The Boy and the Dalek

📝2/10 = VERY UNENJOYABLE!

Thworping through time and space, one adventure at a time!

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: “THE BOY AND THE DALEK”

Mark Griffiths opens the Adventures Before collection with a childishly written and confusingly plotted “prequel” to The Daleks (1963-1964). It features Two, Jamie and Victoria, in small roles at the start and the end (but they aren’t well-written at all and barely make a dent in the story; they might as well have been left out entirely). The short story is mainly focused on a human boy who has been transported to Skaro and joins a seemingly benevolent Dalek scientist (named Dalek 444), who helps him get back home. 

We also meet the gold-domed Dalek Emperor from Time Lord Victorious, who is suddenly part of Skaro at this time, and other Daleks, all who talk and act very differently from how they were characterised in the TV serial. Nothing that is said, done, or described here screams “prequel to the Daleks” until the very last few paragraphs, which casually show how a dying Dalek 444 mutant sees One, Susan, Ian, and Barabara arrive in the petrified forest on Skaro. In that sense, this story fails to do the very things it seeks to do, and it’s not a successful Second Doctor story nor a good Dalek story.

I was frustrated and annoyed when reading this and frequently raised my eyebrows at some of the bafflingly off-beat plot decisions Griffiths makes here.