N.B. there might (or might not) be spoilers in this article!

Dr. Who! And the Daleks! On the Big Screen! In COLOUR!

Now, I know what I said: this time it would be Four Hundred Dawns (the first episode of Galaxy 4), but between the end of season two and the beginning of season three, Dr. Who and the Daleks was released in cinemas, so it made sense for me to watch this as my first so-called sidestep.

“Anyone can understand science if they put their mind to it.”

Dr. Who, Dr. Who and the Daleks

Frankly though, I have never warmed to this movie. Perhaps it’s because (unlike its sequel), I didn’t see it either as a child or before the television serial upon which it’s based. Oddly, despite it being less than half the length of The Daleks, it feels twice as long, dragging interminably!

Part of the problem for me is that much of the tension of the original has been replaced with really, really bad slapstick (sorry, Roy); it also somehow manages to feel cheaper than the BBC serial (even though I’m sure it wasn’t that low-budget) with the effect being that I am watching a gaudy fake version of Doctor Who.

Even in the opening credits, to a twenty-first century cynic such as I, the character names are screaming out to be read in “scare quotes”: Roy Castle as “Ian”, Jennie Linden as “Barbara”, and so on. It’s almost like they knew what they producing wasn’t really Doctor Who, and the quotation marks are there to let me know they know that.

All that said, Peter Cushing as this other “Dr. Who” is rather good, certainly early on (where he possesses a genuine dottiness), but despite the great actor’s efforts I doubt that I will ever really like this movie.

But hey-ho, next time normal service is resumed!