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TARDIS Guide

Review of Planet of the Daleks by dema1020

22 June 2024

This review contains spoilers!

A barely serviceable story and one of the least memorable set of Doctor Who episodes I've encountered, especially when it comes to the Third Doctor Era. There's nothing specifically bad about it, their just isn't a lot of great content to grapple with. It very much feels like a boring rehash of past Dalek stories, particularly "The Daleks." The stuff with the Thals really just bored me this time around more than anything, while something just felt off with the scenes and the sets. It just all felt cheaper and more phoned in compared to stronger Dalek adventures and really just comes across as lacking against what I've come to expect with this Doctor and this production team at their best. Also missing some of that more essential character work, or at least delivered in a way that doesn't leave a mark like even other, Third Doctor stories. Jo really feels like she could have been any female companion, when that wasn't what I've liked about her up until this point. The chemistry between Jo and Latep really wasn't there for me and in comparison to how Manning normally bounces off the Doctor this was kind of hard to get through. Even some other weaker ones do this a lot better than Planet of the Daleks, in my opinion. I think in some ways this story is worse than some other more spectacularly bad Doctor Who content out there - at least that stuff sticks in your memory and leaves you with some kind of emotional reaction. Planet of the Daleks just felt like nothing.