The Daleks - 21 Minutes of Adventure

The Daleks Narrated by David Graham Produced by Des Saunders Dr. Who Theme by Eric Winston [sic] Orchestra In their flight from the Pursuer-Daleks, Dr. Who and his friends land on yet another strange planet. Trapped in a city built on massive stilts which tower above a dangerous jungle, they fight their way to safety.

Side One Detailed Breakdown - 10'04"

• The record begins with 1’21” of the Eric Winstone Doctor Who theme. This up-beat orchestral recording had been released on Pye Records in 1964 - more details are in our Tributes Discography!

  The tale I have to tell is like a dream. A fantastic nightmare. As you sit in your comfortable, familiar surroundings, listening to my story, you may feel it could never have happened. But to Dr Who and his friends, it was very real. For two years they had been ranging in time and space in their craft, the TARDIS. Relentlessly, they were being chased by the Daleks, a humanoid race from the planet Skaro, evil creatures intent on pursuit and destruction. In their own space craft, they had chased Dr Who, Ian Chesterton, and the girls Vicki and Barbara onto yet another new and strange planet. All around them was a seemingly endless jungle, where strange carnivorous plants reached out greedily at them. In desperation they fled into a cave, hoping to find some kind of refuge; but the dark interior soon crushed their optimism. Solid black rock faced them in every direction. In their panic, they had rushed into a trap. Then, to their astonishment, the far wall of the cave slid open, revealing a room where a robot stood and addressed them.
  
  
  

• From 0’32” into the as-broadcast episode (including titles) there is then a 0’03” clip of the Mechanoid saying “Enter”, which is played twice.

  Dr Who and his party could do nothing but obey. The Daleks were too close behind for argument. Although the robot would say no more, it was enough that they had been saved for the moment.
  
  
  

• The soundtrack returns, having jumped 0’12” (missing a short music cue and Ian: ‘You heard the gentleman, let’s go!’)
  
  
• 0’07” of silence is cut before The Doctor: ‘You got us out of a nasty situation there’.
  
  
• At the end of this lift scene, there is 0’02” of silence not present in the TV version.

  Whilst they continued their journey in the lift, the Daleks reached the cave and were thronging around it in anger and frustration. Playing their syzmic detectors around the cave walls, they found traces of the Earth people who had eluded them.
  

  The soundtrack then cuts back in, having jumped 0’04”.
  
  

• The majority of this scene plays uncut, ending 0’11” early after ‘It is required that we penetrate this wall’.

  Meanwhile the strange robot was conducting Dr Who and his party higher and higher. The elevator seemed to climb for an eternity. Finally it slowed to a halt, and the Earth people wondered what scene would meet their eyes when the elevator doors were opened.
  

  The soundtrack, which cuts back to the lift scene as in the TV version, actually cuts in early and includes the final few syzmic detector bleeps from the end of the Dalek scene.
  
  

• The Mechanoid then whirs for 0’05”, the soundtrack jumps 0’05” to a mechanical thud, and then cuts a further 0’10” to ‘Foll-low; Foll-low.’
  
  
• Immediately after this edited Mechanoid speech, 0’01” is cut before Vicki exclaims ‘Look at it!’.
  
  
• The incidental music that plays over the model shot of the Mechanoid city is faded out one bar early, and is mostly covered by narration.

  It was indeed a sight to take their breath away. The elevator had taken them to a vast city that towered on massive stilts above the jungle. Through the elevator, Dr Who and the others were transported by conveyer belt through this strange, unearthly place. Although their eyes searched high and low, they could not see a trace of human existence. Instead they saw a completely mechanised civilisation, controlled only by robots like the one escorting them. At last they came to a halt at the door of a huge building in the centre of the city. As the door slid open, the robot again addressed them, and indicated the room beyond.
  

  Before jumping 0’45” to the Mechanoid’s line, the looped sound of a Mechanoid whir is played, which once clanks to a stop and quickly cuts back to another elongated whir.
  
  

• After Barbara jokingly translates the Mechanoid’s speech, there is a 0’04” jump to the TARDIS crew entering their cell and the door closing behind them, followed by a further cut of 0’09” to Vicki’s line ‘oooh, not bad!’
  
  
• The scene plays as broadcast until the Doctor mentions that they have seen only robots since arriving in the city, when the following narration is spoken over a piece of stock music (jumping 0’05” to remove Dudley Simpson’s music cue and the line ‘Stay where you are!’)

  As if in answer to their words, into the room stepped the first human being they had seen for ages. A well-built young man wearing a spacesuit, he paused, regarding them in equal amazement. It was a moment or two before any of them could find their tongues.
  
  
  

• The scene that then plays is drastically trimmed:
  
  Steven: ‘You real?’
  (0’03” of silence cut)
  Ian: ‘Who are you?’
  (0’02” of silence cut)
  Steven: ‘You are real! From Earth?’
  Ian: ‘Yes’.
  (0’02” cut, removing Ian’s ‘Who are you?’ and an indistinguishable exclamation from Steven).
  Steven: ‘It couldn’t have happened! I worked out the odds two thousand and one agai - ‘
  (0’06” cut, removing the rest of Steven’s line)
  Steven: ‘Look, I’m Steven Taylor, flight red-fifty’.
  The Doctor: ‘Well, we’ve learned something, ha ha, his name!’
  (0’22” cut, removing Steven introducing Hi-Fi).
  Barbara: ‘I’m Barbara’. (actually talking to Hi-Fi)
  (0’05” cut after the introductions).
  Steven: ‘This is great, huh? I mean it’s ridiculous! I’m lost for words!’
  (0’06” cut, removing the end of this line).
  The scene then returns to it’s original pace with the Doctor’s question, ‘How long have you been here?’
  
  
• 0’02” is cut after ‘This is Mechanus!’
  
  
• 0’01” of silence is trimmed before Steven admits ‘I crashed, y’see’.
  
  
• The Eric Winstone theme plays for a further 0’18” after Steven reveals ‘We’re all prisoners!’. There is then a jump of 0’38”, with dialogue-paraphrasing narrative:

  Steven Taylor was right. They were indeed in the power of the Mecons, and from time to time shuttered windows would slide back, to reveal their captors staring in at them, as if they were some kind of specimens in a zoo. Meanwhile the Daleks were working frantically to break through the rock wall which had closed between them and the elevator. Into the cave they brought their powerful electrode unit that was to activate the elevator machinery and bring the conveyer down again to their own level.
  
  
  

• The following Dalek scene plays in it’s entirety before the narration resumes and covers a 0’15” jump in the soundtrack:

  And so with the Daleks making their way up the elevator shaft towards the city, the Earth people sought a method of escape from their prison. Steven drew their attention to a kind of ladder that led up to the ceiling of the room.
  
  
  

• 0’01” of silence is cut after the Doctor mentions the TARDIS before Steven.
  
  
• The scene on top of the city roof is another that is dramatically trimmed.

(0’01” of silence is cut once Steven leaves the Doctor and Ian alone on the roof-top)
The Doctor: ‘Chesterton, be careful!’
(0’01” cut)
Ian: ‘Yes, I can see why the Mechanoids don’t mind us coming up here’.
(0’03” cut)
Ian: ‘Doctor, what do you make of this?’
The Doctor: ‘Oh, it’s some kind of arial I suppose’.
(0’02” cut)
Ian: ‘Doctor, I’ve got it!’ (etc.)
(0’10” cut)
Ian: ‘C’mon, let’s get the others’

• The side ends with 0’04” of atmospheric wind, not present in the TV version.

Side Two Detailed Breakdown - 09'46"

• Narration opens side two, running over the same swirling wind effect that ended the previous scene.

  Ian’s idea was to use the enormous length of cable on the roof of the building as a means of lowering themselves to safety. It would be a perilous operation. There was a sickening drop from the roof of the city to the jungle, far below, but it was too good a chance to miss, and the men hurried down the ladder to tell Vicki and Barbara.
  

  The soundtrack then jumps 0’09” to Barbara’s ‘Well?’
  
  

• After Vicki says ‘Look!’ after seeing the Daleks outside the cell, the soundtrack cuts out immediately.

There was now no time to argue. Through the window of the prison they looked across the top of the elevator shaft and saw the Daleks. They had reached the level of the city, and were attacking the Mechons who stood in their path.

• The soundtrack fades back in, having jumped 0’20” of the Doctor setting the Dalek bomb.
  
  
• After the Dalek cries ‘You will be annihilated!!’ and fires an exterminating blast, there is a jump of 0’11”, cutting out some Mechanoid speech, to another Dalek ordering ‘Dispatch a section to the roof area’ and the reply, ‘I obey’. After this, 0’11” of the Doctor placing the bomb from the previous 0’20” cut is heard.

  Before escaping up the ladder with the rest of the party, Dr Who left by the door of the room one of his cunning anti-Dalek devices. This was a machine programmed to explode whenever any of the creatures came in. In fact the Earth people had escaped just in time, for a moment later one of the Daleks broke in and set off the Doctor’s device.
  

  We then hear a stock explosion, considerably more dramatic than that used for the TV version, and the Daleks’ death cries.

  But the threat of destruction by the Daleks was only delayed. One or two of them had been exterminated, but the party knew that others would soon follow. Quickly they unwound the cable on the roof. When Ian wrenched the end of the cable from the junction box, there was a flash and an explosion.
  

  The soundtrack cuts in, having jumped 0’13”, and two stock explosions are heard - there are none in the episode-as-broadcast.
  
  

• 0’14” is cut, removing Vicki stepping near to the edge of the roof (and Dudley Simpson’s music cue).
  
  
• 0’02” is trimmed before Ian suggests lowering Vicki to the ground instead.
  
  
• 0’20” is cut from the lowering sequence, jumping to Steven noticing the fire and running off to fetch Hi-Fi. The soundtrack then fades slowly into the Mechanoid/Dalek battle (jumping 0’39”), and over this entire sequence atmospheric wind and a rather absurd fire bell is added.
  
  
• 0’14” is cut from the Mechanoid/Dalek battle, and the earlier Dalek line, ‘You will be annihilated’, is played twice over top of the explosions (and the accompanying exterminating blast three times). Almost the whole sequence is narrated over.

  So as the Doctor and his friends made their descent to the jungle below, the fire in the city gained in strength. Started by the explosion from the Doctor’s anti-Dalek device, it had been fed by the flames from the large junction box on the roof. The city was a blazing inferno, and through it all raged the great battle between the Daleks and the Mechanoids. Both sides had advanced electronic weapons. The Mechanoids were programmed to destroy at once anything that showed violence towards themselves. But the Daleks had the advantage of great cunning and their deadly radiation guns. The two sides hurled themselves into the battle for possession of the flaming city. It looked as if each side must surely destroy the other. Still more Daleks swarmed upon the scene, bent on the total annihilation of their enemies. (pause) When Vicki came to, she found herself at the base of the stilts of the city. With the noise of the battle still raging far above her, Barbara was bending over her in concern.
  
  
  

• This scene on the ground has a continuous banging drum sound added to it, in an attempt to drown out Dudley Simpson’s music.
  
  
• 0’04” is cut after Vicki asks what happened to Steven.
  
  
• 0’01” is cut before the explosion, which is another more powerful stock alternative.

  It was a terrifying spectacle. The Mechanoid city was collapsing on top of it’s foundations right above the party. So they raced into the jungle again, desperately fleeing the chaos that was falling all around them as they hurried by. On and on they pressed, until at last they came to the TARDIS, and alongside it the spacecraft the Daleks had left when persuing them. A new terrifying thought struck them: would there be any Dalek creatures left behind to guard the craft? Had they escaped from the dangers of the Mechanoid city only to find new ones just as freedom was within their grasp? But when they looked inside the Dalek craft, they found to their great relief - nothing.
  

  The soundtrack jumps 0’52” to the TARDIS crew laughing in relief.
  
  

• 0’05” cut before Vicki offers to show the Doctor around the craft (removing the Doctor remembering that she had already been inside, which has not happened in this episode).
  
  
• The final episode of this story had quite a surprise for regular viewers, with Ian and Barbara leaving the TARDIS. For the EP, of course, this was old news, and the final five minutes have been trimmed and altered considerably.

The Doctor: ‘My dear, I’d be delighted!’
(0’04” cut)
Barbara: ‘Ian? Do you realise... we could get home?’
Ian: ‘Home... yes... d’you want to?’
Barbara: ‘Yes. I never realised it before.
(0’03” cut)
Ian: ‘We may never get another chance...’
Barbara: ‘Do you think we could work it?’
Ian: ‘Would the Doctor take us?’
Barbara: ‘Let’s ask him!’
(0’05” cut)
Steven: ‘Doctor?’ (in the EP the listener assumption is that this is Ian’s voice).
(0’09” cut)
The Doctor: ‘I’ve never heard such nonsense in my life! You’ll end up as a couple of burnt cinders, flying around in..’
(0’01” cut, removing Hartnell’s fluff, ‘..in Spain, dda..’)
The Doctor: ‘.. in space!’

• 0’02” is cut as the Doctor exclaims ‘How dare you!’ only once.
  
  
• 0’06” of silence is cut before Vicki speaks to the Doctor.
  
  
• 0’11” cut before the Doctor speaks to Ian and Barbara.
  
  
• 0’09” cut as the Doctor tells them to follow his instructions implicitly.
  
  
• After the Doctor’s ‘Follow me, come along’, we cut to an electronic wibble effect (not present in the broadcast episode). This continues to play beneath the narration:

  And so after Dr Who had instructed them in the workings of the Dalek spacecraft, and stressed the importance of destroying it when they landed, Ian and Barbara left the planet and their friends, and set a course that took them back through space and time to the sights and sounds they had so sadly missed.
  

  There is then a jump of 1’04” to Ian exclaiming ‘Barbara! We made it!’, and then a further edit of 0’32” to Barbara and Ian bidding farewell to the Doctor. Over this scene the sound of Big Ben’s chimes have been added.
  
  

• After this scene ends, we cut back to 0’12” of the wibble effect, and then jump 1’03” to

Vicki: ‘Doctor - they made it!’
(0’10” cut)
The Doctor: ‘I shall miss them.’
(0’11” cut)
The Doctor: ‘Come along my dear, it’s time we were off..’
(0’07” cut)
The TARDIS takes off.

Yes Doctor, goodbye and good luck to you wherever you are travelling in space and time. For the moment you have escaped from the Daleks, but remember there are countless more on the planet Skaro you may yet have to reckon with.


• The record ends on a 0’15” reprise of the Eric Winstone theme, which fades slowly to silence, cutting 1’17” from the end of the TV episode (including titles).