There's no denying the fact that when Doctor Who was just starting to get popular there was one set of villains that also started to get really popular. With those villain of course being The Daleks and well with the characters seen fast approaching their very own sixtieth anniversary I thought that now was the absolutely right time to check out another dalek serial from when they were in their heyday and so then join me as I review the episode that sees two companions leave the TARDIS and one companion join it with the episode in question being called sim ply just "The Chase" enjoy.
The plot of this episode is when it's discovered that The Daleks are after the TARDIS it's up to The Doctor , Ian , Barbera and Vicki to find out why they want the TARDIS and stop them before it's far to late. Now then interms of what I personally thought / felt about the actual plot that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual plot that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode was in all honesty one of the more weaker dalek plots as it's just not as captivating as alot of the other Dalek stories but what this episodes plot dos have going for it s the fact that the plot can be really quite entertaining at times with the plot of the episode also being rather engaging at times as well in my freaking opinions anyways / at least.
Starring in this episode is William Hartnell as The Doctor , William Russell as Ian Chesterton and Jacqueline Hill as Barbara Wright. Also starring in this episode is Maureen O'Brien as Vicki , Robert Marsden as Abraham Lincoln , Roger Hammond as Francis Bacon , Vivienne Bennett as Queen Elizabeth I , Hugh Walters as William Shakespeare , Hywel Bennett as Rynian , Al Raymond as Prondyn , Arne Gordon as Guide , Peter Purves as Morton Dill / Steven Taylor , Dennis Chinnery as Albert C Richardson , David Blake Kelly as Capt. Benjamin Briggs , Patrick Carter as Bosun , Douglas Ditta as Willoughby , John Maxim as Frankenstein , Malcolm Rogers as Count Dracula , Roslyn De Winter as Grey Lady , Edmund Warwick as Robot Dr. Who Jack Pitt as Mire Beast , A Cabin Steward , Fungoid and A Mechonoid , Peter Hawkins as The Voice Of The Daleks and Thunderbirds star David Graham as The Voice Of The Daleks and The Voice Of The Mechonoid.
Now then interms of what I personally thought / felt about the actual acting that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual acting that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode was in all honesty really good. However with that being said this episodes script doesn't do the cast any kind of favors as it really doesn't give the cast much to work with which means that even tho the cast do turn in some really good performances which is to be expected from this cast as they a bunch of really good actors they can''t turn in as good of a performance that we all know that they can do as this episodes script just won't allow for it.
This is the first episode to feature new companion Steven Taylor who really doesn't get alot of screen time in this episode. Which is a big issue as it doesn't give us the audience a chance to form an opinion on the character as he only just appears in the final episode of the story and given that he's a character that's going to be travelling with The Doctor he really should have been introduced alot earlier in the story so that we could get the chance to form an opinion of his character and give us a reason to want to care about him as a character and yet by introducing him this late into the episodes plot it makes him feel like an afterthought and like he was only added in at the very last minuet in order to set up a possible companion for The Doctor as he really does play no major role in the vast majority of this story.
There are some things that will always be creepy and seeing the Daleks surrounding the TARDIS will always be one of them. As the very idea of these unstoppable killing machines surrounding the one place that we the audience are told is the safest place in the world and the only place were are heroes will always be safe and yet by showing the Daleks surrounding the TARDIS it makes it suddenly feel unsafe as they could find away to break into the TARDIS and in the best case scenario steal it and in the worst case scenario kill whomever is inside it at the time and there's nothing that are heroes would be able to do to stop them with the only thing creepier then seeing the Daleks surrounding the TARDIS being seeing a bunch of Daleks actually in the TARDIS itself which is something that will always be creepy.
For those of you that are old enough to remember when Twitch live streamed every single episode of classic Doctor Who. This is the episode that has the classic "London 1965" meme that only became a meme as it was featured in literally every single advert that Twitch aired during episodes so much so that it became laughable and it became a meme and it was nice to finally have some context to that scene as it was kind of sad seeing Ian and Barbera leave The Doctor as they were not only one of the very first ever companions in the shows history but they were also partly responsible in making The Doctor the character that we really all know and love today as before he met them he was this cold hearted person who was closed of and had closed himself of to the opportunity of having human friends and yet because of Ian and Barbera the kind and warm hearted man that we all really know and love was really able to come back to the forefront.
The biggest issue that I have with this story is it's tone as the tone of the story is all over the place with the first two episodes being very serious and yet episode three is more comedic and episodes four through six tries and fails to be a mixture of the two. Which just doesn't work as the tone for the first two episodes is what should have been the tone for the whole story as the Daleks are monsters that command a more serious tone and don't really work well with a more lighthearted tone yes a more lighthearted Dalek story could work just look at the film Dr. Who And The Daleks as a prime example of that but what makes the tone in that film work compared to the tone in this story is the fact that from the very first scene that film lets you know that it's going to be a little bit more comedic where as in this story we get alot of serious scenes from the very first scene in the episode one and as such it clashes when we get to episode three and suddenly we are now in a comedy.
Now then while I cannot for the absolutely life of me remember whatever running time this episode has I do know that this episode has / had an exact grand total running time of roughly two hours. Which is such a long time for this episode to have as the plot is so thin that it really does feel like two different stories glued together with the first two episodes being an actually good story and every episode after that feeling like a lesser story and such that this episode really should have been two or three episodes as that's the only amount of plot that the episode has enough episodes to cover and with that shorter episode count it would make the plot really alot more tighter and would have every scene be about advancing the overall plot of the overall story and it would get rid of the terrible comedy tone of episodes three through six as well but I will admit that the episodes really does have some truly wonderful pacing to it.
So now then as this is an action show that means that I have to actually talk about the actual action that's actually featured / presented to us in this very episode well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual action that's actually featured / presented to us un this very episode was in all honesty not that bad. As we do get to see a rather solid fight scene between The Doctor and his robot self which for the time that this episode was made wasn't that bad altho I do wish that they didn't make it obvious when they used a stunt double and the fight scene between the Daleks and the Mechonoids is good and it would have been better if they they didn't put animated explosions over the top of the scene as that was really distracting and it really did bring down the quality of what was a really good and a really rather solid final fight scene in this episode in my freaking opinions anyways / at least.
Overall this a rather weak Dalek story from their creator Terry Nation which is a shame because it had all of the potential to be a good Dalek story and I can see why this story was chosen to be the next Dalek as it would have made for a rather solid in my freaking opinions anyways / at ,least. Now then i've talked about all of the good and as well as all of the bad things that are in this very episode in this very review and as such that means that this very episode really does earn itself a grand old score of exactly a 7 out of 10 from me.
Now then as for where I personally got all of the images that I personally used in this very review well then boys and girls and as well as ladies and gentlemen I personally got all of the images that I personally used in this very review from Amazon . Co . Uk , the official Doctor Who fandom wiki page and Google Images. With my personally preferred website to use to get the images from these very episode that I used in this very review being Google Images simply just due to the fact that alot of the images that are on Google Images are all really fairly high in quality and as well as them all being really fairly freaking high in definition.