The Daleks' Master Plan
"What a waste..."
In this serial, the Doctor, Steven and Katarina land on the planet Kembel to look for help for Steven's injury, unaware it is the new home base of the Daleks. Even worse, as seen in Mission to the Unknown, the Daleks have allied themselves with the most dangerous forces in the galaxy, including Mavic Chen, the Guardian of Earth's Solar System who is selling Earth out for more power. The plan hinges on The Time Destructor, a weapon that can use time to destroy a planet. The Doctor learns of this when he meets Bret Vyon, a Space Agent for the solar system. The four team up to try to escape the planet and get the necessary information to Earth... as well as the core to the weapon, which the Doctor managed to steal. Soon, the Daleks are in hot pursuit as they use a ship to escape. After a crash landing on the planet Desperus, the crew are threatened by a stowaway and Katarina gives her live to save everyone (though it is unclear whether this was deliberate sacrifice or a tragic accident). The Doctor, Bret and Steven arrive on Earth but not before Chen, who uses his position to have them hunted as enemies of the state. Space Agent Sara Kingdom is the commanding officer and kills Bret (who is also her brother) but due to a wrong place/wrong time issue, all three are sent across the galaxy. Eventually they convince Sara that Chen is evil and the three work together to outwit the Daleks. After forcibly returned to Kembel, they return to the TARDIS to escape through space and time.
After a fanciful visit to modern Liverpool and a silent movie set, the Doctor and friends find themselves confronted by the Monk, who is trying to get revenge on the Doctor based on their last encounter. After outwitting his first trap, the Monk follows them to ancient Egypt, only to be caught in the crossfire of the Dalek/Doctor war. Eventually the Doctor steals the mechanism that allows the Monk to navigate space and time (as opposed to the TARDIS bopping around at random) but also lose the core to Chen. The Doctor, Sara and Steven use it to return to Kembel to infiltrate the Dalek base and defeat the Daleks. Sara and Steven lose sight of the Doctor and meet Chen and the other Dalek collaborators who are now their prisoners. They free them so they can warn the universe but their ship is destroyed before take off. A mad Chen is convinced the Doctor is trying to steal his position among the Daleks and captures Steven and Sara to show his loyalty but is killed by the Daleks. As the Daleks chase Chen, the Doctor reveals his final gambit; to activate the weapon on Kembel. He asks Steven and Sara to go without him but Sara returns fearing the Doctor is in danger. The two begin aging rapidly at the presence of the weapon and Sara dies, crumbling to dust with the Doctor barely surviving. The weapon destroys the planet. The Doctor is satisfied that the Dalek menace is defeated for good. Steven is far more concerned with the deaths of Katarina, Bret and Sara... and the Doctor must concede that point.
The Daleks' Master Plan is the longest Doctor serial unless you consider The Trial of the Time Lord to be one... except I don't because really it's just a season with a really clunky narrative device. But we will get to that in the distant future. But yeah, this is a true epic and surprisingly early in the series. Is it a good epic. Well, I can only be so fair to it because we can't see the video for most of the episodes, which can take away some strength. What I feel is I'm going to refer to this one as the series following some of it's best instincts and it's weaker ones. Not worst but certainly some bad ones. Now this one isn't quite like The Chase or The Keys of Marinus because with the exception of the Feast of Steven (the first Christmas episode which tries to have some fun but just isn't very funny) and to an extent Volcano, it's less like an anthology serial with some unrelated nonsense. Still, it does get into that zone with the Doctor finding himself in different places where crazy things happen. Unfortunately, a lot of those are kind of dull. The planet of invisible monsters, the stowaway, and while the last episode has some great stuff it also has a long walking scene. The long walking scene is the kind of padding I associate with the era. However, it is worth noting that that could just be the particular recreation chosen. The wiki has a much more vivid and gripping description of the scene.
I will say that the story had a habit of losing me, then injecting something I didn't expect. I didn't expect Katarina to die so suddenly. I suspected she wouldn't be around long because I've never even recognized the name but it was a pretty abrupt death and the first companion death... and not even the last in the story because Sara dies in the end (though an ally, Bret never feels like I can give him the companion title). I will say, Katarina had potential but she didn't last long but even though she's only around for 7 episodes, Sara is actually rather memorable. At this stage, the show is not great with non-Barbara female companions and Sara's tenure isn't perfect but they allow her to be tough, smart and capable throughout the story. If anything, I wish the show had more time to dwell on her; he backstory is she had so much faith in the villain she murdered her own brother and we barely get time for her to process that. I don't need her to get on her knees and cry but it's such an interesting starting point for the character and a great place to begin an arc, I wish the end of it tied in more.
I also appreciate while the show has had some death, this serial really ends with taking the time to say "it's hard to say 'yay us' when by the end of our mission we lost all our friends." It points to the fact that while there is a league of supervillains (woefully underutilized) and a plan to destroy the world, this comic booky story gets kind of dark. Katarina may not have even made a noble sacrifice. Maybe she just did the wrong thing. Sara saves the Doctor be she not only dies but in a really horrible way, aging to dust in front of her friends eyes. It's a kind of brutality that I associate more with the fifth and sixth Doctor eras, that I remember as a kid being rather nihilistic.
But one of the good things about the serial is it does change gears throughout. And the BEST thing about the serial is the reintroduction of the Monk. What a gift. I love this character and I did not foresee him returning. I feel like the writers knew they had a good thing and it seems a crime they never reintroduced him. Don't spoil me if he has one more serial appearance. I suspect not but it would be great. The character plays off the Doctor so well. Kind of a Dick Dastardly/Harry Mudd-type. He can be a threat but you can't hate him. He's kind of clever but a born loser. Most recurring Doctor villains are genuine threats every time they appear. I mean the Sontarans or Silurians less so but every time you see a Dalek, Cyberman or the Master, the idea is "oh shit, things are getting real" (even if it is more a generic alien invasion plot in practice). It's nice to have a villain who is more like a nuisance that you also like. I feel like if the character is ever reintroduced, he should be reinvented to be more like Doug Judy, the Pontiac Bandit from Brooklyn Nine Nine.
The premise of that character is he's a thief and he is constantly tricking ka9j character Jake Peralta but he will never do him actual harm because he likes him so much in a genuine way (and despite not wanting to, he feels the same). It would be nice for the Doctor to have an antagonist who he... kind of likes. I mean, he has a weird thing with the Master but the Master is always killing people by the score. I just like the idea of an amoral pest but one who brings in the fun whenever her arrives.
The story really builds up Mavic Chen but really he kind of feels like EVERY evil collaborator from the series; overestimating his importance to his partners, not buying that MAYBE the genocidal aliens won't keep their promise, and just being an overall shit. He works but I feel like being such a shit I kind of wish his end was better. I dunno, it just wasn't satisfying enough and I kind of wanted his last moments to be more ironic or poetic if we are going to spend so much of the story with him just being the worst.
Overall, I think the last scene did a lot of work of leaving me with good feelings about the story. Does that mean the totality is great? Nah. But it's not bad. It's a real mixed bag. But it never gets "bad", except the Feast of Steven. It just goes to kind of generic and boring to really interesting and exciting. But really, it just makes me crave more Monk.
Best cliffhanger:
I think the one where Bret is going to abandon the Doctor. The best ones always imply that things are overwhelming, often with a sense of aural chaos (I think something the best New Doctor cliffhangers did, like The Empty Child or Silence in the Library.
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