner of the Daleks
Prisoner of the Daleks
Prisoner of the Daleks is a BBC Books original novel written by Trevor Baxendale and based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It features the Tenth Doctor without a companion and was released on April 2, 2009, alongside Judgement of the Judoon and The Slitheen...
, was released in April 2009. In it, the Doctor crosses into the pre-Time War Dalek timeline by accident, and lands in the 26th centurey, references are made to a recent conflict with the Draconians (Fontier in Space) and the Osterhagen Principle is said to have been invented 500 years before (Journey's End). In this period of history, the pre-Time War Dalek Empire is fighting a huge galactic war against Earth, possibly the same war referred to in the Virgin New Adventures, with Earth Command forced to hire bounty hunters to help them. However, despite the Daleks being superior in technology, the war has reached stalemate, and can go either way. To win the war, the Daleks plan to open the Arkheon Threshold, a schism in time and space, and launch a huge Dalek force into the time votex to conquer the whole of time and space. They capture a fleet of ships escaping from a colony planet and force them to work on breaking through to the Threshold with manual labour. Their plan is however defeated when the Doctor lures them to an abandoned refueling planet where the TARDIS is located- the Daleks needing the TARDIS to make the experiment work-, and then detonates the remaining fuel stores, destroying a Dalek science squad and a small Dalek fleet. The novel ends with the Earth forces overwhelming the Dalek forces at the Arkheon Threshold, and Earth going on the offensive.
Audio plays
The Daleks also appear without Davros in many of the Doctor Who audio playsDoctor Who audio productions
A number of officially licensed audio productions based upon the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who have been produced over the years....
by Big Finish Productions
Big Finish Productions
Big Finish Productions is a British company that produces books and audio plays based, primarily, on cult British science fiction properties...
. The first four Doctor Who audio plays starring the Daleks were released under the "Dalek Empire
Dalek Empire
The Dalek Empire refers to the sphere of influence of the Daleks, a fictional extraterrestrial race of mutants from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Dalek Empire is also a series of audio plays produced by Big Finish Productions, featuring the Daleks. The series begins in...
" banner, and portrayed a territorially expansive Dalek army under the command of the Emperor (who did not appear to be Davros). Three of the four occurred consecutively (though not from the POV of the Doctor), and it's not entirely clear whether they are before or after Remembrance. In The Genocide Machine
The Genocide Machine
The Genocide Machine is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It forms the first serial in the Dalek Empire arc, which continues in The Apocalypse Element and The Mutant Phase...
, the Daleks invaded the Kar-Charrat Library to learn information they eventually use in The Apocalypse Element
The Apocalypse Element
The Apocalypse Element is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. It forms the second serial in the Dalek Empire arc, following on from events in The Genocide Machine...
. In that play, the Daleks invade the Time Lords' home planet, Gallifrey
Gallifrey
Gallifrey is a fictional planet in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who and is the homeworld of the Doctor and the Time Lords...
, but are eventually defeated. They also use the eponymous "apocalypse element" to burn an entire galaxy, Seriphia, and plan to conquer the now-empty galaxy and use it as a new base for their empire. The final story, The Time of the Daleks
The Time of the Daleks
The Time of the Daleks is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who...
, showed that the Daleks had gained much greater knowledge of time travel from their invasion of Gallifrey. The third play, The Mutant Phase
The Mutant Phase
The Mutant Phase is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who....
, had few links with the others in the series and occurred around the time of Dalek Invasion Of Earth; the events of this story were erased
Reset button technique
The reset button technique is a plot device that interrupts continuity in works of fiction. Simply put, use of a reset button device returns all characters and situations to the status quo they held before a major change of some sort was introduced...
at its conclusion.
The Big Finish audio Jubilee
Jubilee (Doctor Who audio)
Jubilee is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Elements of the story were reworked by Rob Shearman to create the television episode "Dalek" in the 2005 series.-Plot:...
depicted an alternate Earth in which the Sixth Doctor
Sixth Doctor
The Sixth Doctor is the sixth incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by Colin Baker...
had helped defeat a Dalek invasion in 1903. Most of the story is set a hundred years later, in a world in which Dalek technology and ideals have been used to create a fascist
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
and sexist
Sexism
Sexism, also known as gender discrimination or sex discrimination, is the application of the belief or attitude that there are characteristics implicit to one's gender that indirectly affect one's abilities in unrelated areas...
"English Empire". This timeline is largely erased at the story's end, but the Sixth Doctor warns that this nightmarish history will "live on, in the shadows." Jubilee was written by Rob Shearman, who used elements of it- such as the Doctor's companion bonding with a lone Dalek- for his 2005 television episode, "Dalek".
Davros has also appeared in several Big Finish audios. He appears without the Daleks in the eponymous Davros
Davros (Doctor Who audio)
Davros is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who.-Plot:...
, set between Resurrection of the Daleks and Revelation of the Daleks. In The Juggernauts
The Juggernauts
The Juggernauts is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who.-Plot:...
, set between Revelation and Remembrance of the Daleks, the Daleks manipulate the Sixth Doctor for the purpose of recapturing Davros (who had escaped his Dalek captors after the end of Revelation). Davros adds human nervous tissue to robotic Mechanoids to create the Juggernauts of the play's title; he hopes to use these as an army to destroy the Daleks. At the end of the story, the self-destruct mechanism of Davros' life-support chair explodes after it is damaged by a conflict between the Daleks and the Juggernauts, destroying an entire human colony. It is not clear how Davros survives to become the Dalek Emperor, as seen in Remembrance.
The Bernice Summerfield
Bernice Summerfield
Bernice Surprise Summerfield is a fictional character created by author Paul Cornell as a new companion of the Seventh Doctor in Virgin Publishing's range of original full-length Doctor Who novels, the New Adventures...
audio Death and the Daleks
Death and the Daleks
Death and the Daleks is a Big Finish Productions audio drama featuring Lisa Bowerman as Bernice Summerfield, a character from the spin-off media based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who.- Plot :...
features the Daleks of the 26th century secretly controlling the Fifth Axis, a military force based on ideals of human superiority and the extermination of aliens, using them as proxies to conquer various worlds the Daleks did not want to be seen conquering, including the Braxiatel Collection
Irving Braxiatel
Irving Braxiatel or Cardinal Braxiatel is a fictional character from the Virgin New Adventures—spin-off novels based on the BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who. He subsequently became a regular character in novels and audio dramas in the Bernice Summerfield universe...
. Through the efforts of Benny Summerfield and her allies, the Axis was defeated and the Dalek control exposed.
By the time of the Eighth Doctor
Eighth Doctor
The Eighth Doctor is the eighth incarnation of the protagonist of the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. He was portrayed by Paul McGann...
audio play Terror Firma
Terror Firma
Terror Firma is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. The story follows on directly from the previous Eighth Doctor audio drama The Next Life and flashes back to scenes that takes place before the first Eighth Doctor...
(set after Remembrance), Davros is commanding a Dalek army which has successfully conquered the Earth. His mental instability has grown to the point where "Davros" and "the Emperor" exist within him as different personalities
Dissociative identity disorder
Dissociative identity disorder is a psychiatric diagnosis and describes a condition in which a person displays multiple distinct identities , each with its own pattern of perceiving and interacting with the environment....
. His Daleks recognise this instability and rebel against Davros. By the story's end the Emperor personality is dominant, and the Daleks agree to follow him and leave Earth. How this can be reconciled with War of the Daleks is uncertain, and may support the proposition that the various spin-off media take place in their own respective parallel universes
Parallel universe (fiction)
A parallel universe or alternative reality is a hypothetical self-contained separate reality coexisting with one's own. A specific group of parallel universes is called a "multiverse", although this term can also be used to describe the possible parallel universes that constitute reality...
. It is possible this takes place (from the point of view of the Daleks) before the original Dalek Empire Doctor stories.
A spin-off series of audios, also titled Dalek Empire, is set after Time Of The Daleks and features a successful Dalek invasion of the Milky Way during an Earth Empire. The Daleks make great headway and manage to conquer their way up to Earth's solar system in a prolonged war against both humans and the Daleks of an alternate reality. They are finally defeated by a psychic attack that causes every piece of Dalek machinery to self-destruct in an ever-expanding wave which obliterates their forces and kills the Emperor. However, this also cripples civilisation of the Milky Way and sets galactic development back by a substantial amount. Centuries later, when only a handful remember the Daleks, the Dalek Empire attacks again under the command of a Dalek Supreme, which infects the borders of the galaxy with a virus that genetically re-engineers humans into Daleks. By the end of the third Dalek Empire series, the Daleks have a new giant army and are poised to go to war with the Galactic Federation, with the outcome uncertain. The Seventh Doctor audio Return of the Daleks
Return of the Daleks
Return of the Daleks is a Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who.-Synopsis:...
, set during the first Dalek Empire series, features the Daleks and Kalendorf trying to awaken their army buried on Spiridon, only for the Doctor to thwart their plans by infecting them with light-wave sickness when they attempt to recreate their old experiments to master the secret of invisibility.
See also
- Dalek variantsDalek variantsSince their first appearance in 1963 there have been a number of variant models of the Daleks, a fictional alien race in the long-running BBC science fiction television programme Doctor Who.Daleks are not robots...
- DalekmaniaDalekmaniaDalekmania is a 1995 direct-to-video documentary released in the United Kingdom. "Dalekmania" is the name given to the craze or "mania" among children in the United Kingdom in the 1960s for all things associated with writer Terry Nation's creations, the Daleks, who were then regularly appearing in...