I’d also recommend Toby Hadoke’s interview with Jana Carpenter who plays Di Maggio in the episode:
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The full deep dive Wakelet:
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I didn’t really remember much about this episode before I just rewatched it, so it obviously didn’t make much of an impression on me at the time it came out. I guess it just got overshadowed in my mind by later episodes in the season.
I haven’t (yet) listened to Jubilee so for me it stands alone at the moment.
It’s strange now to realise that this was the first time we really got a glimpse into the Time War, and the darker side of 9’s personality.
I did really enjoy it this time around, but if I had one criticism it would be that Rose never really owns the guilt of being the direct cause of the deaths of about 200 innocent people through her naive mistake.
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Just rewatched it with my watch buddy in VR. Definitely one of the better episodes of the season. And my friend certainly called that out, after Aliens of London and World War Three, haha. It’s a perfect way to introduce Daleks to new audiences. Especially illustrated by the Doctor’s reaction. He’s scarier than the Dalek, the way his demeanor shifts.
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I love this episode.
Yes it has its flaws. And yes it’s a bit of a rehash of some ideas.
But it introduces the Daleks to a new audience in an interesting way, makes them scary and a credible threat again, the Daleks aren’t a huge army and aren’t easily defeated, it is just so good.
I’ve said it before on here but this is the story that made me a Doctor Who fan. Before this, it was all a bit silly with farting aliens. But this story made me sit down, rewatch it, rewatch the whole series so far, and turned the show into appointment viewing while I was at university.
If it wasn’t for this episode, this website definitely wouldn’t exist 
So whilst not perfect, it has a massive impact. All the more for how this leads into the series finale, which I also loved!
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In a word, fantastic! Probably my favourite episode featuring those pesky pepperpots. The set up of their appearance is great, & Eccleston is just firing on all cylinders here with a brilliant performance in every scene, that really sells how terrifying the Daleks are to new audiences. & how terrifying the Doctor can be - “Your race is dead! You all burnt, all of you. Ten million ships on fire. The entire Dalek race wiped out in one second…I watched it happen. I made it happen”. & then he tortures it (later being tortured himself). He goes through so many emotions in this one.
Eccletson he has said that his father was ill during filming & he took out his anger on the Dalek. That first appearance of the Dalek, so well directed. & when the inevitable happens we have a lethal alien killing machine doing what it does best against an unprepared human opponent. The interactions with Rose not jut between her & the Dalek but her & the Doctor - does she even really know this man? - another standout performance here from Billie, where not only the viewer but the Doctor sees a different side to the Daleks, a possibility of something more maybe? There’s a lot crammed into 45 minutes here but its all so well paced. Love it.
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They do a great job here of escalating the obstacles the Dalek faces only to have him promptly plow right through them like they are nothing. An impeccable show of their strength the franchise desperately needs more examples of.
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Dalek is a story that I’ve never held in the same regard as others have. I do enjoy it and love how it re introduces Daleks into the new series but to me it’s not perfect.
(A big part of that is Adam let’s be real)
Anyway 8/10 for me
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Whilst this story is a favourite of mine, I do agree with you on this scene. That moment in ‘Remembrance’ was remarkable, not only because it finally answered the age old joke about just running up the stairs but also because Sylvester absolutely sold the Doctor’s terror in that moment. Stunning TV!
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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 in 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).
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I agree that it isn’t Shearman’s best DW (that, for me, is a toss up between ‘The Holy Terror’ and ‘The Chimes of Midnight’) but would contend that it’s exactly right for this early in the revived TV series. Much as I adore the two aforementioned scripts, i’m not quite sure the popular audience would have been ready for an adaptation of ‘The Holy Terror’ at that stage. That said, surely an adaptation of ‘The Chimes of Midnight’ is the best Doctor Who Christmas Special we’ve never had.
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Alpha Centauri, a Zygon, and Ogron and is that the 2nd Doctor?
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Oh you can just tell that is the cheapest, most plasticky and bland pizza you’ll ever see.
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Predicting Victory of the Daleks I see
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I’ll raise you the Daleks on the Mary Celeste in The Chase. They had to conquer those stairs on the deck of the ship somehow 
Echoing most people here. Dalek is fantastic.
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Duh, they obviously EXTERMINATED! them…
On screen levitation is technically first seen in Revelation of the Daleks but, as people say, implied much earlier.
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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!
9.5-9.75/10
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The Daleks in the revived era peaked here. This still hasn’t been topped in two decades (although I admit to having slightly higher regard for Genesis and Remembrance overall). The scene where an entire room of armed mercs gets wiped out with just two shots might be my favourite display of just how much of a threat the Daleks collectively pose: They’re lethal, they’re clever, and they hate everything that isn’t them. Despite so many stories showing large-scale invasions and battle plans, they have arguably never been more terrifying than they are here with just one of them.
And then there’s Ninth in full post-War trauma mode. While I personally love him more for his hopeful and campy moments, seeing the Doctor struggling this much with his own conscience is… well, brilliant. More than any other episode this series, this is the one that shows the Doctor/Rose dynamic at its height because of how essential it ends up being. The Doctor is broken (and in my personal head canon, there still exists a timeline where he did indeed wipe out his entire planet and race), and just like what happened every so often in the classic era and even more so from here on in the revived era, humanity saved him just as much he saved them.
Even the inclusion of Adam, I’m totally fine with. While his particular arc wouldn’t fulfil itself until the following episode (and possibly in Prisoners Of Time, depending who you ask), I like that this introduction here led into a companion story arc that hadn’t really been attempted before. I like to think of him as a retroactive response to the idea that Adric would’ve lasted even five minutes as part of the TARDIS crew.
It’s interesting to think about how exceptionally good this episode is on its own, but in the larger catalogue of Robert Shearman, this might be one of his weaker efforts. Not as much of his bleak absurdist sense of humour on display, and it’s much more streamlined than his Main Range efforts, so it doesn’t have the sprawling reach that I quite like about him as a writer. But them’s bragging rights, far as I’m concerned. He put in his equivalent of Leg Day, and managed to set the dramatic and emotional pace for the rest of the revived era to follow.
It will, unfortunately, always have to deal with being in the shadow of Jubilee, but for the very specific story it tells about this very specific moment in the Doctor’s personal timeline, it more than earns its place right alongside it.
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