676 Remembrance of the Daleks: Part Three

EPISODE: Remembrance of the Daleks: Part Three
OVERALL EPISODE NUMBER: 676
STORY NUMBER: 149
TRANSMITTED: Wednesday 19 October 1988
WRITER: Ben Aaronovitch
DIRECTOR: Andrew Morgan
SCRIPT EDITOR: Andrew Cartmel
PRODUCER: John Nathan-Turner
RATINGS: 5.1 million viewers
FORMAT: DVD: Doctor Who - Remembrance Of The Daleks - Special Edition

"Weapons. Always useless in the end!"

The Doctor arrives with his disrupter device and immobilises the Daleks long enough for the army to deal with them using explosives.

Rachel spots that one of the Mutants inside is still active and when the Doctor examines it he is grabbed by a claw which tries to strangle him.

The claw emerging from the Dalek here look very similar to what we saw at the end of Part 3 of the first Dalek Story.

Alison, Rachel's assistant, clubs it to death with Ace's baseball bat. The Doctor notes that the mutant is more developed than those in the grey Daleks and has cyborg implants. On the Dalek Mothership an attack squad is prepared for deployment by Transmat but the Doctor destroys the Dalek transmat receiver in the cellar with the Baseball bat, which breaks.

The Doctor's line to Allison & Rachel "You look hungry, how about lunch?" is a bit out of place as the action here must take place at around teatime on Saturday judging by when Ace left the house in the previous episode. It fits a lot better into Ben Aaronovitch's novelization which provides a better time line for events placing this scene a lot earlier on in the day.

While Ratcliffe finds a grave marked with a Greek Omega, The Doctor sits in Harry's Cafe concentrating.

Ratcliffe sticks a metal stake into the grave which pulses with energy alerting the Imperial Dalek Mothership who detect the Hand of Omega and inform the Emperor.

Love the Dalek mothership set. Love it. Yes it's a few screens and some Neon tubing (which apparently nearly didn't work on the day) against a black backdrop but it looks big and effective. And what's that I can hear? Yes it's the Dalek control room noise, still with us after 25 years since it's first appearance in The Daleks.

Rachel's complaining to Gilmore "drag me down from Cambridge" is reminiscent of Liz Shaw's comments to the Brigadier in Spearhead from Space.

The girl observes Ratcliffe & his men digging the grave up and stares upwards towards the sky.

The Emperor arrives on the Dalek bridge and orders the assault shuttle deployed.

Huzzah, a new style Dalek! This Emperor Dalek is modelled on The comic strip Emperor Dalek, with a spherical dome replacing everything upwards of the skirt. The one in the comic had a sucker arm, gun stick & eye stalk: this is just a white sphere, on a standard Imperial Dalek base with a hexagonal eye on the front of the sphere. In many ways it looks like an old spherical air freshner we used to have when I was little that you opened by tilting the top of the sphere back. I'm told it was called an Airwick Ball.

The "Emperor on the Bridge" line as the Emperor arrives is very similar to Sulu's "Admiral on the Bridge" in Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan when James Kirk arrives on the Enterprise's bridge.

Roy Tromelly is credited as the Dalek Emperor here, a name not previously seen as a Dalek performer.

Ratcliffe shoos the girl away. The Doctor suddenly takes action and orders a base established at the school.

There's some indication here that the reason the Doctor's been concentrating is that he's been in telepathic contact with the Hand of Omega and has been listening for the signal that it's been disturbed. He certainly seems to comprehend the Hand's responses when he's talked to it but it's not made an audible response.

Allison & Rachel's lines "I wish Bernard was here" and "The British rocket group has it's own problems" are references to The Quatermass Experiment and it's sequels, a direct influence on Doctor Who.

Ace asks what's important about the school and the Doctor says nothing now the transmat is disabled. Ratcliffe arrives at his warehouse with the Hand of Omega and telephones his man.

Whatever it is in Ratcliffe's office gets in on the Cyberleader act with a well delivered "Excellent" here.

Mike takes a phone call at the school as the Doctor & Ace arrive keeping an eye on Group Captain "Chunky" Gilmore.

"why they call him chunky I have no idea" - a McCoy ad lib due to some mucking about in rehearsal and fun with a stage direction involving a "chunky revolver".

The Doctor explains how Omega used his remote stellar manipulator, the Hand of Omega to create the supernova that powers Time Lord time travel technology.

ACE: They're really going for it.
DOCTOR: That's the general idea. I want to keep the military fully occupied and out of the way.
ACE: Out of the way of what? Oh, Professor, you promised me, remember?

DOCTOR: A long time ago, on my home planet of Gallifrey, there lived a stellar engineer called Omega.
ACE: Stellar? As in stars? You mean he engineered stars?
DOCTOR: Ace!
ACE: Sorry. Go on.
DOCTOR: It was Omega who created the supernova that was the initial power source for Gallifreyan time travel experiments. He left behind him the basis on which Rassilon founded Time Lord society, and he left behind the Hand of Omega.
ACE: His hand? What good was that?
DOCTOR: No, no, not his hand literally. No, no, it's called that because Time Lords have an infinite capacity for pretension.
ACE: I've noticed that.
DOCTOR: The Hand of Omega is a mythical name for Omega's remote stellar manipulator, a device used to customise stars with. And didn't we have trouble with the prototype.
ACE: We?
DOCTOR: They.
ACE: And the Daleks want it so they can recreate the time travel experiments? But you said that both Dalek factions can already travel in time.
DOCTOR: Oh yes, Daleks have got time corridor technology, but it's very crude and nasty. What they want is the power that Time Lords have, and they'll get that with the Hand of Omega, or so they think.
ACE: And you have to try and stop them.
DOCTOR: No, Ace, I want them to have it.
ACE: Eh?
DOCTOR: My problem is trying to stop Group Captain Gilmore and his men getting diced in the crossfire.
ACE: So, all this is
DOCTOR: A massive deception, yes.
ACE: Oh, well devious. So the Daleks grab the Hand of Omega and go, and no one gets hurt. Brilliant.
DOCTOR: Just one thing.
ACE: What?
DOCTOR: I didn't expect two Dalek factions, and now I've got to make sure the wrong ones don't get their grubby little protuberances on it!

The line here, passed off as a slip of the tongue by the Doctor, "and didn't we have trouble with the prototype" is of key importance. One of the things Script Editor Andrew Cartmel wanted to do was inject a bit of mystery back into the Doctor. This is the start of insinuating that perhaps The Doctor had knew Omega & Rassilon and perhaps had something to do with the very beginnings of the Timelord. The Remembrance of the Daleks novelization introduces a third figure, the Other, who is developed through the Virgin New Adventures novels leading to revelations in Lungbarrow.... These ideas have come to be referred to as the Cartmel Masterplan.

The Daleks want the Hand of Omega to give them the power the Time Lords have.

Daleks have been previously seen with Time Travel technology in (deep breath) The Chase, The Dalek Masterplan, Evil of the Daleks, Day of the Daleks and Resurrection of the Daleks.

The Doctor wants the Daleks to have it, but it needs to be right sort of Daleks. A Black Dalek Supreme emerges from Ratcliffe's warehouse as the hand is unloaded.

If you asked most people what colour the Supreme Daleks is most people would probably say Black with Silver skirt balls. The original Supreme was Black & light blue and the one in Resurrection was Black & white.

Theed Street in Southark provides the location for Ratcliffe's Yard.

His grey minions exterminate Ratcliffe's workers, the being in the chair reveals itself to be the girl.

HUGE shock this at the time. That's not Davros? For three episodes the wools been pulled over our eyes. The obvious question now is where is Davros. Cos he must be in it right?

The Dalek Supreme confronts Ratcliffe threatening him with extermination as the girl activates the time controller to begin the Renegade Daleks journey home with the Hand of Omega. The Renegade Daleks go onto the streets to guard the warehouse against intruders but Ace & the Doctor sneak in.

Some horribly wobbly Daleks here thanks to swapping the castors that were usually used to support the Daleks for the kind of balls found on Garden wheelbarrows!

The Doctor & Ace's presence is missed at HQ and a search is organised. The Doctor speaks to the Hand confirming it knows what to do. He sees the Dalek base and identifies it as a Dalek Battle Computer.

The explanation behind the Daleks use of a child's imagination in their battle computer is a little wobbly but a link to the problems they faced in Destiny of the Daleks.

ACE: What is it?
DOCTOR: Some kind of biomechanoid control system, for a small human. Of course, it's a battle computer!
ACE: But why would a human need to sit in it?
DOCTOR: The Dalek's major drawback is their dependency on rationality and logic. The solution? Get a human, preferably young, imaginative, plug the child into the system, and their ingenuity and creativity are slaved to the battle computer.
ACE: That's well boggling.
DOCTOR: It's obscene. Ah, now for the time controller.
ACE: Hey, is this it?

The Doctor puts the time controller out of phase to slow the Renegade Daleks and leaves his calling card behind.

ACE: What is it?
DOCTOR: It's a device the renegade Daleks use to travel through time. They've come a long way.
ACE: Have you busted it?
DOCTOR: No, no, no, I don't want to lumber Earth with a load of desperate Daleks. I've merely put it out of phase. They'll be able to fix it, but it'll slow them down.

The Supreme Dalek orders his extermination. The Doctor and Ace escape, hiding in a telephone repair tent.

The Master hid in a telephone repair tent while bugging the lines into UNIT HQ in Mind of Evil.

The sequences of the Doctor & Ace's escape route from the warehouse were filmed on Windmill Walk near Waterloo station on 4th April, Easter Bank Holiday Monday 1988. The date is significant and contributes to an incident that occurs at the same location in episode 4.

Surely the Dalek's eye stalk has infa red sensors that could detect them inside?

The Doctor says he hopes Imperial Daleks will wipe out Renegades and that won't then look as suspicious as if he just gives the Hand of Omega to them. The Doctor & Ace return to the school where they are met by Mike asks Ace out to pictures, but Renegade Daleks attack. Mike asks why the Renegade Daleks are attacking if they already have the Hand of Omega, giving himself away as knowing more information than he should.

Mike being a traitor unconsciously tips the hat towards Invasion of the Dinosaurs where Mike Yates is a dirty stinking traitor!

Gilmore has him locked up as the Renegade Daleks attack the school. The Battle Computer detects the Imperial Shuttlecraft entering the atmosphere and recalls all Renegade Daleks to base. The Doctor is surprised when the shuttle lands in the playground and wonders if he has miscalculated.

The shuttle landing sequence looks good and there's a reason for it: it was done for real! The lightweight Shuttlecraft hull was lowered into position by a crane!

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Superb again, great stuff. Up the action, making it clear these are two different groups of Daleks we're dealing with. I can't emphasise how much of a shock that was to find out that wasn't Davros in Ratcliffe's Warehouse!