The Tertiary Console Room: Review - Dalek Empire: Chapter One

"All humanoid life forms beware - the Invasion Of The Daleks has begun!"

Invasion Of The Daleks begins as it means to go on - with a explosion of action as the Dalek’s invasion of the system is reported back to the Earth Alliance as death incarnate arrives in the form of the Daleks with chilling results. Then on Vega 6 Susan Mendes and Alby Brook’s picnic together is stopped by a falling spacecraft, crashing into the surface of the planet. As the Daleks advance increases, things will never be the same again ...

This, the first in the Dalek Empire series, works very effectively on several levels. First and foremost it serves as an entertaining piece of drama in it’s own right, yet it sets things up for the following three sections of the series well, posing many questions yet revealing few answers.

This whole series is the brainchild of Nicholas Briggs with him writing, directing, composing the musical score and creating the sound design for all four stories. And as Briggs has worked extensively on Big Finish’s three released Doctor Who Dalek stories, he is in a great position to ensure the success of the Dalek Empire series, and if it continues in the same vein as Invasion Of The Daleks, that success should be assured.

The structure of the audio is quite different to the norm of Big Finish’s Doctor Who with the story being one feature length piece of drama, and while this makes it a different experience from the typical releases, it’s a very satisfying one. By adopting the feature length form, Nicholas Brigg’s script flows freely and at a length of just over seventy minutes there is no time for padding. It moves at pace with each scene developing the story strongly towards this part’s conclusion which leaves the listening wanting to know what happens next very much. To facilitate the tightness of the script, Briggs deploys the tactic of utilising Joyce Gibbs as an unnamed narrator who conveys the events in a few lines of dialogue of what would have taken considerably longer to show through actual scenes. While this might occasionally disappoint some who want to hear the thousands of Daleks who sweep across the surfaces of the planets, destroying all who oppose them, it does ensure that the focus of the story is very much on the characters that Briggs introduces and the Daleks themselves.

The cast is prominently made up of people who have featured previously in other Big Finish productions, yet they make the move from supporting actors and actresses to main players easily through some excellent performances which bring Briggs’ script to life vividly.

Sarah Mowat is very much the star of Invasion Of The Daleks. Having previously appeared in multiple roles in the very first Doctor Who release The Sirens Of Time, her performance here builds gradually throughout the story and she demonstrates a great deal of inner strength in Susan Mendes’ confronations with her captors the Daleks. The power of her performance makes it hard not to emphasise with her.

Mark McDonnell’s Alby Brooks remains very much an enigma throughout Invasion Of The Daleks. On his first appearance he seems very much to be an ordinary man, but it soon becomes apparent that he knows more about the Dalek threat than most and his exterior conceals hidden depths. McDonnell has a wonderful sense of comic timing. When his ship comes under fire from the Dalek attack force, his immediate reaction is that they’ve spilt his coffee and provides quite a bizarre moment considering what has just transpired.

Gareth Thomas is the other main performer here, and as the most recognisable of the actors involved in this story it is somewhat surprising that his role as the mysterious Kalendorf is kept to a minimum. Whilst he is important to the story, he is kept in the background and Thomas’ understated performance helps to put Mowat and McDonnell into the spotlight as the leading pair. On the basis of this story Kalendorf seems a very different character from Lord Tamworth of Storm Warning which Thomas also played, and at times a little reminiscent of a more cynical version of his most famous role as Roj Blake.

The rest of the cast’s performances are good as well, although the main players tend to overshadow them. John Wadmore’s Pellan is an agreeable enough character, but he doesn’t really make a significant enough impression in this first instalment to be memorable. Ian Brooker does an admirable job in multiple roles and Joyce Gibbs brings a quiet dignity to the role of the narrator.

Alistair Lock and Nicholas Briggs have honed their performances as Skaro’s finest over the last three Dalek stories that have featured so far in the regular Doctor Who audio series, and as a result the Daleks of this story sound effortlessly perfect in capturing the menace of the species.

While the effects used for the Daleks themselves are excellent, Nicholas Briggs uses his role as sound designer and music composer to bring back familiar sound effects and music from the previous Dalek stories which add greatly to the sense of awareness that these Daleks are the same ones whom the Doctor defeated. By doing this Briggs really shows how important this consistency is to the effectiveness of the Daleks as their vast empire is essentially the same all over and it gives them a greater presence in the story itself.

Possibly the only real complaint that can be raised effectively against Invasion Of The Daleks is in the manner which it ends, which is very much a case of fading away, rather than providing definite closure. While it sets up the direction that The Human Factor will take well, it doesn’t really provide a satisfactory ending for this particular part of the Dalek Empire series. But on the other hand, it does mean that it puts the listener in a position where they want to hear more.

Invasion Of The Daleks begins the Dalek Empire series in style, and if the rest of the quartet of stories can build upon what has been started here it will prove to be a highly enjoyable, thought provoking drama series.

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