Thoughts on Doctor Who - Asylum of the Daleks
When you gaze into the Dalek, the Dalek gazes also into you.
Our Half-Human Hero returns for a shiny new season. Though if you know what the BBC are about these days, you won't be surprised that there was a prelude on-line. Go here to check out what everyone was up to between seasons.
Spoilers follow!
- Didn't the Doctor already blow up Skaro? Not as well as he thought, I guess.
- The Daleks have been taking spy design tips from the Nestenes, from the looks of things.
- Rory's called Rory Williams after all? Maybe the Dalek spy recognised the divorce papers?
- I really like the bronze Daleks. I'm just a little surprised that after all the fuss of introducing the New Paradigm Daleks (the brightly-coloured Power Ranger ones) that they've mostly gone back again. That must annoy the merchandise people no end.
- (I do like their Dalek Supreme's voice.)
- And look, hello - there are some Classic Daleks in the asylum (still mostly bronze ones, though). Wish they'd've put a few more of them front and centre, though. Still, even the Special Weapons Dalek got a look-in! (For non-Classic viewers, that's the Dalek that just has a huge cannon for a top half that Rory tumbles past in the 'eggs' scene.)
- For an empty shell of a person, Darla's a bit sassy. Guess there are some things even nanites can't do.
- Poor Oswin's story is really like I Am Legend, isn't it? She's shut herself away while the monsters teem about outside and try to get in. Right down to discovering at the end that she's the monster.
- 'Perhaps that is why we have never been able to kill you.' Ha! Burn!
- If this was a Russell T Davies story, she wouldn't be listening to Carmen, it'd be One Direction or something.
- Conceptually scary as they may be, zombies with glory eye-stalks poking out of their foreheads actually look kinda goofy.
- Wait, why do Darla and the other living puppets have them? Daleks use them to see, but these people still have regular heads with eyes in place.
- I was actually proper creeped by Amy's 'conversion' causing her to see Daleks as people, as they were 'just like her'.
- Rory's interpretation of the 'subtract love' part of the conversion process is a bit literal. (Besides, it'd take longer to convert him anyway because it started later, which is just as 'logical'.)
- Other parts of the internet exploded with Amy's reason for breaking up with Rory, her lack of speaking up, and whether they'll get back together. It all makes sense to me. People end relationships over all kinds of things, whatever they look like to outsiders (or even themselves). I've seen people get back together over just as much or little. All that said, I don't think the tearfest in the teleport room was the best scene the show's ever done.
- 'Why didn't he just tell us?' Kind of your phrase for that moment, eh, Rory (give or take a pronoun)?
- Besides, Rory had a child. She became a juvenile delinquent and a car thief, married a man much older than her who's also convicted criminal and is currently in prison for murder. He might be re-thinking after how it went last time.
- So sad. Sooo sad. The revelation of poor Oswin's state. She thought she was seconds away from rescue, only to find that she was no longer herself. Mutilated and shoved into a metal shell. What's more, the Doctor sounds angry with her. Would he really have just left her behind in her tin if she hadn't sacrificed herself? Of course, by doing so, she made sure she spent her last moments as a human. She did was a true Dalek could never do: giving herself up of her own free will so others could go on living.
- (Also, crying Dalek sounds are heartbreaking.)
- Trouble is, no-one can really ask the question 'Doctor who?' properly. No, it's a perfectly valid question when you're asking who a doctor is, but since everyone now knows it as the title of a television programme, it's hard to make it sound like you're actually asking and not making the reference.
- As for Matt Smith bouncing round the last scene, pulling switches and saying 'Doctor Who!'...well, that's probably what I'd do if I had a TARDIS console.
- Next week: That bloke from Harry Potter! Nefertiti! And...Dinosaurs on a Spaceship!
Not a bad start to the season, all told. Yes, it's the Daleks again, but not wallpapering the series like they used to do. Besides, I just plain like 'em. Can't help myself.
Thoughts?