Why I like Bellal
Bellal is a little green man from Exxilon, and functionally Our Heroes' only real ally in "Death to the Daleks." He's super cute.
The Exxilons come in two basic flavors: the primitive and superstitious brown majority, and the hidden and repressed green minority. I think we see like...two of them over the course of the episode. Whereas the brown Exxilons worship their great City and offer it blood sacrifices, the green Exxilons correctly recall it as the source of their civilization's downfall and hate and fear it. And skulk around in tunnels a lot. It's unclear if the color difference between the two factions is an adaptation towards phosphorescence on the part of the greener ones (since they skulk around in tunnels so much), perfectly ordinary racism, or merely Color Coding For Your Convenience. Maybe it's all three. All of them of whatever color are hairless with large glassy eyes, but as far as I can tell only the browner ones wear clothing of any kind. The clothing is also brown.
Bellal turns up to rescue the Doctor and Sarah Jane when they're lost in the tunnels he's skulking in after escaping from a near sacrifice. Why does he help them? Cuz he's just a nice sort of guy and doesn't like to see people's heads get blown up by malevolent roots. He's there to help Our Heroes out of a jam and provide relevant local backstory, and he does both of these things admirably. From there, he goes on to serve almost in the role of Companion once the Doctor and Sarah split up to pursue different plotlines. That, I have to say, is something I always enjoy - not just the ability of longer episodes to accommodate multiple parallel plot-lines, but tracking our various heroes along different paths. And sometimes if you don't have multiple companions to accommodate this, you can borrow some from the local population, like Ray in "Delta and the Bannermen" or Bellal here.
Bellal is an absolute sweetie. First off, he's tiny - not really even as tall as Sarah Jane at 5'4", and positively dwarfed by Jon Pertwee. This is accentuated by his timorous nature, probably born of a life skulking in tunnels. He is not a coward, but he is almost constantly nervous, in a way that is both practical and strangely endearing. But most importantly, he has huge eyes that give him a perpetual expression of dismayed surprise. It's very C3-PO, whom he predates by a couple of years. They would probably get along quite well, except that Bellal isn't nearly as prissy or obnoxious. Bellal is a genuinely good guy. He's terrified of the great City of the Exxilons, but he comes with the Doctor anyway, and despite his general disposition of nervousness is always game for pressing forward. It costs him a lot physically and psychologically, but he makes it through.
Bellal is the Doctor's buddy and sidekick through the deathtrap laden City. The City needs an Exxilon to serve as its brain, and so Bellal has to come along to activate certain puzzles, including the one that lets them in in the first place. Once inside, he does the Companion thing perfectly, from asking good questions to occasional banter, and even the always necessary delivery of the Expression of Acute Skepticism. He gets a little mind-controlled at the appropriate places - which gives Sarah Jane a bit of a break from all that. He's the Native Guide, yes, but more than that he's just a friend. The Doctor is always at his best when he has someone to talk to (hooray for exposition) and the chemistry between the two of them is just really very nice. Bellal is not dismissed or talked down to - he's just there to help out and he does. It's just all very sweet.
I like Bellal an awful lot. I keep coming back to words like "sweet," "cute" and "endearing" because every time he's on screen it's like "d'awwwwwwww it's Bellal." I don't know if he ends up in Companions Who Never Were lists, and I don't know how well he'd work as full-time TARDIS crew, but he's such a joy here. He's probably my favorite thing in "Death to the Daleks," good character chemistry making up for some degree of weak storytelling. And there's nothing wrong with a cute little dude following along after the Doctor with huge googly eyes like a friendly adorable Gollum. Little green men who skulk in tunnels aren't all bad after all.
The Exxilons come in two basic flavors: the primitive and superstitious brown majority, and the hidden and repressed green minority. I think we see like...two of them over the course of the episode. Whereas the brown Exxilons worship their great City and offer it blood sacrifices, the green Exxilons correctly recall it as the source of their civilization's downfall and hate and fear it. And skulk around in tunnels a lot. It's unclear if the color difference between the two factions is an adaptation towards phosphorescence on the part of the greener ones (since they skulk around in tunnels so much), perfectly ordinary racism, or merely Color Coding For Your Convenience. Maybe it's all three. All of them of whatever color are hairless with large glassy eyes, but as far as I can tell only the browner ones wear clothing of any kind. The clothing is also brown.
Bellal turns up to rescue the Doctor and Sarah Jane when they're lost in the tunnels he's skulking in after escaping from a near sacrifice. Why does he help them? Cuz he's just a nice sort of guy and doesn't like to see people's heads get blown up by malevolent roots. He's there to help Our Heroes out of a jam and provide relevant local backstory, and he does both of these things admirably. From there, he goes on to serve almost in the role of Companion once the Doctor and Sarah split up to pursue different plotlines. That, I have to say, is something I always enjoy - not just the ability of longer episodes to accommodate multiple parallel plot-lines, but tracking our various heroes along different paths. And sometimes if you don't have multiple companions to accommodate this, you can borrow some from the local population, like Ray in "Delta and the Bannermen" or Bellal here.
Bellal is an absolute sweetie. First off, he's tiny - not really even as tall as Sarah Jane at 5'4", and positively dwarfed by Jon Pertwee. This is accentuated by his timorous nature, probably born of a life skulking in tunnels. He is not a coward, but he is almost constantly nervous, in a way that is both practical and strangely endearing. But most importantly, he has huge eyes that give him a perpetual expression of dismayed surprise. It's very C3-PO, whom he predates by a couple of years. They would probably get along quite well, except that Bellal isn't nearly as prissy or obnoxious. Bellal is a genuinely good guy. He's terrified of the great City of the Exxilons, but he comes with the Doctor anyway, and despite his general disposition of nervousness is always game for pressing forward. It costs him a lot physically and psychologically, but he makes it through.
Bellal is the Doctor's buddy and sidekick through the deathtrap laden City. The City needs an Exxilon to serve as its brain, and so Bellal has to come along to activate certain puzzles, including the one that lets them in in the first place. Once inside, he does the Companion thing perfectly, from asking good questions to occasional banter, and even the always necessary delivery of the Expression of Acute Skepticism. He gets a little mind-controlled at the appropriate places - which gives Sarah Jane a bit of a break from all that. He's the Native Guide, yes, but more than that he's just a friend. The Doctor is always at his best when he has someone to talk to (hooray for exposition) and the chemistry between the two of them is just really very nice. Bellal is not dismissed or talked down to - he's just there to help out and he does. It's just all very sweet.
I like Bellal an awful lot. I keep coming back to words like "sweet," "cute" and "endearing" because every time he's on screen it's like "d'awwwwwwww it's Bellal." I don't know if he ends up in Companions Who Never Were lists, and I don't know how well he'd work as full-time TARDIS crew, but he's such a joy here. He's probably my favorite thing in "Death to the Daleks," good character chemistry making up for some degree of weak storytelling. And there's nothing wrong with a cute little dude following along after the Doctor with huge googly eyes like a friendly adorable Gollum. Little green men who skulk in tunnels aren't all bad after all.