Wow. I don't even know where to start with this one.
At the end of Episode 2, the Doctor gets a call from Winston Churchill, who asks them to come to London.
The Doctor and Amy arrive in the middle of the London Blitz (a month after Churchill calls, surprise, surprise). It turns out that England has a secret weapon against the Nazis, and that secret weapon is DALEKS! Not only are they Daleks, they're painted in Army colors.
Well, it turns out that a scientist invented them and calls the "Ironsides". He has the schematics to prove it. Of course, the Doctor knows better, and he keeps asking the Daleks why they are there, and they just reply with, "I am your soldier!" Finally, the Doctor throws a temper tantrum and proceeds to kick and hit one of the Daleks (with a wrench) while shrieking, "I'm the Doctor! You're the Daleks! You're my worst enemies!" Wow. Of course, all he really needed to do was take the top off and show them the FREAKING DALEK LIVING INSIDE!!
The Daleks proclaim that the Doctor's testimony was accepted. It turns out that was exactly what they needed to hear. Yup, that's right. They came to Earth, built a robot scientist, and pretended to be "Ironsides" for the sole purpose of the Doctor finding them and saying that they're Daleks. It turns out that they're trying to reproduce, and the Progenator that pops out new Daleks didn't recognize them as Daleks because they were made from Davros' cells (thus, not "pure" Daleks).
With the Doctor's testimony, the Daleks are recognized for what they are, and the machine spits out new, pure Daleks - lovely, M&M-colored behemoths. They threaten to expose London during the Blitz using a huge beam of light, the robot scientist (at brilliant Amy's suggestion) makes the fighter jets space-worthy, they destroy the beam on the space ship, and London is saved.
The first time I watched this episode, I actually turned it off before the end. When the M&M Daleks rolled out of the Progenator, I'd had just about all I could take. I rewatched this the other day, and surprisingly, I didn't hate it as much. Of course, I still have some major issues.
Things that I thought were stupid:
1) The entire plot of why the Daleks put this immensely complicated plan into action. Really? All this to have the Doctor recognize them?
2) Again, if the Doctor wanted to expose them as aliens, why didn't he literally expose them? We know it's easy to take the top off a Dalek (and hide inside, and control it, a la Ian Chesteron in the First Doctor story The Daleks). Wouldn't that have been simpler?
3) As I mentioned before, I just started watching the Second Doctor episodes. We happened to watch The Power of the Daleks the other night (which is the first story of the Second Doctor. I should explain that in classic Who, each story was made up of five or six half-hour-long episodes). Well, in Episode 2, the Daleks say, "I am your serrrrrvant!" Sound familiar?
4) According to Wikipedia, there's almost the same exact plot in the classic Who episode The Evil of Daleks. Here is an excerpt: 'In Evil of the Daleks the Daleks lead the Doctor to believe that they are interested in humanising themselves when what they really want is for the Doctor to isolate "the Dalek Factor." Here, they bait the Doctor into thinking they have a sinister plan for Earth when the real plan is to restore the Daleks to what they call their "pure form".'
5) Fighter jets in space. Really? Fighter jets in space?
6) From the beginning of the episode, a pretty girl in the war room is upset because her boyfriend is fighting in the war. At the end, we find out that he was killed. WHAT was the point of this entire B-storyline? Amy looks at her strangely, but that's all there is. I don't understand why it was necessary.
7) The robot scientist kept the bomb built into him from going off simply by feeling human.
8) Amy's brilliant plan to make the fighter jets space-worthy. This is a pet peeve of mine, the girl who knows nothing about the subject making a suggestion, everyone agrees that yes, this is the perfect plan, and she ends up saving the day. Elizabeth Swann did that all the time in Pirates of the Caribbean, and it drove me nuts.
Things I liked:
1) Winston Churchill. Of course, I stood on stage next to him at ChicagoTARDIS when I won my award, and he seemed pretty cool.
2) The Army-colored Daleks. They were awesome.
3) When the new Daleks were created by the Progenator, they destroy the Army Daleks because they are inferior, due to the fact that they're not "pure" Daleks. Seeing as this episode takes place during World War II, there is a very eerie parallel here between the Daleks and the Third Reich (and Harry Potter).
And now for a palette-cleanser: Ian Chesterton hides inside a Dalek. Notice how Ian positions the plunger so it's on his neck, and then when they open the Dalek, see if you can spot the operator hiding inside!
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