Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
How the Daleks met their final end,
By
This review is from: Doctor Who: The Evil of the Daleks (Target Doctor Who Library) (Paperback)
Like its cousin, The Power Of The Daleks, the novelization for Evil Of The Daleks was also written by John Peel and is a story that's incomplete in TV form (except Episode 2). However, this is a very significant story in the Doctor Who canon, as this sees the very end of the Daleks. At least that's what it was meant, as Dalek creator Terry Nation was looking to market his creations in America, hence this story. Like the Power novel, is written so that it gives depth into the characters. This book is more effective, as there aren't many supporting characters that there were in Power.Following their adventures at Gatwick Airport, the Doctor and his companion Jamie are shocked to see someone steal the TARDIS. The Doctor is suspicious. Who would want to steal a time machine that has the outward appearance of an outdated British telephone box? "...whoever took it must have known exactly what they were stealing. Which means they must know who I am." he says. His suspicions prove right, as he and Jamie are whisked off to Victorian England, 2 July 1866. They meet Edward Waterfield, a professor, who with his financial backer and benefactor, the leonine bearded Theodore Maxtible, are under the thrall of the Daleks, who have kidnapped Waterfield's daughter Victoria. "The conquest of humanity has eluded us. The Daleks must know why." The Doctor's task is to discover the human factor. To that end, he works at a series of instruments recording Jamie's thoughts on a capsule, as he sets out to rescue Victoria. "It is for you... to select the major emotions and thought processes to make up the human factor," he is told. Once finished, the factor will be transferred to the Daleks so they will become unbeatable, something the Doctor would rather die than do, but the Daleks have his time machine, plus he doesn't want to endanger Victoria's life, despite not having met her. The Doctor seems to sum up the kind of enlightened person he is when he tells the fiance of Maxtible's daughter, "I am not a student of human nature. I am a professor of a much wider academy, of which the human being is merely a part." His cleverness comes in at times when it looks like he's at a disadvantage, which makes the Second Doctor, with his dark Beatles mop-top, and impish smile, come alive. Jamie's nobility and bravery is one of the highlights Examples of the human factor are given by Jamie's rescue of Kemel, the muscular 6 and a half foot mute Turkish strongman initially told that Jamie is a murderer and to stop him. Kemel realizes his being deceived and aids Jamie in his quest. The reason I wish this story were available in TV form is that Daleks are seen acting human, calling the Doctor "friend" and playing trains with him. Another is the image of seeing the Daleks respond not with "I obey" but "Why?" That is what differentiates Daleks from humans, blind obedience versus questioning authority. Two things are in variance. The other is the timing of this story to other Dalek stories. Terry Nation, creator of the Daleks and John Peel agree that this story takes place after the Dalek Masterplan of 4000 AD, with Peel placing his novel more than a thousand years after that adventure. Yet other reference books place the scenes on Skaro either between the 19th and 22nd century, or in the case of History of the Universe, around 2966 AD. And Maxtible's death is not detailed in the novel, being in variance to how he dies in the TV version. One major important thing reinforced in the novel from Terry Nation and John Peel's history of the Daleks book is that the Emperor Dalek here is NOT Davros, but the Dalek Prime, the Gold Dalek who experimented himself to become an immobile, grossly mutated creature that became pure mentality and needed a support system. Another great novelization by John Peel.
5.0 out of 5 stars
SUPREMELY EVIL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!,
This review is from: Doctor Who: The Evil of the Daleks (Target Doctor Who Library) (Paperback)
THE EVIL OF THE DALEKS! Evil, so simple a word to describe villainy and yet it defines the entire story. Adapted from the Doctor Who television story of the same name, the Second Doctor (played on the screen by Patrick Troughton) and his companion Jamie McCrimmon chase after the henchmen of Theodore Maxtible and Edward Waterfield, who have stolen the TARDIS from them. Unfortunately Maxtible and Waterfield themselves are the servants of the Daleks, who want to lure the Doctor into a trap and force him to make themselves more cunning and lethal than ever before.Picking up where the previous adventure The Faceless Ones left off, the Doctor and Jamie say farewell to fellow travellers Ben and Polly as they have decided to leave for a normal life. They return to where they left the TARDIS, only to find it being carted away by a delivery truck. They follow the clues left behind (deliberately) to an antiques store owned by Edward Waterfield, who captures them and brings his quarry to his associate Maxtible via time machine back a hundred years. From them the Doctor learns they are being forced to do the Daleks' bidding as the monstrous aliens have Waterfield's daughter Victoria hostage, and that the Daleks want the Doctor to discern and isolate the Human Factor, which the Daleks will add to themselves in order to make them stronger. What follows is a great game of wits played by many characters, as things about them are not what they seem. The Doctor aims to use the Human Factor to his advantage to make the Daleks finally become good. Maxtible is not working under oppression from the Daleks, but out of greed as they have promised to give him the powers of transmutation (the turning of metal into gold). Jamie begins to mistrust the Doctor, aiming to rescue Victoria himself. Arthur Terrall, an accomplice, does not seem to be doing his part willingly. But as we find out at the end it turns out a new player to the game may hold the greater hand. Operating from the Dalek home planet of Skaro, the Dalek Emperor has been manipulating the events in the story. He has even played the Doctor into doing what he really wants. He knew that the Doctor would try to turn his kind into a way he disapproves, and has tricked the heroic Time Lord into not only isolating the Human Factor, but the Dalek Factor as well. With this in hand, no one is safe from the Emperor and his Daleks. The game has changed from one of wits to one of chess: the Doctor and his humanised Daleks against the Emperor and his corps of still-loyal Black Daleks. Who will win? The Good of the Doctor or.... THE EVIL OF THE DALEKS!!!
5.0 out of 5 stars
An excellent addition to the canon,
By Kurt A. Johnson (North-Central Illinois, USA) - See all my reviews (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (VINE VOICE) (TOP 100 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: Doctor Who: The Evil of the Daleks (Target Doctor Who Library) (Paperback)
When the TARDIS is stolen from Gatwick Airport, the Doctor and Jamie must sleuth out who took it and where. However, the TARDIS is merely bait, to draw the Doctor and Jamie into a trap. Transported back to the 1860s, the intrepid duo finds themselves prisoners of the Daleks. The Daleks have grown tired of being defeated by the detestable humans, and they want the Doctor to give them the "human factor" that will allow them to finally triumph. What will the Doctor do, and what will be the result?"The Evil of the Daleks," starring Patrick Troughton, was first aired in 1967. Shortly thereafter, the original video recordings were wiped, destroying this program for all time. However, when it was first aired, some fans had made audio recordings of the episodes, and in 1993 this novel was produced from the soundtrack. This story introduces Victoria Waterfield to the Doctor, and is an excellent addition to the canon. It has great action in it, with the Daleks being excellently done, made even scarier than they are in the television show. Even having heard the audiobook version of the soundtrack, this book is a great addition, adding some detail and depth to the story. I really enjoyed this book and highly recommend it.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
