Emissary of the Daleks

Main Range #254

Released: 14 August 2019

Listened: 5/14/20

It’s been a while since we’ve had a Dalek story for the Sixth Doctor, and this one is...kind of standard, really. It’s by Andrew Smith, who’s usually pretty good at getting inside the psyche of the villains, but he doesn’t really do that this time around. The major story point is the leader of a Dalek-occupied world, and how much she’ll acquiesce to the Daleks to protect her people, and the point where that becomes collaboration. Which is a decent story, but it’s been done in the Dalek Empire series with Susan Mendez, which doesn’t seem to be a factor in this story at all. There’s some interesting ideas and a bit of double-cross. A lot of minor characters get killed, making the whole story seem somewhat grim, but it is a Dalek story. Peri has a good amount of agency, and gets to do action things, but the resolution is somewhat predictable. A bit disappointing.