Watched again for the anniversary.

This one’s incredible and lives up to its reputation for me. Eccleston gives easily his best performance yet. van Staten plays an incredibly hateable Musk like character who gets his commuppence. While I have a couple issues with Rose’s character at the end, Piper brings her A-game too.

The way it reintroduces the Daleks is perfect. Having only Dalek instead of loads for the introduction really establishes them as a threat, which leads to the oh sh*t moment we get in the finale. It also does what I’ve repeatedly said I like most when the Daleks are done well: it makes it a manipulative schemer. It’s not a yelling shouty robot, it’s a living creature trying its best to survive and do its mission. It’s efficient and it knows how to use people like Rose to get what it wants.

The score is one of Gold’s best. It’s purely atmospheric and it hits perfectly.

I love 9’s characterisation here. It’s so much darker, and the first time we truly see him wanting something dead whatever the cost. Which further establishes the threat. And as I already said, Eccleston puts in an all-timer nuanced performance that sells the fear, rage, trauma and guilt perfectly.

Is it Jubilee? No! But I think despite being loosely based on it, and having some of the same core ideas, it’s tackling totally different themes and has the different missions statement of reintroducing Daleks to a new generation. And I think it succeeds on all fronts. It and Jubilee are both great, even if I do prefer the latter for sure.

Unfortunately. Adam exists. He’s annoying, and his actor uh… Doesn’t put in a good performance to put it very gently. And also as some folks alluded to earlier in the thread, Rose doesn’t show any guilt at all about what she caused and almost seems more concerned about the Daleks than she does human lives.

But I love that ending, whatever folks say. The idea of a Dalek scheming to absorb human DNA to recover itself but due to decades of isolation, years of torture, and the existential discovery that it’s the last of its kind when it thought otherwise all that time made it miscalculate and not realise it too would become a little more human. And that isn’t pure. And to not be pure is a fate worse than death for a Dalek.

In the end I have one word to describe this story…

Fantastic!

4.5-4.75 stars

Review #9

The tale of the Impure Dalek

This was a good one. The daleks are appearing for the first time in new who but this time its only 1 dalek. Rose made it impure so lt can't bring itself to kill the one man that tortured it the most. This episode also delves more into the Time War and we learn that the time Lords and the daleks were the ones at war and everyone lost. Definitely do not skip this one. 9/10

The real Doctor Who begins here

This episode is fantastic, we get the return of the most iconic Doctor Who villain in the revival series, and we get the most hints so far about what happened in the Time War. The Dalek's interactions with Rose and how he feels about being "contaminated" are definitely a foreshadowing of things to come

2025 Rewatch

• I have a mixed love for this story. I know it's great, of course it is. But I never want to watch as bad as everything else. I wonder if it's related to it being a Dalek story (I'm not a big Dalek fan) or because the whole set looks so dull and dry.
• Adam Mitchell is a nice addition I guess? Not a huge fan, could have done without him or at least him staying an episode longer
• Henry and Goddard are bold and brilliant characters for the story and really shine, that is also thanks to a limited cast of prevalent characters
• A lone Dalek story is great, bringing out the best of the classic alien as well as developing the Doctor
• This is a big story for the season, character-driven and beautifully shown, the development of the Doctor and the impact Rose has had on him is evident

One of the very best of the revival. Rob Shearman brings us classic after classic, the same goes with this.
I always a fan for a good dalek story and when they are amazing, they REALLY are amazing. So is this! Similar to Power of the Daleks it explores the nature of the Dalek and shows how threading those pepper potts can be when used right. Sure it cools hearing 10.000 Daleks are here on a planet, but this is exactly why the daleks work so well.
All the tension between 9 and the Dalek is just amazing. If somebody wasnt convinced yet by Eccelstons amazing perfomance, they certainly will be at this one. I also think Nick Briggs does one of his very best perfomance as a dalek, such a good one. I could praise the idea and the concept behind it. I could point to some lovely little details. I could write even more on this Episode, it’s amazing. Sure it’s a bit “overrated” and it’s by far not the best shearman has done with who, but still I think this one just works and is the moment where the series went from solid to great for me at least.

But I’d agree with the sentinte that this Episodes gets seen in high regards of bringing back the scare factor of the Daleks, when their last proper story was rememberance and one of their very best, you’d think the way people talk about it, their last Outing was Destiny instead (I like destiny but it’s definietly a weaker outing of the beloved foes).